Boog Powell - April Vintage Athlete of the Month

This month I am introducing a new regular feature, the Sports Then and Now Vintage Athlete of the Month. The purpose of this monthly post will be to celebrate and re-visit the accomplishments of notable athletes from past generations. I will start this month by highlighting the career of one of my childhood favorites, Boog Powell. If you had a favorite athlete growing up that you would like to see featured as the Vintage Athlete of the Month, send me a nomination by e-mail.

Given the super-sizing of professional baseball players in recent years, a 6-4, 240 pound player may not seem all that special, but in the 1960s and 1970 when most players were shaped like string beans, Boog Powell was hard to miss. With tree trunks for arms that looked even larger when wearing the Orioles tight fitting gray uniform top, Boog Powell spent more than a decade launching mammoth home runs and playing first base for the Baltimore Orioles.

A fair-skinned giant with reddish hair, Powell looked like a farm boy from the Midwest, but actually was born in Lakeland, Florida and grew up in the Sunshine State. Though his given name was John Wesley Powell, he earned the nickname “Boog” as a kid due to his mischievous nature. He seemed to always be getting into something and became known as Booger, as in, “What’s that little Booger doing now?” The nickname was eventually shortened to Boog, probably around the time he got big enough to beat the snot out of anyone who would dare call him Booger.

Powell’s prowess on the baseball field was evident from an early age. In 1954 he was part of the Lakeland Little League squad that played in the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

Signed as a free agent by the Baltimore Orioles in 1959, Powell quickly made his way to the majors. He led the International League in home runs in 1961 and made his major league debut that September.

The next season he became the starting leftfielder for the Birds and was an important reason the Orioles were steadily moving from perennial doormat to contender in the American League. Powell blasted 25 home runs in 1963 and the following season hit 39 homers and led the American League with a .606 slugging percentage despite missing several weeks with a broken wrist.

In 1965 Powell moved to first base and for the next decade his soft hands helped make infielders Davey Johnson, Mark Belanger, Luis Aparicio, Bobby Grich and Brooks Robinson regular Gold Glove recipients. Despite the presence of so many Gold Glovers in the Orioles infield, and the fact that Powell posted a better fielding percentage than the league’s Gold Glove first baseman on several occasions, he never won a Gold Glove.

The 1966 season proved to be a breakout year for Powell and the Orioles. Baltimore won the American League Pennant for the first time and then defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers to claim the World Series title. Powell finished third in the voting for Most Valuable Player, behind teammates Frank Robinson and Brooks Robinson, after hitting 34 home runs and driving in 109 runs.

Injuries hampered Powell and the entire Orioles team the next two seasons, but they rebounded in 1969. Baltimore led the league with 109 victories and Powell finished second in the American League MVP voting after hitting .304 with 37 home runs and 121 RBIs. Baltimore lost the World Series in five games to the New York Mets.

The following season, Powell finally earned the AL MVP Award with another productive season. The Orioles also won the World Series in five games over the Cincinnati Reds. The lasting memory of the 1970 World Series is the stellar play of third baseman Brooks Robinson, but Powell also had a pretty good series hitting .294 with two home runs and driving in five runs.

Baltimore returned to the World Series in 1971, losing to the Pittsburgh Pirates in seven games, but Powell struggled with injuries during the season and his productivity started to decrease. He followed up seasons of 22 and 21 home runs in 1971 and 1972 respectively by hitting a combined total of only 23 home runs during the 1973 and 1974 seasons. The Birds won division crowns in both 1973 and 1974, but Powell was no longer an everyday starter.

The Orioles parted ways with their popular first baseman following the 1974 season as he was traded to Cleveland for journeyman catcher Dave Duncan. The move reinvigorated Powell as he was reunited with his former teammate Frank Robinson, who was the player-manager for the Indians. Returning to the everyday lineup for the first time in three years, Powell responded with his best season since winning the MVP Award. He hit .297 with 27 home runs and 86 runs batted in while finishing third in the league in slugging percentage.

That proved to be Powell’s final productive season as he hit only nine home runs during the 1976 season before being released by the Indians during the 1977 spring training. He latched on with the Los Angeles Dodgers for much of the 1977 season, but with no designated hitter in the National League and Steve Garvey firmly planted at first base, Powell was relegated to a role as a left-handed pinch hitter. He struggled in this new position and was released late in the season.

While Powell’s play on the field was outstanding, the key to his great popularity was his status as a “gentle giant” of the game. Known for his sense of humor and fan-friendly attitude, Powell was a beloved figure in Baltimore and across baseball. That larger-than-life personality made Powell a popular figure in a number of Miller Lite television commercials following his retirement. When the Orioles opened their new Orioles Park at Camden Yard in 1992, it made perfect sense that Powell would play an important role in setting the atmosphere of baseball’s best park. A trip to the stadium isn’t complete without a visit to “Boog’s Barbeque.”

Though his career numbers (339 home runs, 1187 RBIs, .266 batting average) aren’t worthy of consideration for the Baseball Hall of Fame, the accomplishments and personality of Boog Powell should never be forgotten. For that reason, I am proud to name him the first Sports Then and Now Vintage Athlete of the Month.

Final Four is Full of Nostalgia

Just when it looked like all the nostalgia talk at the 2009 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Final Four was going to be about 1985, the Michigan State Spartans threw a wrench in the plan and ensured that the 30th anniversary of their first championship would be properly remembered.

By trouncing top seeded Louisville 64-52, the Spartans denied the Big East’s bid at taking three teams to the Final Four for the first time since 1985. With the Final Four being played in Detroit, Michigan State is looking to be the first team since UCLA in 1975 to win the national championship in their home state*.

Of course, the return of Villanova to the Final Four for the first time since winning the title in 1985 ensures that there will still be lots of talk about that unbelievable upset.

While I personally believe that North Carolina State upsetting Houston in the 1983 finals was a little more improbable, it is hard to dispute that Rollie Massimino and his 1985 Wildcats played one of the best games in tournament history to defeat defending champion Georgetown.

Having twice faced the Hoyas during the regular season and lost close games both times (52-50 in overtime in Philadelphia and 57-50 in Washington), Villanova wasn’t intimidated by the defending NCAA Champions and their lineup of stars, which was led by senior All-American Patrick Ewing.

In the era before the shot clock and three-point line, the Wildcats knew that the key for them was to break the pressing defense of the Hoyas and then to make the most of every possession by waiting for the opportunity to take good shots.

What ensued was a 40-minute clinic in which Villanova executed that game plan to perfection.

Villanova connected on an amazing 72.2 percent (13 of 18) of their field goal attempts in the first half and led 29-28 at intermission. The hot shooting made for a great half of basketball, but surely they would cool off in the second half and Georgetown would pull away for the expected victory.

Not only did the Wildcats not cool off in the second half, they actually improved. Villanova connected on nine of 10 field goal attempts in the final 20 minutes to finish the game at 78.6 percent, easily the best showing ever for an NCAA final. And it wasn’t as if Georgetown was throwing up bricks. They hit on a very respectable 54.7 percent of their field goal attempts.

A 6-0 run late in the second half gave Georgetown a 54-53 lead with just under five minutes remaining. The Hoyas tried to run off some clock, but a steal by Dwayne McClain and a basket by Harold Jensen gave Villanova a lead and they would never again trail. The final score was Villanova 66, Georgetown 64.

The 1979 NCAA Championship victory for Michigan State was not quite as surprising, but it did prove to be just as memorable.

Unbeknownst to those watching the game that night, the meeting between the undefeated Indiana State Sycamores, led by senior Larry Bird, and the Michigan State Spartans, led by sophomore Magic Johnson, would serve as the trigger to a rivalry that would forever change professional basketball.

Still the most watched college basketball game ever, the 1979 Championship game wasn’t a barnburner with a final pivotal moment. In fact, Michigan State pretty much controlled the contest throughout and won 75-64.

However, in an era before ESPN and the over saturation of college basketball on television that exists today, the game served as a coming out party for two future legends. The game introduced the nation to a 6-8 point guard who had the charisma, smile and all-around basketball ability that would eventually captivate a nation. It also gave fans across the country a chance to see the grit and determination of a farm boy from French Lick, Indiana, who didn’t play his best game, but still did everything he could to keep his team in the game.

Of course the game was the final college game for both players and, as they say, “the rest is history.” Bird went on to lead the Boston Celtics to three NBA Championships, including a win over Magic Johnson and the Los Angeles Lakers in the 1984 Finals. Johnson would play in nine NBA Finals for the Los Angeles Lakers and the team won five championships. After losing the 1984 title to Boston, the Lakers edged Boston in both 1985 and 1987.

The game also helped usher in a golden era for the NCAA Basketball Division I Tournament. The 1979 tournament featured 40 teams, but over the next six years the field was twice expanded until it reached 64 teams in 1985. NBC paid only $5.2 million to broadcast the tournament in 1979, but by the time CBS snatched the rights away in 1982 it was $48 million. The current contract for rights to what is now known as “March Madness” is $6 billion over 11 years.

While both Villanova and Michigan State bring nostalgia to the 2009 NCAA Final Four, the championship pedigrees of the other two Final Four participants are also pretty impressive. Like Michigan State, which claimed the title in 2000, Connecticut (2004) and North Carolina (2005) are looking to join Florida as the only school to claim two titles this decade.

The Tar Heels are looking to join UCLA (11), Kentucky (7) and Indiana (5) as the only schools with at least five NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championships. If Connecticut can claim the championship, Jim Calhoun would become only the fifth coach in NCAA history (joining John Wooden, Adolph Rupp, Bobby Knight and Mike Kryzewski) to lead a team to at least three championships.



(*Note: The University of Kansas won the 1988 title at Kemper Arena, where they regularly played one home game a season, but the arena is located in Kansas City, Missouri, rather than in the state of Kansas)

“Much Traveled Lou” Embodied a By-Gone Era of Professional Football

The sports world lost a legendary character on Sunday with the death of former football player, coach and administrator Lou Saban.

Known as “Much Traveled Lou” for his penchant of hopping from job to job, Saban is best remembered for his 16 years as a head coach in the AFL and NFL.

Though it has been 33 years since he last coached in the NFL and he spent most of the last three decades floating from one small college coaching job to another, Lou Saban’s fiery personality will forever be immortalized in some of the most memorable moments in NFL Films history.

If you have ever watched any of the NFL Films where they show coaches on the sidelines or in the locker room, then you have probably seen Saban’s antics. His intensity and spontaneous comments reflect a truly by-gone era in professional football. While the NFL of today is part sport and part entertainment, Saban thrived during an era when both the players and coaches reflected the brutality and harshness of the game.

After hearing of his passing last night, I went back and re-watched some of the segments in which he and other coaches from the 1960s and 1970s display the emotion and passion of the times. Unlike modern coaches whose passion and intensity are perhaps slightly tempered by the safety nets of guaranteed contracts, you can see in their sideline antics how Saban and other coaches of his generation truly lived and died with every play.

In one set of clips from while he was coaching the Denver Broncos, Saban first yells, “My daughter could do better, my daughter could do better.” At another moment he brutally cries out to an assistant “They’re killing me Whitey.”

Perhaps Saban’s most famous NFL Films moment occurred before and after a 1974 battle between his Buffalo Bills and the defending Super Bowl Champion Miami Dolphins. In a rare glimpse into an NFL locker room, the piece starts with Saban telling his players not to be too proud to take in all the fluids they might need to make it through the South Florida heat. He then reflects to them the urgency and opportunity of the moment.

“If we die, we die together,” he bellowed in a gruff tone. “You can get it done, you can get it done. What’s more, you’ve got to get it done.”

Despite a dramatic late game rally led by rookie backup quarterback Gary Marangi, the Bills lost the game when Miami marched down the field to score a touchdown in the final minute.

After the game, Saban is shown not standing at a podium as is the custom today, but sitting in the locker room with reporters gathered around him. Even after a disappointing loss, he reflects the straightforward approach that was part of that era of NFL football.

“Boy oh boy, 56 seconds and we let them off the hook,” Saban said. “We’ve got to beat these people one of these days and we haven’t been able to do it. We’re coming after them again next week.”

After playing college football at Indiana University, Saban was twice a first team All-AAFC selection while playing for Hall of Fame coach Paul Brown and the Cleveland Browns from 1946-49.

In 1950 he started his coaching career as the head coach at Case Institute of Technology in Cleveland. He also coached at Northwestern and Western Illinois University before embarking on his professional coaching career.

Saban joined the fledgling American Football League as head coach of the Boston Patriots in 1960 and amassed a 7-12 record before leaving midway through the 1961 season. In 1962 he joined the Buffalo Bills and led the team to back-to-back AFL titles in 1964 and 1965. However, he left the franchise after a disagreement with owner Ralph Wilson and spent the 1966 season as the head football coach at the University of Maryland.

Resurfacing in Denver in 1967, Saban coached the Broncos for four and a half years, but never won more than five games in a season. Perhaps the most significant accomplishment of his tenure occurred in 1968 when Saban became the first modern AFL or NFL coach to start a black quarterback. Marlin Briscoe started five games for the Broncos with the team posting a 2-3 record.

Briscoe moved to Buffalo the next season and spent the rest of his career as a wide receiver, but Saban’s decision to give a black quarterback an opportunity to start put the wheels in motion for other coaches and black quarterbacks.

Saban returned to Buffalo in 1972, but the Bills he inherited were a far cry from the championship team he left nearly a decade earlier. He did manage to post three winning seasons and make one playoff appearance, but the team was never a championship contender.

His second tenure with the Bills is best recognized for serving as the launching pad for O.J. Simpson’s amazing five-year stretch as the best running back in football. After not rushing for more than 742 yards in any of his first three NFL seasons, Saban made Simpson the emphasis of the offense when he arrived in 1972. Simpson responded by leading the NFL in rushing in 1972 and the next season became the first running back (and only one in a 14 game season) to break the 2,000-yard mark. Overall, Simpson gained 7,699 yards between 1972-1976 and led the NFL in rushing four times.

After starting the 1976 season with a 2-3 record, Saban quit as coach of the Bills during the week of his 55th birthday and never again coached in the NFL.

Saban became the head football coach the University of Miami in 1977 and though the Hurricanes posted a 9-13 record during his tenure, he is credited with laying the foundation that led to Miami’s emergence as a national power in the 1980s.

He spent the 1979 season as the head football coach at Army and later made a brief foray outside of football serving two seasons as President of the New York Yankees, which happened to be owned by longtime friend George Steinbrenner. Steinbrenner had served as an assistant football coach for Saban at Northwestern. He also spent 19 days as the Athletic Director at the University of Cincinnati and reportedly quit during halftime of an early season football game against Ohio University.

Saban also spent two seasons as the head coach at the University of Central Florida from 1983-84. He helped set the wheels in motion for the Golden Knights to move from Division II to Division I, but again didn’t stick around long enough to reap the rewards of his labor.

Over the next two decades, Saban continued to wrack up lines on his resume with each position seemingly taking him further and further away from the limelight. He coached at the high school level in the late 1980s and except for a brief stint coaching in the Arena Football League spent the remainder of his career starting or building college programs at a number of small schools including Peru State, Canton Tech, Alfred State and Chowan.

The numerous obituaries about Saban that have emerged on the internet say that he had a short temper and that may partly account for why such a decorated professional coach completed his coaching career at such off-the-beaten-path locations.

Dick Finnegan, an Orlando area businessman and a friend of this blog, crossed paths with Saban when they both worked at the University of Miami in the late 1970s and he described Saban as being “gruff...thick-bodied, harsh tone. You got the impression he lived a full life and showed the fun side to close friends only.”

There is no doubt that Saban was a true sports character the likes of which we will probably never see again. However, while Saban may be gone, thanks to NFL Films, his intensity and passion will never be completely forgotten.

(Click Here to watch Saban and other NFL Coaches from the 1960s and 1970s in a classic NFL Films montage)

Perfection is Never Easy

When they led by 14 points early in the second half of the NCAA Finals, it looked like the University of Findlay would cruise to the 2009 NCAA Division II Men’s Basketball Championship and an undefeated season. However, in the end it took overtime and a three-point basket as time expired to help the Oilers complete the season with a perfect 36-0 record.

Regardless of the level of competition, completing a college basketball season undefeated is never an easy task and deserving of appreciation. Findlay became just the fourth team in Division II history, and first since Fort Hays State in 1996 to accomplish the feat.

They join the George Fox University women’s basketball team, which claimed the NCAA Division III Women’s Basketball Championship with a perfect 32-0 record, as undefeated NCAA basketball champions this season.

With four more victories, the University of Connecticut’s women’s basketball team could add their name to that list. The Huskies are aiming for the third undefeated season in their history and the fifth such season in NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball history.

For the 33rd straight season, there will not be an undefeated national champion at the NCAA Division I men’s level. No men’s Division I champion has finished undefeated since Bobby Knight led Indiana University to an undefeated campaign in 1976.

It has been 30 years since Larry Bird and the Indiana State Sycamores became the last Division I team to reach the NCAA Finals with an undefeated record. They were 33-0 before losing the national championship game to Magic Johnson and the Michigan State Spartans.

Since the NCAA Tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1985, the 1991 UNLV Runnin’ Rebels are the only team to reach the Final Four with an undefeated record. They lost in the national semifinals to eventual champion Duke.

A few teams, including Illinois in 2005 and Memphis in 2008, have flirted with entering the NCAA Tournament undefeated. However, eventually the grind of a long season, pressure of perfection and difficulty of maintaining such a high level of play for every single game have proven to be too much for even the best teams.

If a team is ever to again go undefeated in NCAA Division I men’s basketball, it will probably follow the pattern of Indiana State, UNLV and Memphis. All three of those teams, along with the University of Massachusetts, which started the 1995-96 season with 26 straight wins, hailed from a conference not considered among the “power” conferences of the NCAA.

While conferences like the ACC, Big East, Pac 10 and Big 12 annually boast at least two teams capable of winning the national title, top teams from other conferences can often run the table in their league and depending on their non-conference schedule could conceivably be undefeated come time for the NCAA Tournament. The question then becomes whether a team that hasn’t faced significant challenges on a regular basis will be able to withstand the rigors of the NCAA Tournament.

Memphis, which lost in the Sweet 16 in 2009 after coming within a last-second shot of winning the title a year earlier, has proven that a rigorous conference season is not necessarily mandatory. The Tigers have won 61 straight Conference USA games since last losing to a conference opponent in March 2006. However, I’m willing to bet that John Calipari and supporters of the Tigers would trade in a couple Conference USA wins if it helped them claim that elusive national title.

While no school would turn down an undefeated season and it would be fun to watch a team make that kind of magical run, the reality of college basketball is that unlike football’s Bowl Championship Series when an undefeated season is no guarantee of a title (just ask Utah) and one last second loss can end your chances at a championship (see Texas), in college basketball a teams final record isn’t going to have a real barring on who claims the national title.

Come the first week of April, the only record that matters is how your team performed in the climactic NCAA Tournament and to cut down the nets at the Final Four you don’t have to be perfect for four months, just for the final three weeks of the season.

NASCAR Remembers Its Roots

The National Association of Stock Car Racing (NASCAR) will return to its roots this weekend with the running of the Goody’s Fast Pain Relief 500 in Martinsville, Virginia.

The last original NASCAR sanctioned track still hosting a Cup Series event, the Martinsville Speedway is the shortest track on tour at .526 miles. The Bristol, Tennessee track, which hosted last week’s race, is the second shortest at .533.

Constructed more than a decade before the Daytona International Speedway, the Martinsville Speedway hosted its first NASCAR sanctioned race on July 4, 1948 and a year later was one of eight tracks to host a race in the initial year of what was then called the Strictly Stock Series and is now known as the Sprint Cup Series. After hosting one race in 1949, Martinsville has hosted two Sprint Cup races every year since 1950. Other than being paved in 1955, the track configuration has not changed from its original design. The track originally had seating for 750 spectators, but today has a capacity of 60,000.

While short tracks played an important role in laying the foundation for the success of NASCAR, as the national and international appeal of the sport has increased over the last two decades, a number of smaller tracks with longstanding traditions have been removed from the Sprint Cup schedule in favor of larger tracks in locations that expand the exposure of the sport to new audiences. Bristol, Martinsville and the Richmond International Speedway (.75 miles) are the only tracks remaining on the Sprint Cup schedule with a lap distance under a mile.

Richmond hosted its first race in 1953 and has held two NASCAR Sprint Cup events every year since 1959. Originally a half mile track, it expanded to .75 miles in 1988 and has a spectator capacity of just over 112,000.

The Bristol Motor Speedway was completed in 1961 and has hosted two NASCAR Sprint Cup races every year since. The Speedway began with 18,000 seats for its initial race on July 30, 1961 and has undergone a number of grandstand renovations to increase capacity to its current level of 160,000.

Though NASCAR made its initial foray into the Mid-West and West Coast markets in the 1950s, it took the sport decades to finally gain a solid foothold outside the traditional Southern hotbed. Since 1988, NASCAR has brought the NASCAR experience to strategic locations across the country including Chicago, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Phoenix, Sonoma, Fort Worth and Las Vegas.

The price for this nationalization of the sport was the reduction of NASCAR races at traditional home tracks, primarily in the South. While Bristol, Martinsville and Richmond have managed to survive, other places such as Rockingham, North Wilkesboro and Nashville did not.

However, there has been talk that Martinsville could be the next casualty of the nationalization of NASCAR. Because the region around Martinsville has never had a booming economy, even in good economic times the track has struggled to sell out despite having one of the lowest spectator capacities on the circuit.

While the global economic crisis might at first blush seem to increase the pressure on NASCAR to move at least one of the Martinsville races, I contend that the opposite is true.

Though the overall fan base has grown over the last decade, the greatest concentration of loyal die-hard fans remains in the South and specifically in rural areas of Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee. Many of these fans have been life-long NASCAR lovers and cherish the history and tradition of the sport.

As the last original NASCAR track, Martinsville represents an important connection to the past and at the same time can also be a key part of the future for the sport. NASCAR generally has done a very good job walking the tight rope of embracing the past while also looking toward the future. At a time when they are needed most, many loyal fans could become disenchanted with NASCAR if it eliminates the annual trips to Martinsville.

Rather than consider dropping Martinsville from the schedule, I hope NASCAR will instead recognize the value of its oldest track and ensure that the Martinsville Speedway remains an important part of the annual circuit for decades to come.