Inductees
Members
of the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame
2007
Brian Boitano, Bert Bonanno, Kim Oden, Carlos “Bud” & Ralph Ogden, Mark Spitz
2006
Jennifer Azzi, Bill McPherson, Walt McPherson
2005
Brent Jones, Barbara & Kathy Jordan, Benny
Pierce, Ken Venturi
2004
John Brodie, Amy
Chow, Kurt Rambis, Pat Tillman
2003
Anne Warner Cribbs, Becky Dyroen-Lancer, Andre Phillips, Billy Wilson
2002
Dennis Awtrey, Ed Burke, Betty Hicks, Carney Lansford, Craig Morton
2001
Ernie Nevers, Joe Leonard, John Ralston, Dave Righetti, Carroll Williams
2000
Donald Bowden, Jack & John Elway, Francie Larrieu Smith, Chuck Taylor
1999
Millard Hampton, Claudia Kolb Thomas, Pat Malley, Patty Sheehan
1998
Hal Davis, Pablo Morales, Buck Shaw, Debi Thomas, Bill Walsh
1997
Payton Jordan, Angelo “Hank” Luisetti, Bob Mathias, Al Ruffo, Tommie
Smith,
Chris von Saltza Olmstead
1996
Peggy Fleming Jenkins, John Hanna, Julius Menendez, Yosh Uchida
1995
Donna de Varona, Lee Evans, George Haines, Jim Plunkett, Charlie & Lucy
Wedemeyer, Bud Winter
– Figure Skating Olympian –
Ice skating first captured Brian Boitano’s attention when he attended an “Ice Follies” show with his parents. The Mountain View native soon fell in low with the sport and, at the age of nine, began training with Linda Leaver, who would become his life long coach. His technical talent, exceptional athleticism, and dedication to task, produced rapid results: by age 12, Boitano won 17 regional medals; by 15, he won the 1978 U.S. Junior Men’s Championship, and at 19, he made headlines at the 1982 U.S. Championships as the first skater to land a triple axel (a move he’d been perfecting since age 11!). A few years later, Boitano unveiled his own signature jump, the Tano triple lutz, in which the skater, while already performing the extremely difficult move, raises his left arm above his head.
In 1988, Boitano reached several more pinnacles in his illustrious career. First, he earned nine perfect 6.0 scores in the U.S. Championships – a stunning feat that has yet to be matched. Then, at the Winter Olympics in Calgary, he won gold in the memorable “Battle of the Brians,” against Canadian rival Brian Orser. Boitano’s performance still stands among the very best of all time. Since Calgary, no other American male skater has fared better than bronze. As a final mark on the year, Boitano won the World Championships, again beating Orser.
After turning pro, Boitano won six World Professional Championship titles – including 5 consecutively. He has since been voted into both the U.S. and World Figure Skating Halls of Fame.
Today, Boitano lives in San Francisco, where he unveiled yet another signature move: he founded Youth Skate, a non-profit organization that introduces the city’s at-risk youth to his sport. Since its inception in 1998, Youth Skate has reached more than 3,000 kids and teenagers; it’s a different kind of legacy, but just as spectacular as any triple lutz.
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– Track & Field Coach –
In international track and field circles, Bert Bonanno is regarded as one of the greatest coaches and administrators of his era. His career has spanned more than 35 years.
Beginning his collegiate coaching career as an assistant to Lloyd “Bud” Winter, the legendary track and field coach at San Jose State, Bert led the Spartan freshmen squad to two national track and field championships. He also recruited Ed Burke, the national record-holder and three-time Olympian in the hammer throw.
Under Bert’s award winning tutelage, many track and field athletes became Olympic champions and world record holders. He coached both nationally and internationally, including the 1976 Montreal Olympics where decathlete Bruce Jenner and sprinter Millard Hampton won golds.
Among his many career highlights, Bert was Director of the World International Bruce Jenner Classic Track and Field Meet for two decades, which brought some of the world’s greatest talents to the South Bay. He also served as the Meet Director for the USA Track and Field Championships at San Jose City College, including the memorable 1984 championships, when ABC’s Wide World of Sports made its first ever appearance in San Jose.
Bert was the driving force to bring the USA Junior Olympics and the Masters National Championships to San Jose and the South Bay. He was also cofounded the widely successfully Mercury News 10K Race, held annually for 29 years.
Bert was inducted into the California Community College Track and Field Hall of Fame and a recipient of the distinguished Bud Winter Sportsman of the Year Award. And perhaps most meaningful of all, San Jose City College now honors one student every year with the Bert Bonnano Scholar-Athlete Award, an appropriate legacy for someone who has given so much to his community.
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– Volleyball –
When talking about volleyball, Kim Oden once described the game to a reporter as “a fun sport, a teamwork sport, and a smart sport,” but her words don’t reveal her own contribution to the game. Says associate Stanford head coach Denise Corlett, “She was one of the best players in the history of our program and all of collegiate women’s volleyball.” It doesn’t get much better than that.
Oden, who graduated from Stanford in 1986, was a three-time All-American during her time on The Farm. She was honored as the National Player of the Year in 1984 and '85 and won the 1985 Honda/Broderick Award for being the nation’s most outstanding female collegiate athlete – in any sport. Kim was a four-time all-conference selection as well as Pac-10 Player of the Year in 1983, '84 and '85. She holds the Cardinal single-match record for most blocks (16) and is ranked among the top five in several other career and single-season categories. In 1990, she was named Player of the Decade on the AVCA's All-Decade Team (1980's).
And if that wasn’t enough, she excelled in the classroom as well, earning Academic All-America honors in 1984 before graduating in 1986 with a degree in Public Policy.
After graduation, Kim went on to play on the U.S. National Team (1986-92, '94) and was named Olympic team captain in 1988 and 1992. At the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, she was named "Best Hitter” for tallying the highest hitting percentage during the games. In '92, she helped the U.S. women win bronze at the Summer Olympics in Barcelona. She also played professional beach volleyball in the National Four-Women Pro-Beach Tour, and in 1995 was voted the league’s MVP.
Today Kim resides in Palo Alto and is the head coach of the girl’s volleyball team at Saint Francis High School in Mountain View.
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– Basketball–
Bud and Ralph Ogden’s love for basketball was a family affair. The boys grew up playing on the driveway of their childhood home – along with their father, Carlos, and their other brothers, Jim and Fred. It must have been a sight for the neighbors, as the four boys and their dad all stood 6-foot-4 or taller. “Dad was a big man. He coached us in everything,” said Bud.
Standing tall wasn’t just a physical trait – it was also a way of life. Carlos was a man of courage and valor, a highly decorated World War II combat veteran who had received the Medal of Honor, three Purple Hearts and the Bronze Star for his service. Carlos passed on his strength and tenacity to his boys. Explained Bud, “He was the competitive influence in all of our lives. He didn’t give us anything; we earned everything we got.”
After their driveway battles, Bud and Ralph took their games to the next level, becoming star centers at San Jose’s Lincoln High School and Santa Clara University.
Bud lit up the scoreboard at Santa Clara. He was the school’s lead scorer in 1968 – as only a sophomore. He helped the Broncos reach the NCAA Western Regionals in both 1968 and 1969 with the best back-to-back teams in school history (22-4 and 27-2). Looking back on those remarkable seasons, Bud modestly said, “We kind of caught lightning in a bottle.” Bud still owns the SCU single-game scoring record – 55 points against Pepperdine in 1968 – is on the school’s all-time Top 10 list in both scoring and rebounds. In 1970, he averaged an impressive 18.2 points per game, third best in school history.
After college, Bud played two years in the NBA with the Philadelphia 76ers, before eventually returning to San Jose, where he embarked on a teaching and coaching career at Valley Christian High School as well as Gilroy High School. Bud’s achievements have been long recognized, as he’s a member of the Halls of Fame of both Lincoln High School and Santa Clara University.
Younger brother Ralph followed in his brother’s footsteps – but also made a name for himself along the way. During his high school career at Lincoln, Ralph earned All-CCS and All-Northern California honors in both 1965 and 1966. His senior season was exceptional: he led Lincoln to a perfect 29-0 record as well as to the title in the post-season Peninsula Basketball Championship. His career as a Bronco was no less impressive: a 72-12 collegiate record; three trips to the NCAA tournament – including two with his brother -- and 1,280 career points, placing him 14th among SCU’s all-time scorers. As a senior, Ralph was named to the First Team All-WCAC before going on to play one season in the NBA with the San Francisco Warriors. Ralph’s basketball career then took him to Germany, where he has played and coached professionally for nearly 30 years.
Together or on their own, Bud and Ralph have played many roles in their lives – teammate, champion, teacher and coach. But perhaps they will be most proud of their induction into the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame in their most personal role – brothers.
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– Swimming –
When Mark Spitz graduated from Santa Clara High School in 1968, there was no doubt he would become an Olympic gold medalist – it was only a question of how many times overHe had always been a champion. By age 10, he held 17 national age group swimming records; by 14, he was training under famed Olympic coach George Haines at the Santa Clara Swim Club and filling up the record books. Then he headed for the Olympics in Mexico City, where he predicted he’d win six gold medals.
Mexico City did not go as planned. Although he won two golds in relay events and individual silver and bronze medals, he was disappointed in his performances and yearned to do better. Four years later in Munich he kept his predictions to himself and unleashed a performance that has never been equaled in swimming or Olympic history – seven races. seven gold medals, and seven world records, a feat still unequaled by any other athlete in a single Olympiad.
The International Olympic Committee named him one of its five best athletes of the 20th century; Sports Illustrated magazine gave him similar accolades and featured him on the cover three times during his career.
Before moving to Santa Clara, the Spitz family lived in Hawaii where his father, Arnold, taught him to swim. Mark loved the sport, but it was Arnold who developed his competitive spirit by telling him, “Swimming isn’t everything; winning is.”
Looking back on his accomplishments, Spitz said, “Part of winning is the phenomenon of being able to convince those that compete against you that they are competing for second.” No swimmer – indeed, very few athletes – have ever been as successful at owning first place.
Now living in Los Angeles, Mark still hits the pool, swimming laps for both fun and fitness. He continues to be actively involved in the Olympic movement, too, by working with and fundraising for the United States Olympic Committee. He and his wife Suzy – to whom he has been married for more than 30 years – have two grown sons, Matthew and Justin.
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– Basketball –
 When Jennifer Azzi began playing basketball for her junior high team in 1981, girls in Tennessee schools were just a few seasons removed from the antiquated rules that had limited players to only three dribbles and confined two players on each team to the defensive end of the court. Title IX, the federal law that opened up sports opportunities for girls around the country, was just beginning to produce a core of female scholarship athletes. Women’s sports had not yet been added to the NCAA. Stanford’s women’s team was mediocre, watched by fewer than 100 fans per game. And women’s professional basketball was still learning its alphabet, moving from one forgettable failure of a league to another: LPBA, WBL, WBA, WABA.
When she retired in 2003 after nine years of professional basketball in the American Basketball League and Women’s National Basketball Association, basketball had the highest public profile of any women’s college sport and it had become the first successful women’s professional team sport.
Azzi was a pioneer in all that by changing America’s idea of what female athleticism was all about, in the process creating acceptability for the girls who followed her to train hard, play with guts and skill, and lay claim to glory.
That junior high team Azzi played for never lost a game. Oak Ridge High was 86-11 during her four years with a Tennessee state championship semifinal appearance her senior season. But when she arrived at Stanford, she was not an immediate starter on a team that had gone 13-15 the year before.
“She was not a complete package when she arrived,” Coach Tara VanDerveer told Sports Illustrated. Four years later she was. She led the Cardinal to a 32-1 record and its first NCAA championship in 1990. The two-time All-America was the Final Four’s most valuable player and Naismith National Player of the Year. Women’s basketball had arrived on the national stage, and Azzi was one of its most compelling stars.
Her professional opportunities lay in Europe, where she played five seasons. But her opportunity to further raise the level of the women’s game was in the United States, where she was a member of the gold medal team at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
Atlanta was a triumph for women’s sports in the United States, launching professional leagues in softball and soccer as well as two in basketball. Azzi was a founding player of the ABL, making its all-star team all three seasons of the league’s existence as a guard with the San Jose Lasers. The ABL lost its competitive battle with the WNBA, and when it folded in 1998, Azzi moved to the rival league where she was tops in three-point field goal percentage three times and first in free throw percentage twice.
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– Football Coach –
 Bill McPherson managed to elude the public’s radar detection, which is hard to do in a community where football is king and you’ve been involved in every level of the local game from the Bellarmine jayvees to five 49er Super Bowl champions. But as the Santa Clara native said in an interview while he was the 49ers defensive coordinator, his next-to-last job, “if people know who you are, then when things go bad, they know who to yell at.”
Not many things could have gone wrong in McPherson’s career, though. From the time he played at Bellarmine in the 1940s until retiring from the 49ers in 2005, when he was director of pro personnel, he was always moving up in the football world. Up, but not out. Except for three seasons at UCLA in the mid-1970s, where he was defensive line coach under Dick Vermeil, and a season as linebackers coach under Vermeil with the Philadelphia Eagles in 1978, his fulfilled his football career within 50 miles of where he was born.
It was a career that included Bellarmine, Santa Clara University and 27 years with the 49ers, the first 20 of which were in five different assistant coaching capacities. And that, of course, was what kept him out of the public eye. He was always an assistant coach.
“The guy has forgotten more football than most people know,” said Gary Plummer, a 49ers linebacker for four seasons under McPherson. '”Without a doubt, Mac is the best guy in the NFL in terms of the front seven on defense. He likes being around the defensive linemen and linebackers. He's a throwback. He appreciates the toughness of the game. He loves smash-mouth football.”
When McPherson finished his playing career at Bellarmine and Santa Clara, where he was a defensive tackle, he returned to the Bells and then to the Broncos as coach. He helped Pat Malley revive Santa Clara’s football program and remained there from 1963-74. That’s when Vermeil lured him away to UCLA, the connection that would eventually take McPherson to the NFL.
Bill Walsh called McPherson after his first season in Philadelphia, and the opportunity to return home was too much to resist. After collecting five Super Bowl rings under Walsh and George Seifert in various assistant’s positions, McPherson moved into the personnel position where he evaluated NFL talent and worked on game plans.
What’s he doing in retirement? What retirement? McPherson’s back at Bellarmine helping coach the junior varsity.
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– Coach & Administrator –
 Walt McPherson’s sports legacy is more difficult to categorize than most athletes’, coaches’ or administrators’ because he had an impact on so many college sports – baseball, basketball, football and golf. But the location of his legacy is easy to pinpoint.
It’s at San Jose State University, where his name runs along each side of the basketball court in the Event Center in huge letters: Walt McPherson Court. “I’ve never been a legend before,” he said the night the court was dedicated in his honor.
He was simply the last person at the university he served for 35 years to recognize the fact. He played three sports there after an outstanding athletic career at San Jose High, coached four Spartan sports, was athletic director, ran the physical education department and finished up as commissioner of the West Coast Athletic Conference.
There was hardly any area of San Jose State sports that McPherson touched that doesn’t still bear his fingerprints. As soon as he graduated in 1939 – after a career in which he lettered in three sports and captained the 11-1 football team in 1938 – McPherson was hired by his alma mater as freshman baseball coach. Just 22 years old, he was the nation’s youngest head coach. The next year he was added as an assistant on the football staff, and the year after that became head basketball coach.
Navy service in World War II interrupted McPherson’s tenure at San Jose State, but he returned in 1945 to coach baseball, basketball and golf. “With basketball and baseball, I thought I knew the sports pretty well,” he said. “In golf … they were all better golfers than I was.” Indeed, his 1948 golf team won the NCAA championship.
But it was in basketball that McPherson achieved his most public success, compiling 264 victories over 17 seasons, the most of any coach in school history. Twelve teams had winning seasons, three won conference championships, three went to postseason play and the 1950 team climbed to as high as 17th in national rankings.
“He cared a great deal for his players,” said George Clark, a player on the 1950 team. “He had a wonderful memory and remembered the names of his players long after they graduated. He followed their careers and knew the names of their wives. He was like a life-long counselor.”
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– Football –
He caught more passes than any San
Francisco 49er tight end ever. In his 11 seasons with
the team, he won three Super Bowl rings. He played in
the Pro Bowl four years in a row.
Brent Jones is living proof that sometimes
it’s better when you don’t get what you wish
for.
“I never thought about becoming
an NFL tight end,” he once wrote. “As a young
person growing up in San Jose, I had aspirations of playing
pro baseball.”
It was the early years of his sports
career at Leland High School that had Jones headed in
the wrong direction, because by heritage, you’d
have figured him a football player from the start. His
father Mike had been a draft choice of both the Oakland
Raiders and Pittsburgh Steelers in 1961. But he was a
first team all-league player on the Chargers’ baseball
team. As a football player, he was only second string.
Santa Clara gave him a scholarship
that allowed Jones to play both sports, and the change
in athletic fortunes surprised both school and athlete.
He hit .345 for the Broncos’ JV baseball team while
playing wide receiver on the football team. But after
switching to tight end his sophomore season, Jones’ future
as a football player was sealed. He made all-conference
three years in a row and in 1985 was named All-American
and Western Football Conference player of the year.
Still, Jones’ future as a professional
wasn’t secure. Just one week after being drafted
in the fifth round by the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1986,
he suffered a neck injury when hit by a drunk driver.
His rookie season wasn’t impressive, and he was
cut by the Steelers.
Signed as a free agent by the 49ers,
Jones finally realized his football potential. He became
a regular player in 1988, his second season when he went
to his first Super Bowl, and a starter in his third season
when he caught a 7-yard touchdown pass from Joe Montana
to give the 49ers a 13-0 first quarter lead in their
Super Bowl victory over the Denver Broncos. He got his
third Super Bowl ring in 1995 when he caught a pair of
passes for 41 yards in a victory over the San Diego Chargers.
In 19 post-season games, Jones caught 60 passes for 745
yards and five touchdowns. In two of those games he gained
more than 100 yards receiving.
But Jones’ impact on the 49ers
and on the tight end’s role in the modern NFL was
as a receiver in the regular season. By the time he retired
as a player and became a television analyst following
the 1997 season, he had caught 417 passes, just the fifth
49er to surpass 400 but the only tight end.
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– Tennis –
Women had long ago claimed a share
of the tennis spotlight by the time the Jordan sisters
came along in the 1960s and ’70s. But the women
who preceded them to greatness at the Grand Slam tournaments – the
Australian, French and U.S. Opens and Wimbledon – had
traditionally achieve fame straight from the country
club.
Not so the daughters of Robert Jordan,
an insurance executive in King of Prussia, Pa., who was
a nationally ranked player at the time in the men’s
45s division.
Barbara, the older of the two girls,
was bound for Stanford University in the fall of 1974,
one of the first women athletes at the Farm to win an
athletic scholarship. Two years later Kathy would join
her, and in their only season together on the Cardinal
they would lead the team to its first national championship,
taking the national doubles title for themselves.
But they took independent paths in
blazing the new trail for American women’s tennis
through the collegiate sports system. And though they
would leave their ultimate marks on the women’s
professional game as doubles players, they did not do
so as doubles partners.
Barbara was a dominant junior player
before she got to Stanford. Between her 13th and 18th
years, she never lost a singles match in her age group
of the U.S. Tennis Association’s Middle State Sections.
She was named an All-American three times at Stanford,
and immediately after winning the 1978 collegiate doubles
title, she won the 21-and-under National Hard Court championship.
Kathy skipped that tournament in ’78,
instead electing to play in the National Amateur Clay
Court Championships, which she won. The next year she
won the national collegiate singles and doubles crowns
before joining her sister in the professional ranks.
Barbara struck first as a pro by winning
the women’s singles at the 1979 Australian Open,
the only American woman to win the singles title there
in the decade. She climbed as high as 37th in the Women’s
Tennis Association rankings, and in 1983 she won the
mixed doubles championship in the French Open.
Kathy’s professional career went
into high gear in 1980 when she won doubles titles a
month apart at the French Open and Wimbledon. She won
two more Grand Slam doubles championships the next year
at the Australian and U.S. Opens. In ’85 she added
her second Wimbledon doubles title and then closed out
her career in ’86 with mixed doubles championships
in the French and Wimbledon. She climbed as high as fifth
in the singles rankings with victories over Chris Evert,
Martina Navratilova, Pam Shriver and Tracy Austin.
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– Football Coach –
When he retired as Saratoga High School’s
football coach after the 1994 season, one of the many
newspaper stories honoring Benny Pierce said “Pierce’s
teams were noted for their upsets.”
If that’s true, a lot of people
weren’t paying enough attention to Pierce.
How does a coach last 33 seasons with
the same team unless he’s doing a lot of things
consistently right? How does a coach with 33 winning
seasons surprise anyone? How does a team with 21 league
or section championships over that span ever rank as
anything less than the team to beat?
The story did mention one of Pierce’s
great achievements as evidence – the 1987 season
when his second-place Falcons qualified for the Central
Coast Section playoffs by a coin flip but then downed
three undefeated teams in a row to take the title. But
by then, Saratoga High’s trophy case was already
bursting at the seams with hardware brought home by his
teams. Surely folks had become accustomed to his miracles
by then.
It also mentioned that after reaching
an enrollment high of 2,100 students in 1976, Saratoga’s
student body had dwindled to only 900 by Pierce’s
last season. But did that ever make the ranks of Falcon
players who packed the sidelines any less menacing from
the other side of the field?
It shouldn’t have. People should
have expected Pierce-coached teams to be consistently
superior, and, in fact, they did. Pierce was the capital
letter and the period on an era of Saratoga football
history.
He came to the school to start the
junior varsity program in 1959 after playing quarterback
for San Jose State, where he was the guy who threw the
ball to Bill Walsh. The switch from player to coach was
broken by a three-year stint as an Air Force pilot. And
from the very start, Pierce’s teams won, never
having a losing season.
“It is very hard to single out
one team as being the best,” he said prior to his
final game as coach, four years after the mild heart
attack that caused him to give up teaching. He remembered
his 1980 undefeated team, ranked sixth in the national,
and the Cinderella squad from ’87.
Upsets? Upon further review, maybe
the newspaper was right. Never in Pierce’s career
did his teams play a “home” game, instead
taking the bus down Highway 9 to Los Gatos High. Today
the Falcons have a stadium on campus. Benny Pierce Field.
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– Golf –
In the words of Sports Illustrated,
Ken Venturi had become a “loser’s loser.” And
really, until that searing hot June day in 1964, who
could have argued the point?
The former San Jose State golfer from
up the Peninsula in San Francisco – the one who
once had come closer than any amateur to winning the
Masters, who had been a regular winner since turning
pro in 1956 – was mired in a three-year winless
slump. His prize money amounted to less than $4,000 in
1963. And he was no longer on the Master’s invitation
list.
But in the ’64 U.S. Open, the
slump that had begun following injuries suffered in an
automobile accident ended suddenly and mysteriously.
Gobbling salt tablets as defense against heat exhaustion
on that 100-degree day at Washington’s Congressional
Country Club, Venturi put together a 66-70 on the 36-hole
final day to win the Open in one of the greatest finishes
in tournament history. He was PGA Player of the Year,
and Sports Illustrated named the loser’s loser
its Sportsman of the Year.
Venturi’s return to the top of
competitive golf didn’t last long. Carpal tunnel
syndrome forced him off the tour in 1967 with 14 career
victories. So he began a 35-year career as CBS Sports’ lead
golf analyst that represented a comeback every bit as
unlikely as his Open championship. As a youngster, Venturi
had played round after round alone at San Francisco’s
Lincoln and Harding Park public courses while he worked
to overcome his stutter.
Playing serious golf from the age of
9 and winning the first of his three San Francisco city
championships at age 17, car dealer and U.S. Golf Association
executive committee member Ed Lowery gave Venturi a sales
job that allowed him to pursue golf as a career.
He first gained local notice in 1951
when he won the first of his two California State Amateur
titles, but it was five years later when he exploded
onto the national golf scene. That year he was invited
to the Masters as an amateur and took the first-round
lead with a 32-24 – 66 that included an eagle 3
on the 13th. He held the lead through the next two rounds
but missed becoming the Masters’ only amateur champion
when Jack Burke nipped him by a single stroke.
The PGA of America honored Venturi
in 1999 with a Lifetime Achievement in Journalism Award
for his work with CBS. In 2000, Venturi served as captain
of the U.S. President’s Cup Team that swept to
victory.
“It was a great way to cap it
all off and wind down a career,” he said.
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– Football –
 When
you look back over the career of John Brodie, it isn’t
long until an inevitable thought occurs: Was there any
sport this Stanford athlete could not play? Growing up
in Oakland, he won a state youth tennis championship
and lettered in four sports in high school. He set a
slew of records as Stanford’s quarterback, then
went to the San Francisco 49ers and played a team-record
17 seasons. After football, he switched to golf and recorded
a dozen top-10 finishes plus a championship in a 13-year
career on the Senior PGA Tour.
Yet there’s also another prominent
theme that runs through Brodie’s career, and that’s
of the many fall Sundays at old Kezar Stadium in which
he compiled record passing statistics for a sub-par team
before unappreciative fans. It took 14 seasons until
a suitable roster was assembled around the quarterback
with the precise and prolific arm, but when it was, the
booing stopped. The 49ers went to the 1970 NFC Championship
Game and Brodie, who led the league with 223 completions
in 378 attempts for 2,941 yards and 24 touchdowns, with
was named the NFL’s most valuable player. The 49ers
returned to the championship game the next season.
By the time Brodie retired from the
49ers in 1973, he compiled passing statistics that still
rank him second in team passing yardage at 31,548 and
third in team touchdown passes with 214.
Brodie developed his talents during
a period of Bay Area sports history that produced several
all-time greats. In high school he jumped center against
future NBA star Bill Russell and played baseball against
future Hall of Fame third baseman Frank Robinson. His
original plan was to play baseball and basketball at
Stanford, but he ended up on the football and golf teams.
In his senior season in 1956 he was named All-American,
finished seventh in the Heisman Trophy vote and later
was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.
Following retirement from the 49ers,
he joined the Senior PGA Tour in 1985 and won the Security
Pacific Senior Open in 1991, finishing with career winnings
of more than $735,000.
In 2000, while
watching an NFL game on television from his home in
Riverside County, Brodie
suffered a life-threatening stroke that permanently damaged
his speech. He continues to fight back from its affects,
slowly regaining the ability to speak and gradually expanding
the range of movement with his arms. Those who have watched
him master almost every task set before him in his life
have no doubt that this is another struggle he’ll
win.
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– Gymnastics –
 Two
years before she competed in the 1996 Atlanta Olympic
Games – when Amy Chow was beginning to show potential
as an international gymnast – her mother mused
about Chow’s competitive future.
“You know, if Amy could represent
the United States (in the Olympics), I feel it would
be a contribution,” Susan Chow said. “I think
it's a way to thank the country for letting us immigrate
here.”
Consider the
debt repaid. The daughter of Chinese immigrants who
met and married in San Jose,
Chow made history as a member of the “Magnificent
7,” the first U.S. women’s team to win the
Olympic team gymnastics championship. Two days later,
in the individual event finals, Chow returned to the
medal podium to receive a silver medal in the uneven
bars.
But perhaps as impressive as her performance
in Atlanta was that four years later, Chow qualified
for her second Olympics and returned to compete for the
fourth-place U.S. team in the Sydney Games, rare longevity
in a sport where careers are notoriously short.
Chow’s
career began almost by accident. The ballet schools
her mother tried to enroll
her in would not accept a 3-year-old. By the time she
was 5, she had been moved into an accelerated gymnastics
program at West Valley Gymnastics in Campbell, and by
8 she was the first elite-level athlete the gym had ever
produced.
She was 14 when
she was chosen for her first U.S. international team,
traveling to Argentina
for a dual meet and then to Mexico for that country’s
Olympic Festival. There she won first in the all-around,
first in vault, balance beam and uneven bars and second
in floor exercise. A year later she won floor exercise
and finished third in the all-around and vault in a U.S.-Japan
meet in Japan.
That set the
stage for her first appearance with the senior U.S.
team, which won the silver medal
in the 1994 World Team Championships at Dortmund, Germany.
A year later at the Pan American Games on the United
States’ gold medal team, Chow won an individual
gold medal in the vault, silver in the uneven bars and
bronze in the all-around.
The road to
the Atlanta Olympics seemed clear for Chow. All she
had to do was get through the
Olympic Trials in Boston, and she’d be on the team.
But Boston proved to be scary. Her foot slipped during
a series of backward somersaults on the balance beam
and Chow’s head cracked against the wood. Even
as the swelling around her eye grew noticeably, she remounted
the beam and finished her routine.
It put her on an Olympic team destined
for glory and history.
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top
– Basketball –
 No
one – not even Kurt Rambis himself – would
have foreseen four NBA championship rings for the former
Cupertino High and Santa Clara star. A third-round draft
pick in 1980, Rambis was cut before the New York Knicks
even finished training camp. A season playing for AEK
in Athens, Greece gave no indication of Rambis’ future
either. In those days, European leagues were where mediocre
American players went to fade away, not the source of
NBA talent they have come to be today.
But after a season in Europe, the Los
Angeles Lakers took a small chance on Rambis, giving
him a non-guaranteed contract in 1981. He responded by
becoming one of the greatest role players in NBA history,
a blue-collar player on a glitzy team that won league
titles in 1982, 1985, 1987 and 1988.
Of course, there
are those in Cupertino today who might say they weren’t
surprised. In three seasons at Cupertino High, the
Rambis-led Pioneers
won two Central Coast Section championships and he was
named Player of the Year in 1975 and 1976 by the San
Jose Mercury News. At Santa Clara he was the West Coast
Conference Freshman of the Year and in 1980 he was conference
Player of the Year.
Still, when
he joined the Lakers, Mitch Kupchak had just been signed
and figured to stand between
Rambis and floor time. But Rambis got his break two months
into the ’81 season when Kupchak suffered a serious
knee injury, and he wound up starting 43 or the remaining
45 games of a championship season.
Over the next
six seasons, Rambis continued to play an integral role
in the Lakers’ success.
With the exception of the 1983-84 season, when he missed
32 games with a sore left foot, he appeared in at least
70 games each year and annually ranked among the team’s
leading rebounders.
He finished his playing career in stints
with the Charlotte Hornets and Phoenix Suns before returning
to the Lakers in 1994 for three seasons as an assistant
coach. Early in the 1998-99 season Rambis was named interim
head coach and led the team to the Western Conference
Finals. He then spent three years in the front office
as an advisor and assistant general manager before returning
to the bench as an assistant coach under Phil Jackson.
Rambis has also
worked in several television ventures including pre-game
commentator on Lakers’ telecasts
and has begun an acting career.
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– Football –
Pat Tillman
died a hero. He was in harm’s way in Afghanistan last April by choice,
and few people – weighing whether to the alternatives
of life as a pro football player or the risks of a soldier
in a combat zone – would have made the same choice
he did.
Still, it’s important to remember
that Tillman’s choice was about service; it was
neither a quest for heroism nor a death wish. “The
essence of the man was to help somewhere else if he felt
he was needed to help,” said Dave McGinniss, coach
of the Arizona Cardinals in 2002 when Tillman decided
to give up his NFL career for the U.S. Army Rangers following
the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States.
Tillman’s death sharpened the
nation’s understanding of how fully and intensely
the San Jose native and Leland High graduate lived his
life. He fully supported family, friends and teammates
and accepted the consequences of those commitments.
In high school,
where he played both ways, Tillman once sneaked back
into a game after being
subbed out, so the coach took his shoulder pads and helmet
away from him the rest of the game. He also came to the
defense of a friend in a fight and had to serve 30 days’ juvenile
detention. He later told Sports Illustrated he was proud
of that chapter of his life, not because of what happened
but because “it made me realize that stuff you
do has repercussions. You can lose everything.’’
That was two
weeks before his first football practice at Arizona
State and was the last fight
he was involved inn until Afghanistan. The Sun Devils
planned for Tillman to redshirt his freshman year, but
he made it clear his commitment to them was for four
years, after which he had other plans. He rewarded ASU
by leading the team to the 1997 Rose Bowl as a linebacker
and being named Pac-10 Conference Defensive Player of
the Year as a senior. He graduated in 3 ½ years.
Still, he was considered undersized
at 5-11, 192 pounds, and the Arizona Cardinals waited
until the seventh round to take him in the 1998 NFL Draft.
He switched to safety and became the first rookie starter
at that position in team history. He led the Cardinals
in special teams tackles with 30 in 1999, and by the
end of the 2001 season, the team was prepared to reward
him with a $3.6 million contract.
But for the second time in his football
career, Tillman had to tell his coach he had other plans.
He and his brother Kevin, a former minor league baseball
player, had been profoundly moved by the terrorist attacks
on the United States, and they enlisted in the Army together.
Tillman’s
decision ended a great football career as well as his
life. But it was the decision
of a man more concerned with what he could contribute
than what he would receive.
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