Hopefully, this will catch us up there with only a non-sports version coming soon.
Goodbye to Bob Watson at the age of 74.
Watson was a solid first baseman for the Houston Astros throughout the seventies after transitioning from catching and finished his career in the early eighties with stints in New York, Boston, and Atlanta.
Watson hit over .300 six times, served as the head of MLB's vice president in charge of discipline, and served as the general manager for both the Astros and Yankees with the Yankees winning the 1996 World Series under Watson's direction.
We wrote about Watson scoring baseball's one-millionth run in 1976 and the contest that was part of the chase for the honor, but Bob Watson was always a cult favorite of mine for two reasons.
The first was his brief cameo near the end of Ball Four as Watson breaks his finger after a September callup on a Jim Bouton knuckleball as Bouton warmed up in the Houston bullpen, but the second is one that a certain age demographic likely has at least some memory.
The Bad News Bears sequel "Breaking Training" isn't a satire classic as its original, but it is a fun romp anyway, and the "Let Them Play" chant still rings loudly from those that have seen the film.
It's Bob Watson that utters that line first (with Fred Landucci's good friend, the noted Slurpee cup/cocktail mixer Cesar Cedeno just behind Watson) and sent the line from what might not have been a highly remembered film otherwise into history.
Goodbye to Matt Keough at the age of 64.
Keough pitched for five teams but is usually connected with the Oakland Athletics during the end of the Charles Finley era.
Keough made the All-Star team as a rookie in 1978, would lose his first 14 decisions in 1979 in finishing 2-17, won 16 games in 1980, and then lost 18 in 1982.
Keough's career ended sadly in 1992 when he had made the Angels roster in a comeback attempt but was hit by a foul liner in the temple while sitting in the dugout during a spring training game.
Goodbye to Curtis Cokes at the age of 82.
The former world welterweight champion won his title in 1966 when he decisioned Manuel Gonzalez to win the title vacated by Emile Griffith.
Cokes would defend the title five times at a time when the division wasn't very strong, but fighters don't always have a choice in their opponents during their reign.
Cokes would lose his title via 13th round knockout to Jose Napoles in 1969 and would lose their rematch two months later in ten rounds.
Cokes would never challenge for the title again and retired in 1972 after losing three of his last five fights.
Goodbye to Johnny Majors at the age of 85.
Majors won the SEC player of the year as a Tennessee running back in 1955 and 56 and finished second in the 1956 Heisman voting to Paul Hornung.
Majors played one season in the CFL with Montreal before entering coaching, where he would become the head coach at three programs- Iowa State, Pittsburgh (Twice), and his alma mater Tennessee.
Majors would have his greatest success in his first term at Pittsburgh in landing Tony Dorsett and leading the Panthers to the 1976 national title before leaving to take over at Tennessee after the season.
Majors would win 116 games at Tennessee before being pushed out midway through the 1992 season as he recovered from heart surgery in a "really" classy move.
Majors returned to Pittsburgh, but in four years would win only twelve games.
Goodbye to Pat Dye at the age of 80.
Dye was the head coach at East Carolina and Wyoming before starting a twelve-year run at Auburn.
It was under Dye that Auburn was able to fire up their rivalry with Alabama on closer terms as it was Dye that defeated Alabama in Bear Bryant's final regular-season game that snapped a nine-game Alabama winning streak in the series, and it was Dye that worked out the contract to move the Alabama-Auburn game out of Birmingham and turned it over to the schools to alternate home games.
Dye won three SEC titles at Auburn and recruited Bo Jackson to the Tigers before being forced out by NCAA violations after a 5-5-1 season in 1992.
Goodbye to Lee Grosscup at the age of 83.
Grosscup was a journeyman quarterback in the late fifties and early sixties for teams in three leagues as a backup with the Giants, a season with the AFL's New York Titans, and a year in Canada with the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
Grosscup is remembered more often for his work in the broadcast booth as he announced college football for ABC for over twenty years along with all three seasons of the USFL.
Grosscup also worked on the California Golden Bears radio network for over thirty years as a game analyst and postgame host.
Making progress in catching up with more to come soon!
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