From the time he started playing baseball, Yogi Berra has met every sitting President.  It was an honor, it was a goal; each occasion brought joy to Yogi.
   
BUT, Yogi has not met Obama.  He wanted to, hoped to, but conflicting schedules prevented the meeting.  In the absence of a face-to-face, Yogi still has a valued possession he wants to give to our president – a signed picture showing Jackie Robinson sliding into home plate as Yogi is making the tag.

So what do you do when you’re trying to get a special gift to the biggest celebrity in the world and you can’t be there yourself? You call the Celebrity Magnet – Tom Murro.  That makes sense, doesn’t it? If your house is populated by ghosts, who you going to call? Why Ghostbusters, of course! Same thing if you need to get next to a celebrity, you enlist the services of a celebrity-getter-next-toer, this Magnet guy, a professional celebrity sider-upper. 

This guy has his own Celebrity Magnet blog, parlayed the blog into a column in International Watch Magazine, a monthly publication about wristwatches, which, by the way allows The Magnet, as if he needed it, even MORE access to celebrities.  Even more access because, more than anything on earth, celebrities love to talk about wristwatches.

 Do you doubt me? Tom Murro stands outside a Broadway Theater where Daniel Craig stars in A Steady Rain and then meets Daniel Craig (don’t ask me if it happened to be raining when Murro was waiting outside the theater) and immediately they start gabbing about wristwatches.  Murro, the Magnet, was a former banker who knows his watches and hear this, Craig holds up his arm and offers Murro his Rolex. 

Mr. Celebrity Magnet refuses to accept, of course, because if he took everyone’s watch who falls into his magnetic spell well… it would be like abusing his super powers.  It would be like if Clark Kent entered a skydiving contest or someone bet their house against Peter Parker in rock climbing;  like getting duped into playing a game of hide-and-seek with the Invisible Man.

    Being a “celebrity magnet” has responsibilities. Yes, your gravitational pull draws in stars like elf bell shoes to the North Pole.  You can’t interview or hob-nob with every celebrity sucked into your vortex, therefore you must have a strategy.  Tom Murro culls and picks. When he bumps into or places himself in a spot near an unsuspecting superstar, he sets the stage for the “chance” meet-up. Anyway, the question remains, can he make it through secret service and deliver Yogi’s gift to Obama?

    You might be asking how did Tom Murro become the Magnet? What cosmic alignment spawned this creature? What Kismetic event bestowed celebrity drawing super powers onto this mild mannered banker?  It all started one year ago this week when Murro and his daughter were on the same Martha’s Vinyard golf course when Obama was on vacation.  Murro decided to approach the president to see if his daughter could get a picture with him. To Murro’s luck, Spike Lee was in the president’s foursome, knew and vouched for Tom so he was let through.  Kismet.  Shockingly long odds Kismet.   


    Yogi’s picture, the one from the 1955 World Series showing Yogi at home plate preparing to tag out Jackie Robinson, has the inscription “Dear Mr. President, he was out” signed by Yogi Berra. Yogi, 85, has been recovering in a hospital and unable to walk since taking a fall in July.  He was not able to attend Hall of Fame ceremonies this year at Cooperstown, an event he never misses.

    Will the picture make it into the president’s hands?  Can the Magnet pull off another miracle? We’re writing this prior to an answer. Tom Murro assured us he would give it an all-out try.  Can he do it? We think “Yes, he can!”