Archive for the ‘Sports’ Category
Catching Up With Lavell Edwards
Friday, August 7th, 2009From a mission to the mound
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009From The Daily of the University of Washington:
Adrian Gomez hadn’t pitched in two years.
From September 2006 to September 2008, he was on a church mission in Mexico, practicing his baseball every so often by throwing oranges or chucking rocks at dogs that chased him on the streets of Guadalajara.
And when it came time for the pitcher from Battleground, Wash., to return to the UW baseball team this season, head coach Ken Knutson had to introduce Gomez to the new members of the team.
“Kenny had been talking about me,” said Gomez. “He would tell stories about, ‘You guys are here throwing baseballs, he’s just out there throwing … rocks at dogs.’ That was the introduction.”
Perhaps re-introduction would be a better word.
Now a sophomore, Gomez came to the UW in 2006 and immediately made an impact on the mound as a freshman, but as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he left on the church mission he had been eyeing since he was 12 years old.
Now he’s back, trying to readjust and pitch at the level he was recruited for three years ago.
Knutson might have been apprehensive about allowing one of his new pitchers to go on a mission one year into a college baseball career, but both he and Gomez agreed that, as long as he returned to pitch for the Huskies, Knutson would be OK with it.
“I went into the interview with [Knutson], and the first thing I said was, ‘Look, I’m going to be leaving in a year, and for two years I’m going to be on a mission. What do you feel about that?’” Gomez said. “He didn’t say anything for, like, 10 minutes. I was just sitting there really quiet, and finally, he said that would be OK.”
So after his first year — during which he tossed 28 1/3 innings with a 4.45 ERA and led the Huskies to a 13-inning 5-4 victory over Washington State — he departed for Mexico.
But, being a Mormon missionary, Gomez had a lot of hardship ahead of him — hardship he said made him humble and made him work harder to achieve his goals.
Gomez had to learn Spanish essentially from scratch and woke up at 4 a.m., more than two hours earlier than the rest of his group in the heart of Guadalajara, to study the language.
“Some nights I would just come home crying because I couldn’t understand people, and they couldn’t understand me,” Gomez said. “But, little by little, I got better and better and eventually mastered the language to where I could joke with people and get along on a daily basis.”
That was just the language, only one aspect of his time in Mexico.
Gomez continued his study of the Book of Mormon and spent most of his days doing what missionaries do — helping those in need.
“I would … mow people’s lawns, sweep people’s front porches,” Gomez said. “I washed a lot of houses’ dishes and offer to come in and help them.”
His time in Mexico was exhausting; He started out in Guadalajara, went to Puerto Vallarta and then traveled throughout Mexico. Gomez didn’t skip a beat, doing his missionary work 12 hours a day, seven days a week.
“It was two years of absolute work,” Gomez said. “I lost a lot of weight. I got sick a lot. I walked probably 12 miles a day. And I came home with nothing.”
In fact, the day after he got back to Seattle, he walked to baseball practice with nothing but the shirt and tie that he had on from his mission. It was like a reverse culture shock.
For two long years, he hadn’t seen his teammates, hadn’t seen his coach, hadn’t seen the girl he dated before the mission — Corinne, now his wife.
“It was tough to adjust,” Gomez said. “They gave me new shoes, everything that I have on. It was amazing to be able to get all this stuff when I had nothing.” (cont.)
Braves icon Murphy visits old friends
Sunday, March 22nd, 2009From Braves.com:
Nearly 30 years after making a career-changing conversion, Dale Murphy returned to Braves camp and was reunited with the two men who gave him the opportunity to end his days in the infield and become a five-time Gold Glove-winning outfielder.
When Murphy arrived at Disney’s Wide World of Sports complex on Tuesday morning to begin a week-long stint as a special Spring Training instructor, he was greeted warmly by manager Bobby Cox and Bobby Dews, the two men who gave him a chance to display his athleticism in the outfield.
“I have to go in the clubhouse to look in the mirror to see if I’m 69 years old,” said Dews, who currently serves as a Major League consultant for the Braves. “But when I see Murph, I feel young. He makes everybody on the field feel good about themselves.”
Murphy wore his retired No. 3 Braves jersey on Tuesday and walked onto the field to interact with former teammate Glenn Hubbard and many of the current Atlanta players, some of whom were too young to remember when he won consecutive National League Most Valuable Player Awards in 1982 and ‘83.
“The jersey is a little tighter than it used to be, but it’s always great to get out here with the guys,” Murphy said. “All of my kids are done playing baseball. So I’d like to get down here as much as I can in the future.”
Times have certainly changed since Dews, who will turn 70 next week, and Murphy first met during Spring Training in 1975.
Dews was in the first year of his current tenure with the Braves and Murphy was less than a year removed from having been selected as the fifth overall selection in the 1974 First-Year Player Draft.
“He was just a skinny high school kid,” Dews said. “He had a bullet arm, really quick feet and good power. He was very coachable. The first time you saw him, you said, ‘This guy has a chance to be a champion.’ A champion to me is a champion off the field and on the field. He certainly qualifies for that.”
When Murphy struggled during his early years as a catcher, the Braves decided to keep his bat in the lineup by moving him to first base. But to best utilize his athletic skills, Cox, who was in the midst of his first tenure as Atlanta’s manager, decided to convert him into an outfielder during the 1980 season.
“I just thought with his speed, athleticism and arm, it would make sense to move him to the outfield,” Cox said. “Then — what do you know? — he won two MVPs.”
While combining for 44 homers during his first two full Major League seasons in 1978 and ‘79, Murphy proved that he could be a successful offensive threat. But he also combined for 35 errors as a first baseman and retired just six of the 38 opponents who attempted to steal a base against him while he was catching in ‘79.
“I knew it was do-or-die for me,” Murphy said of the conversion to the outfield. “I wouldn’t be here today if the two Bobbys hadn’t helped me become an outfielder. I was hitting good. But I didn’t really have a position.”
Murphy reported to camp in 1980 determined to make himself into a strong defensive outfielder. He spent countless early-morning hours with Dews, who was supplying a seemingly endless supply of fly balls via a fungo bat.
“Usually, when you’re hitting ground balls and fly balls to players, you say, ‘Let me know when you have enough,’” Dews said. “But I would say, ‘Hey Murph, let me know when I’ve had enough.’ He would just wear you out.”
Murphy’s determination proved fruitful in 1982, when he captured the first of five consecutive Gold Glove Awards. Now, nearly 30 years later, he still takes advantage of every opportunity to show his thanks to Cox and Dews, who served as his manager in 1975 at Class A Greenwood.
During that summer in Greenwood, S.C., Murphy got fined because he committed the charitable act of going to an apartment building in the middle of the night to pick up some teammates who had encountered some trouble.
Instead of explaining what had happened, Murphy simply accepted the punishment and didn’t tell Dews the truth until he returned from an All-Star Game and learned that, while he was gone, the team had held a party using some of the funds gathered from the fines.
“I think I’m the only manager who ever fined him,” Dews said with a smile. “I didn’t know he was the only reason all of those other guys even got home that night.”
While reminiscing about that summer in Greenville, Murphy remembers benching himself after he didn’t run hard to first base on an infield pop fly. Just a few days earlier, Dews had told the players that they wouldn’t play if they committed that act. But after seeing his star player voluntarily accept the punishment, Dews provided an immediate pardon.
“I was like, ‘I didn’t hustle, and I’m taking myself out of the game,’” Murphy said. “But then Dewsy was like, ‘No, wait, wait.’”
Murphy still laughs about that event and memories of the day when Dews’ anger created a painful self-inflicted injury.
“All I remember is that he got mad at an umpire, threw his hat down, went to kick the hat, came up about a foot short of his hat and broke his ankle,” Murphy said. “So the next day, he’s sitting there relaxed with his foot elevated in the dugout.”
Through these stories and their interaction, it doesn’t take long to recognize the bond shared between Murphy and Dews. Nor is hard to realize that the mutual respect that they’ve nurtured for more than 30 years extends beyond the events they’ve shared on a baseball field.
“When you look at him, you know he’s a winner,” Dews said. “Some of our players build our character, and that’s what I like to say about Dale — he built my character.”
Hard to gag BYU’s Tavernari and his game
Wednesday, March 18th, 2009From Rivals.com (Yahoo! Sports):
(Photo courtsey of The Conglomerate)
His days in the United States have been a precarious balance for BYU forward Jonathan Tavernari, a weighing of what he wants for himself as an athlete and as a human being, a search for self-awareness that always seems to have people questioning his motivations.
Why did he come to this country in the first place? How did he end up at BYU, where he has become the Cougars’ most talkative player and their most prolific 3-point shooter? What will he do after this, his junior season?
The questions never stop.
“There’s more to life than basketball,” he said Wednesday, one day before eighth-seeded BYU’s West Region first-round game against ninth-seeded Texas A&M at the Wachovia Center. “My progress as a person has been as great, if not better, than my progress as a basketball player.”
Tavernari emigrated from Sao Paulo, Brazil, to the United State in 2004, a Catholic kid so set on honing his basketball skills and getting an education at an American university that he was willing to change religions to do it.
His mother, Thelma, a renowned basketball player and coach in Brazil, asked one of her former players, Walter Roese, if Jonathan could stay with Roese’s family and attend high school in Provo, Utah. Roese, who was pursuing his MBA at BYU and was the director of operations for BYU’s men’s program at the time, agreed to take Jonathan in. Himself a Mormon, Roese baptized Tavernari into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
“The religions are not too different,” Tavernari said. “My parents always gave me a good religious base since I was a young kid. They were actually really happy for me. It wasn’t really much of a transition.”
After one year at Provo’s Timpview High, Tavernari moved in with a friend’s family in Las Vegas and transferred to Bishop Gorman, the high school with perhaps the highest basketball profile in Nevada. But Tavernari’s arrival ignited a blaze of controversy. Schools threatened to leave the Nevada Interscholastic Athletic Association if Tavernari was permitted to play because he wasn’t living with a legal guardian. After he was declared eligible, he averaged more than 25 points and 10 rebounds per game, the TV cameras, protests and police escorts at Gorman’s games barely bothering him.
“That was hard,” he deadpanned Wednesday, “because I’m kind of shy.”
Tavernari, who has made 82 3-pointers and is BYU’s third-leading scorer at 15.9 points per game, is so uninhibited that Cougars coach Dave Rose had to put a gag order on him in January after Tavernari reportedly suggested that BYU opponent Wake Forest didn’t play “a whole lot of defense.”
Yet for an institution stereotyped as conservative and homogenous, BYU has learned to live with different sorts of words from the mouths of its basketball players. Foreign-born players at the Division I level now number more than 400, the total tripling from 1993-2006, and BYU has been a trailblazing program. Twenty-eight international players have gone through BYU, and the school touts itself as being the first Division I team to have a foreign-born player on its roster – Finland’s Timo Lampen in the 1960-61 season. And when Roese joined Rose’s coaching staff in 2005 and spent two seasons on BYU’s bench, he became the first full-time native Brazilian assistant in Division I history.
“The U.S. still has the best players, no question about it,” Roese, now an assistant at Nebraska, said by phone this week. “But there are other countries picking up the love of the game, especially because of TV and the Internet. Now, they’re showing all the NCAA games. On Brazilian channels, you see NCAA games now.
“That creates a lot of expectations for these kids because they want to play the best basketball possible.”
That was what drew Tavernari to the United States initially, but here he is now: an international relations major who loves college life (even the more restrictive life on BYU’s campus), is engaged and on Thursday can help the Cougars win their first NCAA tournament game since 1993.
Tavernari was the only non-professional to earn a roster spot on the Brazilian national team last year, and his return to BYU for his senior season is questionable. He will have opportunities to play professionally, here or elsewhere.
“Since they have their own professional teams [in Europe and South America], it’s tough to get a kid who could get money and bring him to the U.S.,” Tavernari said. “I’m half-Italian and have my Italian passport, so the temptations and offers to play overseas come all the time. You get $600,000, $700,000 offers.
“I’m debating with my parents whether I should have done it or not, but at the end of the day, when I put my head on the pillow, there’s so much more than basketball: my education, my legacy.”
Those questions are for another time, though. Texas A&M beat BYU 67-62 in the first round in last season’s tournament, so this matchup is unique for this field of 65.
“It’s kind of a controversial thing that we’re matched up with them again,” Tavernari said. “But I think from all the 65 teams here, we’re probably the luckiest ones because we know who we’re going to face. We actually have a chance to know who we’re playing against.”
Then he headed off for practice. For once, come Thursday, basketball will be all there is for him.
Utah State’s Gary Wilkinson A Changed Man - On And Off The Basketball Court
Sunday, March 15th, 2009From UtahStateAggies.com:
LOGAN, Utah - It’s not uncommon for a teenage boy to feel lost at times, to wonder what life has to offer. In rare cases, one will even rebel and choose an alternate path; one that is not socially or morally acceptable. Such was the case with Gary Wilkinson. And for anyone who has had the privilege to meet the out-going redhead, you would never guess that not long ago Gary’s life was spiraling out of control.
Raised in Salt Lake City, Gary’s upbringing was no different than anyone else. His parents, Gary and Kristine Wilkinson, were even members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, though they rarely attended Sunday service. As a youth, Gary never did get baptized and even took measures to avoid any religious gatherings.
As Gary matured and advanced in high school, he never seemed to find his niche athletically or academically. He did try out for the basketball team his sophomore year, but was cut in large part to a bad attitude and lack of desire. The volatile combination finally seized control of his life midway through his senior year at Bingham High School, and Gary simply dropped out of school, three months before graduation.
“I had no desire to go to school,” admits Wilkinson. “I didn’t feel like the things I was learning had a lot of validity to what was required to be successful.”
So there he was, a high-school dropout with no desire and a bad attitude. Not necessarily the best of combinations to find success or make a name for yourself.
Then in November of 2000, one of Gary’s friends took his own life, and that tragic event forced Gary to re-evaluate the prior decisions he had made. Shortly there-after, Gary embarked on a new path in life that included joining the LDS Church and serving a two-year mission in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
“When the Church came into my life, it provided me with the structure to be successful,” Wilkinson stated. “The Lord had done so much for me. I knew I could never repay Him, but serving a mission seemed like a desirable thing to do.”
Once Gary returned from his mission, he decided he wanted to give basketball another try. So he called Norm Parrish, the head men’s basketball coach at Salt Lake Community College (SLCC), and secured a tryout with the team. Two days later he was offered a scholarship.
And when that scholarship from SLCC was offered, Gary took full advantage of it - both on and off the basketball court. In his two years at the junior college level, Gary thrived in his new surroundings earning junior college All-American honors twice as he averaged 14.6 points and 7.0 rebounds a game as a freshman, and 18.5 points and 8.1 rebounds as a sophomore. Gary also thrived in the classroom, earning a cumulative 3.96 grade-point average and was twice awarded Academic All-America honors.
With a successful stint both athletically and academically at Salt Lake Community College coming to an end, Gary set his sights on a four-year institution and transferred to Utah State University to continue his development as a student-athlete. And even though his demands were more at USU, Gary continued to excel. In his first year with the Aggies, he earned second-team all-Western Athletic Conference honors as he averaged 13.3 points and 7.0 rebounds per game in helping USU win its first-ever WAC regular season championship and finish the year with a 24-11 record. He also earned academic all-WAC honors majoring in sociology.
Entering his senior season, Gary’s list of honors and accomplishments continue to grow. Beginning the year, Gary was named the WAC’s Preseason Player of the Year. He was also named a preseason high-major All-American by CollegeHoops.net, and to the early season watch list for the Naismith Trophy, given annually to college basketball’s player of the year. Furthermore, Gary was also named a finalist for the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award, which is presented annually to one senior in the country who demonstrates outstanding character and competition, not only on the court and in the classroom, but in the community as well.
Now, with a college degree just months away and a potential professional basketball career on the horizon, Gary Wilkinson has truly come full circle from his days at Bingham High School. Days where his bad attitude and lack of desire kept closed the doors of athletics and academics, the two things that has helped him realize his dreams.
Florida Marlins' LDS closer Lindstrom is armed and dangerous
Thursday, February 19th, 2009From The Miami Herald:
The folks in tiny Rexburg, Idaho, witnessed their 100-mph legend firsthand, and they rejoiced when Matt Lindstrom got a chance to show the Major League Baseball world as the Florida Marlins’ closer.
REXBURG, Idaho — The fastest pitcher in the majors comes from one of the slowest towns in America. The schools close in October for the potato harvest, the nearest stand-alone tavern is 30 miles down the road and some locals prefer to leave their cars unlocked and the keys in the ignition.
It’s the place where Marlins reliever Matt Lindstrom grew up as a person and developed as a pitcher, from Little League through college. It’s a town where most everyone in the close-knit community of 17,000 — ”America’s Family Community,” the sign leading into town reads — have long known that Lindstrom could hum it like nobody else around, from Rexburg all the away to Yellowstone across the border in Wyoming.
They didn’t need some fancy radar gun to prove it. Word of mouth did the job. The stories about Lindstrom’s bazooka arm got around.
There was the kid he accidentally nailed in the face with a fastball and another he hit in the helmet with a poorly aimed pickoff throw. Both kids quit baseball, right then and there. And there were the scores of batters he left gawking at blurs that stung the catcher’s mitt — that is, if they didn’t stray wildly over their heads or behind their backs.
Problem was, Lindstrom threw plenty hard in his younger days, just not accurately.
”The way to win a Little League game,” said Ray Lindstrom, Matt’s father, “is to have a hard thrower like Matt hit the first kid, have him start bawling. And then the game’s over. None of the other kids wants to get close to the plate after that.”
Matt Lindstrom said he never tried to hit anyone on purpose. But the mere possibility struck fear in the hitters, who quaked and shivered in his presence.
Big-league hitters don’t frighten like that, but they respect the smoke. They see the three-digit readings — 100 mph — and the scoreboard bulbs seem just a little bit brighter.
”It’s like a carnival effect,” Marlins catcher John Baker said. ‘You look up on the scoreboard and you see 101, and you say, `I’m supposed to hit that thing?’ ”
Last season, nobody in the majors threw it harder than Lindstrom. Not on average.
According to the Bill James Handbook, Lindstrom’s average fastball of 96.9 mph topped the sport. Lindstrom also was one of only three pitchers to throw as many as 10 pitches measured at 100 mph or faster. The Dodgers’ Jonathan Broxton and Tigers’ Joel Zumaya were the others.
Lindstrom’s heat doesn’t surprise anyone in Rexburg.
What does is that, as erratic as he was, he made it to the majors in the first place, and that the Marlins have him primed to be their closer, their man in the ninth. It causes Ray Swanson, who coached Lindstrom in high school and college, to shake his head in mild disbelief.
”Sure, he threw plenty hard,” Swanson recalled. “In high school, he was throwing 90. Around here, we don’t see 90. Around here, people see 75 and they think it’s 90. But he couldn’t throw strikes. He’d win games 8-7 with 15 strikeouts and nine walks. If [hitters] went up there with a Wiffle bat and didn’t swing the thing, they could beat him.”
A MISCHIEF-MAKER
Back then, Lindstrom couldn’t envision where he is now, either. He dominated in Little League, but so do hundreds of kids. And he was busy enjoying life, on the field and off. In school, he was a bit of a mischief-maker. Once, he got in trouble for tying a hook to a string, hanging it from a classroom ceiling and howling with laughter when the dangling contraption caught the teacher’s wig and yanked it off.
When Ray Lindstrom found out, “I drove from Idaho Falls, went to the junior high, and kicked his butt down the hallway, I was so mad. I got calls from the teachers all the time because he was such a pain in the butt.”
Matt Lindstrom interrupts the stories as they’re being told in the family living room, gets up from his seat and walks over to a window, looking out on the back yard.
”See that blue spruce over there?” the younger Lindstrom said, pointing. “In the winter, just like it is now, I’d stand behind that tree, wait for the cars to come down the road, and hit ‘em with snowballs. Then I’d run into the house and wait for the coast to clear.”
Lindstrom’s shenanigans didn’t go over well in a family that adhered to its strict Mormon values. The Lindstroms, like so many families in Rexburg, are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
”I thought I was going to have to send him to a school for juvenile detention,” said the elder Lindstrom, who supported the family as a beef jerky and sunflower seed salesman.
Eventually, though, Lindstrom calmed down and remained out of trouble. He played all the major sports — football, basketball and baseball. And like most high school students in Rexburg, Lindstrom helped with the potato harvest, the most important time of year in southeastern Idaho. One year, he stacked the potatoes in neat piles. The next, he drove a spud truck back and forth from the fields.
It was hard, dirty work.
”All through high school, we would work on the potato farms all day, and at night, at 9:30, we’d come back down and have football practice,” he said. “That’s how a lot of us in high school made money to buy basketball shoes, or have extra spending money during the school year.”
Lindstrom helped to lead his high school team to a state basketball championship, but baseball always was his first love.
He walked on at the local junior college, which was then known as Ricks College. The most famous athlete to come out of Ricks was Rulon Gardner, who won gold at the 2000 Olympics in Greco-Roman wrestling, super-heavyweight class.
But Lindstrom didn’t receive a scholarship his freshman year because he wasn’t good enough.
”He got a uniform, and that’s pretty much it,” Swanson said. “ He was the 10th or 11th pitcher on an 11-man staff.”
Lindstrom was used for mop-up duty in more ways than one. He and his brother, Rob, remember the winter and early spring months when, using snow blowers and brooms, they would clear the diamond of snow in order to play. Sometimes they played while it was snowing.
”We had some guys who could flat out throw,” Swanson said. ‘Lindstrom was just `there,’ just a local kid.”
GROWTH IN SWEDEN
After his freshman year, Lindstrom, like most of the Mormon-based students at Ricks, left for his two-year mission. Lindstrom served his in Sweden, the country from which his great-grandparents had emigrated in the 1890s, eventually settling in Idaho, homesteading a piece of property and becoming farmers.
Baseball was the last thing on Lindstrom’s mind when he left for Scandinavia.
”I took two gloves and a ball over there, but I only used them twice,” Lindstrom said. “Once I played some catch on a soccer field. The other time I worked out with the Swedish baseball team. They were terrible. I was hitting balls over the fence. I was kind of putting on a show.”
After his two-year hitch was up, Lindstrom returned for his sophomore year at Ricks and tried out for baseball again. Swanson was flabbergasted when he learned the new coach had offered Lindstrom a scholarship.
‘I said, `Why in the world would you do that?’ ” Swanson said. “He said, `Well, he’s a local kid and he’s pretty good.’
‘I said, `He is not very good, and you just spent $1,000 of precious scholarship money on him.’ ”
Swanson said his biggest shock came next, when he quickly discovered that Lindstrom — who was now older (21) and larger (by 15 or 20 pounds) than before leaving on his mission — was vastly improved.
‘When I saw him throw, I’m like, `Holy Cow, this is unbelievable,’ ” Swanson said.
Ray Lindstrom believes the two-year break from baseball enabled the bone and muscle in his son’s arm to mature and strengthen. Swanson doesn’t disagree with that theory.
”It’s tough on hitters when you go a few years without picking up a bat,” Swanson said. “But for pitchers, it can actually be a bonus for them if they’ve been throwing all along. Their arms get a rest.”
Lindstrom didn’t just throw hard anymore. He began to confuse hitters, changing pitch speeds to keep them guessing. More importantly, he started throwing with accuracy.
”Everybody and their dog was in love with him,” Swanson said.
Scouts, radar guns in tow, started showing up to watch whenever and wherever Lindstrom pitched. Idaho. Utah. California. It didn’t matter. The New York Mets took him in the 10th round of the 2002 draft. (cont.)
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Steve Young Headlines the 2009 NCAA Silver Anniversary Class
Tuesday, February 17th, 2009From BYUCougars.com:
Steve Young receives the prestigious 2009 NCAA Silver Anniversary Award from BYU Director of Athletics Tom Holmoe at the 2009 NCAA Convention. NCAA Photo
Former BYU football All-American Steve Young headlined a group of six former NCAA student-athletes who received the prestigious 2009 NCAA Silver Anniversary Award at the NCAA Convention in January.
The honor recognizes former student-athletes who successfully completed collegiate careers in various sports and have excelled in their chosen professions. The Silver Anniversary Award acknowledges the former student-athletes on their 25th anniversary of completing their athletics eligibility.
The Silver Anniversary Award recipients are selected by the NCAA Honors Committee and were honored on January 15 at the NCAA Honors and Delegates Celebration in Washington, D.C.
Young set 13 NCAA records (four total offense and nine passing) and seven Western Athletic Conference marks during a prolific career as quarterback at BYU.
Other 2009 NCAA Silver Anniversary Award winners included:
> Darrell Green, Texas A&M (football & track)
> Deidre Collins-Parker, Hawaii (volleyball & basketball)
> Mark Fusco, Harvard (ice hockey)
> Earl Graves Jr., Yale (basketball)
> Kathy McMinn, Georgia (gymnastics)
Young, who is currently a NFL studio analyst for ESPN, was the 1983 Davey O’Brien Award winner and the 1982 WAC Offensive Player of the Year. As a senior he posted a completion rate of 71.3 percent (306 of 429 for 3,902 yards and 33 touchdowns) — the highest single-season percentage in NCAA history at the time.
The highest-rated quarterback in NFL history, Young was named MVP in the San Francisco 49ers’ Super Bowl XXIX victory in 1995. The two-time league MVP was selected as the 1992 NFL Player of the Year by Sports Illustrated and The Sporting News. During his career, appeared in seven consecutive Pro Bowls and won four straight NFL passing titles. He was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2005.
A 1984 NCAA postgraduate scholarship winner and NCAA Top Five honoree, Young graduated with a degree in international relations from Brigham Young and earned a law degree from the Brigham Young’s J. Rueben Clark Law School in 1994.
An active participant in numerous charities across the nation, Young serves as honorary chair of the Children’s Miracle Network in San Francisco and is a member of the Dream Team of Children’s Miracle Network and Parents of Children with Disabilities. He also is the founder of the Forever Young Charity Foundation.
Young is the fourth BYU Cougar to receive the prestigious NCAA Silver Anniversary Award, joining Larry EchoHawk (1995), Gifford Nielsen (2003) and Danny Ainge (2006).
Tigers shortstop Cale Iorg back on top after two-year absence
Thursday, February 12th, 2009From CutoffMan:
He might have been away from the game for two years, but Tigers shortstop Cale Iorg is playing like he hasn’t skipped a beat.
Iorg, who went on a Mormon mission to Portugal while attending the University of Alabama for two years, was recently selected to the Canadian provisional roster for the World Baseball Classic.
Tigers farm director Glenn Ezell tells MLB.com’s Jonathan Mayo that Iorg’s aggressiveness helped with his selection and recent success, but must be controlled at times.
Tigers.com, Feb. 6: “He’s a high-energy guy,” Tigers farm director Glenn Ezell said of the young shortstop, who is on the Canadian provisional roster for the World Baseball Classic. “Sometimes high-energy guys outrun their body. He had to be sure he was able to not back off but also control it. Sometimes that aggressiveness, that athletic ability — the RPMs are running real high and his drive tires are sitting on ice.”
Tigers catcher Max St. Pierre, who signed a Minor League deal with the Tigers before the 2008 season, will also join Iorg on the Canadian provisional roster.
When choosing where to play, Mormon recruits face unique issues
Saturday, January 31st, 2009From Sports Illustrated:
Five-star linebacker Manti Te’o has only considered programs that will permit him to go on a two-year Mormon mission after his freshman season. (Chris Livingston/Icon SMI)
Manti Te’o refrained from mincing words each time he met a college coach. Te’o, one of the nation’s highest ranked linebacker prospects, told every coach who recruited him that, after his freshman season, he might leave the country for two years.
“I basically told them, ‘This is me,’” said Te’o, from Laie, Hawaii. “I’m LDS. I’m thinking of serving a mission, and I want that to be available to me. If that’s not in the cards for your university, I have to respect that, but I have to consider others.”
Te’o is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints — more commonly referred to as the Mormon church. When male members of the church turn 19, they are encouraged to embark on a two-year mission to proselytize in parts of the world that may not have been exposed to the 189-year-old faith. Te’o would like to serve that mission, even if it means leaving college for two years. A pronouncement like Te’o’s might end most players’ recruitments, but Rivals.com ranks Te’o as the nation’s No. 12 overall prospect. Because Te’o has so much potential, almost every coach who recruited him consented to the mission.
The mission question is just one of a set of issues LDS players face when they look outside the small group of schools that are accustomed to signing Mormons. LDS players also must consider how their faith will mesh with the campus environment at either a secular school or one run by a different faith, and they must prepare for a backlash from some in the LDS community should they choose a school other than Brigham Young, the Provo, Utah, university run by the Mormon church. Te’o and Provo offensive lineman Xavier Su’a Filo (No. 63 by Rivals) each have faced these issues during the past few months, and each will weigh them carefully in the next few days as they decide which school they’ll sign with on Wednesday.
Te’o will sign either with a state university (UCLA), a secular private university (USC) or the nation’s most prominent Catholic university (Notre Dame). While starring at Punahou — President Barack Obama’s alma mater and SI’s No. 1 high school athletic program in 2008 — Te’o piqued dozens of schools’ interests. He had 29 scholarship offers before he stopped counting them. His sideline-to-sideline speed and penchant for gut-rattling hits brought recruiters in droves, and, somewhat to Te’o’s surprise, his request that he be allowed to go on a mission didn’t drive them all away.
Te’o worried especially about USC, which had a reputation for discouraging players from going on missions. He had good reason. DeAnn Longshore, whose son, Nate, just finished his career as a quarterback at Cal, said that when her son was being recruited for the class of 2004, USC coaches told Nate, an LDS member, that they would offer a scholarship only if he promised he wouldn’t leave for a mission. So, in a phone conversation about a year ago, Te’o asked Trojans coach Pete Carroll pointblank if his scholarship would be waiting for him when he returned from his mission. Te’o’s father, Brian, said Carroll explained how his opinion of mission trips has changed in recent years. Brian Te’o said Carroll answered all questions when he said, “Once a Trojan, always a Trojan.”
Su’a Filo, who narrowed his finalists last week to BYU, LSU, UCLA, USC and Utah, also met with less resistance than he anticipated when he brought up the mission. “The coaches have been really good at understanding,” he said. Two of Su’a Filo’s finalists, BYU and Utah, are accustomed to signing future missionaries. BYU encourages the mission trip for all its students, so the coaching staff is adept at juggling scholarships and the depth chart as players depart and return. Ditto for Utah, a state school only a few miles from LDS headquarters in Salt Lake City. Utes coach Kyle Whittingham is an LDS member and BYU alumnus so familiar with the Book of Mormon that he has a standby passage to fire up Utes fans (”And the Lord shall be red in his apparel”). “See,” Whittingham told Yahoo! Sports last month. “It was right there in the Doctrine and Covenants the whole time.” (cont.)
Australia's Torah Bright wins women's superpipe
Saturday, January 24th, 2009From The Los Angeles Times:
If the X Games’ women’s superpipe competition was a barometer for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, put Australia’s Torah Bright atop the podium.
And place a large order of painkillers for a powerful U.S. contingent, which has been favored to claim at least two medals at the Vancouver Games but took some lumps Friday.
Bright was brilliant and smooth in posting a winning run that included a backside 360, a switch-backside 720, a 540 McTwist, or back-flip, and a Cab 720. Her winning score: 91.33.
Among the top three U.S. riders, only Hannah Teter, the 2006 Olympic gold medalist, didn’t have a run end with a wicked spill. She ended up in third place with an 83.00. Hometown favorite Gretchen Bleiler, the 2006 Olympic silver medalist, endured a wipeout for the ages after clipping the lip while attempting a 900.
The defending event champion somersaulted backward down the wall of the 22-foot pipe, slammed her head into its icy bottom and lay motionless for several seconds.
She rose and smiled amid cheers beneath the bright lights of Buttermilk Mountain but could not make a third and final run. Her crash was shown repeatedly on the big screen, unnerving some of the greener competitors.
“We’ve all taken our share of beatings this week,” said Bright, who revealed she had suffered a shoulder injury during practice earlier in the day. “But that’s just because everybody wants to ride their best and to push the sport.”
Jeff Kent walks away after 17 seasons
Wednesday, January 21st, 2009From MLB.com:
LOS ANGELES — Jeff Kent, the premier slugging second baseman of his generation and arguably of all-time, will announce his retirement at a Dodger Stadium news conference Thursday.
The 40-year-old Kent will retire with a resume worthy of Hall of Fame consideration. The all-time leading home-run hitter at his position, he played the last four seasons of a 17-year MLB career with the Dodgers, hitting a combined .291 with 75 home runs.
He will retire with a .290 career batting average, 377 home runs, 1,518 RBIs and a .500 slugging percentage. His 351 home runs hit as a second baseman are 74 more than the next closest second baseman, Hall of Famer Ryne Sandberg.
The 2000 National League MVP, Kent was a five-time All-Star and four-time Silver Slugger. He drove in more than 100 runs eight times (a record at the position), scored at least 100 runs three times and had at least 20 home runs 12 times. In 2008, he passed Ralph Kiner, Gil Hodges and Carlton Fisk on the all-time home-run list and passed Billy Williams, Dave Parker and Mickey Mantle on the all-time RBIs list. He’s tied with Eddie Murray for 20th on the all-time doubles list with 560.
Last year, Kent became the first 40-year-old in Dodgers history to go into a season as a starting position player. After batting .253 during the first half of the season with little protection in the lineup, he enjoyed a resurgence when Manny Ramirez was added to the lineup. Kent caught fire to hit .353 in August, only to injure his knee Aug. 29 and undergo surgery Sept. 2.
While the Dodgers were overtaking the Diamondbacks to win the NL West, Kent rushed back in time to make the postseason roster and let it be known he felt ready to play. But he was relegated to a bench role during both playoff series and went 0-for-9 with four strikeouts. He finished the regular season hitting .280 with 12 homers and 59 RBIs in 121 games.
Following the 2008 season, Kent was eligible for free agency and Dodgers management, anticipating his retirement, moved Blake DeWitt to second base after re-signing Casey Blake. DeWitt had replaced Kent at the position after the surgery.
Kent’s best season with the Dodgers was 2005, when he hit 29 homers with 105 RBIs and 100 runs scored and made his only All-Star appearance for the club, the first Dodger to start an All-Star game at second base since Steve Sax in 1983.
The son of a policeman, Kent grew up in Southern California, was a walk-on shortstop at the University of California at Berkeley and began his professional career after being drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays in 1989.
He also played for the Mets, Indians, Giants and Astros, enjoying his greatest success when matched with antagonist Barry Bonds in the Giants’ lineup. With San Francisco in 2002, Kent made his only World Series appearance, hitting three home runs while the Giants lost to the Angels in seven games.
Early in his career, Kent developed a reputation for his work ethic and no-nonsense commitment to winning, although he received at least as much media attention for his intolerance of teammates who didn’t share his intense approach. He had run-ins with Bonds, as well as Dodgers teammate Milton Bradley.
In 2007, he aired his frustration to reporters after the Dodgers had fallen out of the division race and the resulting dust-up fueled stories about a clubhouse divide between old and young players that hastened the departure of manager Grady Little.
In recent years, Kent has been critical of players who used performance-enchancing drugs, while advocating more widespread testing to ensure a level playing field.
Kent, who makes his offseason home in Austin, Tex., is married with four children, the oldest age 12 and the youngest 5. He has increasingly expressed interest in spending more time at home with his family. He also runs Kent Powersports, owner of Yamaha of San Antonio.
HATCH HEADED TO HARVARD
Wednesday, January 21st, 2009From Realfootball365.com:
Call it a no-brainer.
It certainly didn’t take a Harvard education to determine that former LSU quarterback Andrew Hatch made a good move in announcing his decision to return to Harvard. Not only does a degree from Harvard usually carry more weight than one from LSU, but it was obvious that the NFL wasn’t in Hatch’s future plans.
In fact, Hatch’s playing days at LSU likely were numbered. He opened 2008 as the starting quarterback, but a concussion preceded a season-ending broken leg. That thrust redshirt freshman Jarrett Lee into a starting role, but an ankle injury forced him out as well.
True freshman Jordan Jefferson started the last two games and led LSU to a 38-3 upset of Georgia Tech in the Chick-fil-A Bowl. Jefferson is the odds-on favorite to become LSU’s third consecutive new starting quarterback to begin the season and the fourth in five years.
Hatch appeared in six games last season and completed 26 of 47 passes for 286 yards and two touchdowns. He also rushed for 129 yards and two touchdowns.
Hatch played on Harvard’s junior varsity as a freshman before going on a Mormon mission to Chile and then eventually transferring to LSU.
Former BYU Cougar Vai Sikahema Sets the Record Straight
Tuesday, January 20th, 2009From KFYI.com (Phoenix):
Sikahema, joined JD Hayworth today to talk about the NFC Championship game, and to dispute the recent claim on who he is going to cheer for during the game!
Listen to the entire interview
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Phillies manager Manuel feels common bond with Eagles coach Reid
Thursday, January 15th, 2009From Philly.com:
ONE IS A Pentecostal from Virginia. The other is a Mormon from California. One speaks in a Southern drawl. One speaks in a low growl. One likes to tell the press stories. The other likes to tell the press - well, nothing.
On the surface, Phillies manager Charlie Manuel and Eagles coach Andy Reid do not have much in common, aside from their imposing physical presences. But in many ways, coaching a sports team in Philadelphia is like sitting in a foxhole, and the fire outside has a funny way of forging a brotherhood between those who are bunkered down within.
“I sat there [Sunday] and I watched every freaking play of the game,” Manuel said from his home in Winter Haven, Fla. “The commercials and everything.”
In one of the most unique 5-month stretches in the history of Philadelphia sports, an unlikely support network has developed between the city’s two longest-tenured coaches. It started back in October when Manuel’s Phillies were beginning their improbable championship run.
“We are all in the same city,” Reid said. “It’s all about Philadelphia.”
Several times throughout the playoffs, Reid would send a text message to Manuel with some encouraging words. Then, last month, as the Eagles made their unlikely run to the playoffs, Manuel began to return the favor. After each win, he’d shoot Reid a message. Nothing long. Just an encouraging word or two.
As of Monday, Manuel hadn’t yet offered congratulations on the Eagles’ win over the Giants. But he was preparing to.
“I send him one and they keep winning and it makes me feel good,” Manuel said.
Once you peel away the differences in their styles and realize the parallels between the two men, the relationship makes sense.
Both men are set in their ways, confident that their perspective is the correct one. Both refuse to publicly criticize their players. Yet both made the decision to bench a star player during the season. Reid’s benching of Donovan McNabb for the second half of the Nov. 23 game at Baltimore has been widely cited as the spark for the Eagles’ revival. (cont.)
