Since its first airing in 1982, CBS has become synonymous with the Big Dance

When watching sports at home in western Massachusetts, Neal Pilson will occasionally find himself reaching for the phone until his wife of almost 60 years, Frieda, stops him. “You have no one to call,” she says. For Pilson, who ran CBS Sports in various capacities from 1981-94, the habits of a former network sports president are hard to break. If there is no longer an executive producer for him to ring with instructions, then at the very least Pilson can revel in his lifelong ability to see plays develop on the screen and know what happened before being told. “I have the skill of watching the whole field,” he said.