Forgotten Superstars: Jose Luis Castillo

    Some people have just been unlucky in life.

It's hard to call Jose Luis Castillo unlucky in his career. 

After all, Castillo was a two-time lightweight champion and is remembered as one of the two participants in the greatest fight of all time. So how could he be unlucky?

Well, Castillo lost the greatest fight of all time, possibly due to a referee error, may have beaten the never-defeated Floyd Mayweather, only to be denied on the scorecards, and defeated five world champions during his career (Six if you count Floyd). Yet, he's not in the boxing hall of fame.

Castillo has wins over Diego Corrales, Joel Casamayor, Juan Diaz, Stevie Johnston, and Jorge Paez, and has fought world champions Ruslan Provodnikov, Ricky Hatton, Cesar Soto, and Floyd Mayweather, all in losing efforts.

Castillo's credentials make him deserving of the Boxing Hall of Fame, but there are a few reasons that he's missing his plaque.

First, he didn't receive the decision he deserved against Floyd Mayweather.

That evening and the resulting ripple effect would affect boxing for years.

I've always thought that if Castillo had won, Mayweather's career might have been even better. As his career advanced, Floyd would have been a fighter rather than a businessman, not worrying about protecting an unbeaten record.

It would also have raised Castillo in the eyes of boxing historians as the only man to have defeated an all-time great, and adding that victory to an already-qualified resume would have put him over the top for induction.

I think Castillo's win is held against him, which sounds silly, but allow me to explain.

Castillo badly missed weight for his rematch against Diego Corrales, and after paying a fine to Corrales, Corrales agreed to fight, and the much bigger and stronger Castillo stopped Corrales in the fourth round.

It was one of the first cases of what has become a problem in the sport, weight bullying, where a fighter doesn't try to make the weight, accepts his punishment (which in a title fight means the title is no longer at stake, pays a fine to the opponent, and often gives himself a better chance of winning.

Castillo had a huge advantage in the second Corrales fight (Corrales made the weight), and when the third fight saw Castillo miss the mark by an even larger number, Corrales, who again made the weight, refused to fight under those conditions, and the fight never happened.

I believe missing weight is held against Castillo (he also missed weight for a fight against Timothy Bradley, forcing a cancellation) by Boxing Hall of Fame voters(In which I'd do a far better job as a voter than many, by the way), and it shouldn't be.

While Castillo wasn't always professional about making the contracted weight, those issues shouldn't keep him from the Hall.

After all, Castillo moved from the top sparring partner for the great Julio Cesar Chavez to a successful two-time lightweight champion with several prominent victories and an exciting, fan-friendly style, so it has to be held against Castillo for the two blown weights against Corrales, because I can't think of another reason.

Jose Luis Castillo deserves a spot in boxing's hall. For now, he will have to settle for being the latest to enter the Forgotten Superstars universe. 

Forgotten Superstars: Dwight Muhammad Qawi

 I originally planned this as part of a tribute post, but it ran long, so I decided to change it to a Forgotten Superstars addition.

Goodbye to Dwight Muhammad Qawi at the age of 72.   

"The Camden Buzzsaw" held the WBC light heavyweight and WBA cruiserweight titles with an aggressive, stalking style that ripped through opponents, leaving them tattered and torn.

Known as Dwight Braxton before his name change, Braxton suffered a defeat and a draw in his first three professional bouts following his release from Rahway State Prison in New Jersey, before ripping off an impressive string of wins that included a KO win over former WBA champion Mike Rossman and a decision win over top contender James Scott in Braxton's return to Rahway.

Braxton's win streak earned him a WBC title shot against Matthew Saad Muhammad, an anchor of network television known for his exciting brawls and miracle finishes to keep his title.

There would be no miracle as Braxton punished Saad Muhammad on his way to a tenth-round knockout to take his title.

Braxton added three quality wins, all stoppages, in his three title defenses against Jerry "The Bull" Martin, Saad Muhammad in a rematch, and Eddie Davis before a highly anticipated unification match in Atlantic City against WBA champion Michael Spinks.

The fight appeared to be a can't-miss action pairing with Spinks's one-punch power and Braxton's charging style. Braxton didn't fight as aggressively as expected, and Spinks chose to box rather than bang, as Spinks won a deserved but disappointing unanimous decision.

Braxton changed his name to Dwight Muhammad Qawi after the fight, winning a few fights before a Spinks rematch was cancelled when Qawi injured himself in training.

Qawi was short (5'7), and there were questions about his size when he moved to the cruiserweight division for a 1985 title challenge in South Africa against WBA champion Piet Crous.

Qawi cut Crous down in eleven rounds to win the title and followed up with a brutal sixth-round stoppage over former heavyweight champion Leon Spinks in his first defense.

This set up a nationally televised fight on ABC in July 1986 from Atlanta's Omni against unbeaten Olympian Evander Holyfield that is still the best cruiserweight fight ever (apologies to Vasily Jirov vs James Toney) with Holyfield winning a split decision over fifteen rounds of hell (fifteen rounders were soon to become extinct) in a fight that could just as easily gone to Qawi.

The Holyfield loss took away (understandably) the best of Qawi, who lost a very questionable decision to former WBA champion Ossie Ocasio and knocked out former IBF boss Lee Roy Murphy in six before the Holyfield rematch, where Holyfield took Qawi out in four rounds.

Qawi was the biggest name in the early portion of George Foreman's comeback, creating quite a dichotomy in the ring with the 6'4 Foreman against the 5'7 Qawi.

Qawi's seventh-round stoppage loss looked like the end of his career, but the Buzzsaw wasn't finished yet, winning four fights in a row to qualify for the WBA cruiserweight title vacated by Holyfield when he moved to heavyweight.

Qawi would lose a split decision to Daniels and would lose his next fight to Mike "The Bounty" Hunter before winning seven of his final nine fights, including a win over former IBF champion Rickey Parkey and a decision loss to former WBA champion Nate Miller.

Qawi retired after the 1992 loss to Miller but returned in 1997-98 with three lower-level fights, winning two of them.

Qawi trained fighters after his retirement and worked with patients at a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center before his battle with dementia in recent years.

Qawi was inducted into the Boxing Hall of Fame in 2004, but I wonder how his career could have been even better.

What would have happened had he been more aggressive against Michael Spinks?

Would that have been enough to win the biggest fight of his career?

What if the first Holyfield fight had been held anywhere but Atlanta? 

Would that have nudged Qawi on the judges' cards?

Either way, Dwight Muhammad Qawi was a deserving inductee into the Hall of Fame and led an interesting life that might make a great film.

We welcome Dwight Muhammad Qawi to the Forgotten Superstars Universe.

Forgotten Superstars: Steve Watson

      I've been watching old Denver Broncos games on YouTube (Remember it was the Broncos who were the team of my youth) as I do other things and it made me want to write about my favorite Bronco on offense from childhood- wide receiver Steve Watson.

The Broncos weren't always known for offense in the seventies and eighties.

In fact, when Sears sold the NFL jerseys in their catalog at that time, Denver was the only team to have a defensive player jersey (53 Randy Gradishar) as their representative, so the "Orange Crush" defense was the star of the team.

Still, Steve Watson took over the top receiving option from Haven Moses in his third season in 1981 and was the go-to pass catcher for Craig Morton as he ended his career and for the first formative years of John Elway as well.

Watson made the Broncos in 1979 as an undrafted free agent from Temple but only caught six passes in each of his first two seasons in Denver before his breakout season in 1981.

In 1981, the first season of Dan Reeves's coaching career and the final season of Craig Morton's quarterbacking career, Watson caught sixty passes for 1,244 yards and a league-leading thirteen receiving touchdowns as he made his only Pro Bowl in a breakout year.

Watson wouldn't be selected to another Pro Bowl but he continued to rack up receiving yards with 555 (in the nine-game strike season), 1,113, 1,170, and 915 in the following four seasons for the Broncos.

It was Steve Watson who was the go-to receiver for a developing John Elway as an intermediate threat and occasional long-ball target.

Watching these Denver games during a time when the football wasn't in the air as much as it is today, Watson's ability to get open deep as well as on shorter routes makes me think that he might have been more effective in today's game.

Watson's numbers dipped a little in 1986, catching forty-five passes for 699 yards and he played only five games in 1987, catching eleven passes in what would be his final season.

Watson finished his career with over six thousand receiving yards, three hundred fifty-seven catches, and a very good average of seventeen yards per catch.

I wonder if Watson had come along a few years later with his skills perhaps the Broncos would have won one of those lost Super Bowls under Dan Reeves as he would have given the team the bigger receiver that the team lacked with their quicker smaller pass catchers such as Vance Johnson and Mark Jackson.

And now, why Steve Watson was part of my childhood fandom.

You see, the local newspaper would every year or so mention Watson in the local sports section as his grandparents lived in Hagerstown.

That was the connection to Watson and I remember every time we made our weekly run for supplies, I tried to wear something Bronco-related on the remote chance that I would run into these people (remember this was in an era that wasn't easy to acquire items from a non-local team) who in my early teenaged mind would see me, talk to me, and make a connection with someone that knows a Denver Bronco!

In a shocking development, none of that would occur and I'm not a Broncos fan anymore but Steve Watson is still one of my favorite players and we welcome him to the Forgotten Superstars series. 

Forgotten Superstars: MIZZ Georgia Hase!

     Last week when I wrote about the MLB draft, I mentioned the Guardians first-round selection Ralphie Velasquez and how the name reminded me of the diminutive gentleman to the left, Ralphie Valladares of the "World Famous Los Angeles T-Birds" of the now defunct Roller Derby and its failed 1989-1990 comeback as RollerGames.

However, that reference reminded me of the greatest personality of Roller Derby and just how good she was at getting heat from the fans.

Georgia Hase managed the Detroit Devils of the original Roller Derby league and "Bad Attitude" of the revamped RollerGames as the main heel manager during the lifespan of the two leagues.

I think so highly of "Mizz" Hase's (That's how the television broadcasts always spelled) ability to infuriate the fans and add to the product that I would rank her just under Bobby "The Brain" Heenan and Jim Cornette as "managers" in the realm of  "pre-determined" athletic competition.

Hase played the feminist villain that played to the phobias of the roller derby fan by insinuating that she was a lesbian (I honestly don't know if she was or wasn't in her private life), insisting on being called "Mizz" to play off the women's movement's adaptation of the term "Ms" when spoken to by an interviewer, and generally pulling various tactics that pushed the rulebook to its limits in an effort to defeat those popular T-Birds.  

When you have some experience watching pro wrestling from the time that managers were used, it's easy to pick up on Hase's similarity to Bobby Heenan, especially with the black jumpsuit with the embroidery on the back as seen in the Hase photo above.

Heenan used the same trick to stir up the fans with one version that stated "Bobby Heenan #1" and a lesser-used version "California", which was certain to make Heenan loved as he referenced himself often as hailing from California, Beverly Hills, and Hollywood to place himself above the "Ham and Eggers" as Heenan often referred to wrestling fans.

Hase's use of "Rose" to appear ladylike and classy to an audience that viewed her as neither worked equally well in raising the ire of the skating fans that saw her as neither of those adjectives!

Hase apparently was a skater in the sport before transitioning to the heel manager spot which made her the memorable performer that she was.

I have no doubt that had a wrestling promotion decided to use Hase as their top heel mouthpiece (which would have been way too forward-thinking for the wrestling business) that she could have been a star for that business as well.

The only thing that I would wonder about with Hase in pro wrestling would be her ability to take the big bumps that a wrestling manager needs to take and I'd think that would be unlikely to be an issue with Hase's past taking similar bumps in roller derby.

Georgia Hase passed away in 2015 and unless you remember her from the prime access days of roller derby, it's unlikely that you'll remember her today but she's worth remembering or even checking out on YouTube if you are unfamiliar with her.

If you watch and immediately find yourself thinking "What an obnoxious woman!", "Mizz" Georgia Hase did her job and did it very well. 

Forgotten Superstars: Conrad Dobler

      An all-time favorite of mine passed away recently at the age of 72 in Pueblo Colorado, the self-professed "Dirtiest Player in the Game" Conrad Dobler.

Dobler had struggled with his health in recent years and his family has donated his brain to Boston University for their studies on CTE, a condition that cannot be definitely diagnosed until after death and is often linked to football players and other athletes that deal with contact injuries.

Conrad Dobler was the player that you loved if he played for your team and hated if he didn't and while his tactics on the field with his "questionable tactics" that he often referred to as "exploring a gray area"

Watching Dobler's "highlights" on the occasional NFL Films feature shows him doing one thing- anything in and outside the rulebook to keep his man from getting to the quarterback.

For all of Dobler's behavior on the field. when I would see Dobler speak, I always thought of Dobler embracing the image but not as a pure bad guy.

Instead, Dobler seemed to play the role of a Burt Reynoldsish lovable rogue that left you thinking that this was a pretty good guy that was also a rugged football player.

Dobler was selected as an All-Pro three times and was once referred to by teammate Dan Dierdorf as one of the best pass-blocking guards in the history of the game.

Dobler's feud with Merlin Olsen continued past their playing days with Olsen placing Dobler's name on a tombstone when Olsen was filming his television program "Father Murphy" as an inside joke.

Dobler once said that he caused Olsen to worry more about Dobler than about playing the game, causing Olsen to lose his poise and that's what bothered Olsen the most.

Conrad Dobler's tactics may have been questionable but you cannot deny that he made every team he played for better.

The St.Louis Cardinals won their only two division championships in their twenty-eight years when Conrad Dobler was protecting Jim Hart, the New Orleans Saints had their only .500 season in their first twenty-one seasons with Dobler, and the Buffalo Bills won a division title with Dobler on the offensive line.

After football, Dobler wrote a book "They Call Me Dirty", appeared in several Miller Beer commercials that parodied his on-field image, and would make appearances on the memorabilia show circuit, including signing a helmet in the TRS collection.

Dobler's post-football life wasn't all easy though as he would deal with the brain issues that so many players face, nine knee REPLACEMENTS ( not surgeries-replacements!). When his wife, Joy, fell out of a hammock, she would become a paraplegic requiring round-the-clock care and their combined medical costs would wipe out all of their savings.

Conrad Dobler may have been a controversial figure in football in the 1970s but he certainly was a memorable figure as well.

Forgotten Superstars: Fred Ward

  We return to the Forgotten Superstars universe to honor the recently deceased actor Fred Ward.     

The long-time character actor passed away in May at 79 with a long list of credits as a supporting actor. However, over his career, Ward had two opportunities to break into the next level as a lead star and show that in Hollywood, as in life, everything is about timing.

Ward's first chance at stardom was in 1983's The Right Stuff.

Based on the Tom Wolff book of the same name, the story of the original seven Mercury astronauts, Ward was playing the role of Gus Grissom, the second man in space, and arguably the one that had the meatiest real story to tell of the seven as Grissom's Liberty Bell capsule sunk into the Atlantic Ocean when the hatch blew prematurely, took on too much water, became too heavy for the helicopter to lift and plunged into the ocean with Grissom almost drowning in the process.

The Right Stuff was expected to be a huge hit and could have sent Ward into leading man roles but disappointed at the box office (making only twenty-one million and costing twenty-seven million to produce) and despite being a critical hit and an artistic one (the film won four Oscars), the film's length of over three hours in length hurt it when moviegoers were deciding what film to attend.

Ward's career worked best as a co-star with huge stars with memorable roles in Escape From Alcatraz (Clint Eastwood), Uncommon Valor (Gene Hackman), Silkwood (Meryl Streep), and The Player (with several stars including Tim Robbins) but Ward made a few pictures that might not be remembered as brilliant cinema but to its targeted audience are well remembered.

In the 80s teen comedy Secret Admirer, Ward shines above the cast as "Lou Fimple", the angry police officer father, who thinks the secret love letters to his daughter are intended for his wife, and the hijinks that ensue.

Ward also was well-received as "Earl Bassett" in the first two films of the "Tremors" series, where Ward's Earl Bassett and Kevin Bacon's "Val McKee" battle monster worms in the American Southwest.

Tremors would become a cult favorite through the years and much of that is due to Ward's performance helping the series to get off the ground.

The second opportunity for Ward to leap into stardom was thought to be in the leading role in "Remo Williams-The Adventure Begins".

Based on the Destroyer series of novels, Remo Williams was hoped to be an action hit in 1985, which would then lead to a series of films, and send Ward into stardom with it.

Remo Williams was a box office disappointment, was more of an intellectual action film rather than a slam-bang affair, and was not a critical hit.

All of which meant nothing- because I loved it.

Other than Ryan, who has watched it almost as much as I have, no one else that I know has seen the film or mentioned it to me.

It may not have been a hit or a critical darling but for whatever reason, it's one of my favorite films and when it's on somewhere, it's one of those films that I have to stop and watch.

Ward was very good as Remo Williams but while I liked his take on the character, the screenplay may have been better suited with a little more action to hook people unfamiliar with Remo Williams or Ward to make them want to see more films in a potential franchise.

Remo Williams and the Destroyer series had the potential to be rolling to this day with several actors trading the characters every few films or years similar to the James Bond series but the failure of the original film doomed those plans and there hasn't been another attempt to give the franchise a try to the present day.

Ward would not receive another chance at stardom, although he would continue to work regularly as a character and supporting actor, including in some of the roles mentioned above, and worked until 2015 when his final credited role came in HBO's "True Detective" series.

Fred Ward may not have wound up as a big star in acting but Ward had an excellent career, made a nice living, and will be well remembered for being a part of films that are well-loved by their fans.

And we welcome Fred Ward as the latest member of our Forgotten Superstars universe.

Forgotten Superstars: Bob Lanier

  The recent passing of perhaps the most underrated NBA star of the 1970s at 73 years of age made me think that Bob Lanier is a perfect selection for our Forgotten Superstars series.

Bob Lanier never played on an NBA title-winner but he always ranked among the elite centers in basketball during his time in the league with Detroit and Milwaukee and for some fans, Lanier is more remembered for his size 22 shoe (which fans can compare their shoe against Lanier's at the basketball hall of fame.) than his career, which saw his college program (St.Bonaventure) and both of his NBA teams retire his jersey number.

Much like Nate Thurmond, a half-generation ahead of Lanier, Lanier was a Hall of Fame center that sometimes didn't get the attention that he deserved because he was the third-best pivotman of his day.

In the case of Thurmond, Thurmond's peak saw him trail Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain and then Chamberlain and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar before ironically being passed by Lanier for that position.

Lanier's name usually ranked behind Chamberlain and Abdul-Jabbar at first, then after Chamberlain's retirement behind Bill Walton (when Walton was healthy), maybe Artis Gilmore when Gilmore first arrived from the ABA, and later a young Moses Malone but make no mistake about it, Bob Lanier ranked with the best centers of all-time.

It was Lanier's name along with Walton that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar famously references in the film "Airplane" telling a young fan "Tell your old man to drag Walton and Lanier up and down the court for forty-eight minutes".

Lanier also had a cameo role as an opposing player in the 1979 Julius Erving film "The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh".

I'm not sure which I would select between Lanier and Artis Gilmore in a hypothetical draft but fans narrowly missed seeing the two talented big men hook it up in the 1970 Final Four but late in Lanier-led St.Bonaventure's East Regional title victory, Lanier injured his knee in a collision with future Detroit teammate Chris Ford and would miss the national semi-final in which the Bonnies would lose to Jacksonville and Artis Gilmore.

If you know anything about college basketball and the size of schools, you'll know just what an achievement it was for a school like St.Bonaventure to make the Final Four, and fans in northwest New York still vow that had Lanier not been injured that the Bonnies would have snapped the UCLA national title string in 1970, not in 1974 by N.C. State.

Their point is well-taken as that Bruins team was the most vulnerable of the seven straight champions as the 1970 team was post-Alcindor/Abdul Jabbar yet before the arrival of Bill Walton with the best players on those teams listing Sidney Wicks, Curtis Rowe, and Henry Bibby as their stars.

If a team such as St. Bonaventure was going to defeat one of the seven consecutive championship teams - 1970 was the one team that could have been vulnerable.

Lanier would be selected as the first pick in the 1971 draft by the Pistons and in his ten seasons with Detroit, Lanier would average a double-double with a scoring average of 22.7 and a rebounding average of 11.8 per outing, despite battling through debilitating knee injuries but Lanier's Pistons never even reached the conference finals as at that time the Pistons were in the Western Conference which was the more balanced of the two conferences.

Lanier played in eight All-Star games and won the game's MVP in the 1974 edition but the Pistons of the late seventies were rebuilding (and desperate to the point of hiring Dick Vitale as their head coach)  and with Lanier's knee continuing to weaken, Detroit traded Lanier to the Milwaukee Bucks, a team that won their division often but couldn't get by Seattle or Portland (Milwaukee also was in the Western Conference) to reach the finals.

Lanier helped to maintain the Bucks at that level but lost to Seattle in his first season and the Bucks last year in the West and couldn't get past Boston or Philadelphia after being moved to the Eastern Conference.

Lanier wasn't the scoring presence as a Buck that he was a Piston (averaging thirteen points a game in five seasons with Milwaukee) but his knees forced him to average ten fewer minutes a game and became a more stationary figure that slowed down any running game that the Bucks would try to use.

Lanier's hook shot wasn't the weapon on the level of Kareem's skyhook but his shorter more rounded hook shot was almost as deadly and Lanier was far from a finesse player on the block with a reputation as an enforcer that ranked him among the elite of the NBA's enforcers as his knockout of Atlanta's Bob Christian and his one-punch left hook that left Detroit's Bill Laimbeer prone on the floor left players smiling long after Lanier's retirement that Laimbeer frustrated throughout Laimbeer's career.

Lanier would serve as an assistant to his Bucks head coach, Don Nelson, with the Warriors and finished the 1994-95 season as Golden State's head coach when Nelson resigned mid-season.

Lanier finished the season winning twelve of thirty-seven games and didn't coach thereafter.

In my opinion, the two most glaring omissions on the NBA's recent 75th-anniversary team roster were Lanier and Bernard King and I have to think that it was held against both players that they never reached an NBA Finals.

It's sad that Bob Lanier never seemed to receive the break that he needed to receive the credit that he truly deserved going back to the knee injury at St. Bonaventure through his early years with the Pistons and his later years with the Bucks playing with teams that were very good but not quite good enough to win a championship.

I certainly think Lanier had a legitimate argument as the most underrated big man of his time and arguably ever and deserves to be remembered as the terrific player that was as we welcome "The Dobber" to the Forgotten Superstars universe.

Forgotten Superstars: Frank Bonner

 We have plenty of sad news as far as passings go, but I wanted to do something special for one of them and place them into the Forgotten Superstars universe here at TRS.

Frank Bonner's recent passing at the age of 79 may have been missed by most, but to Cherie and myself was a loss equal to many stars that were far better known to the general public.

Bonner was a character actor that would eventually transition to the director's chair but will be remembered by me as the actor that brought one of my favorite television characters to life.

Bonner's portrayal of the hopelessly inept salesman with the loud suit, Herb Tarlek, on WKRP in Cincinnati has to be one of the best acting jobs of the era. 

Bonner's Tarlek showed an everyman that desperately wanted to be shown as one person, yet underneath the outer shell, not only knew that he wasn't that person- he didn't really want to be.

For a character to be so remembered over forty years and a supporting character at that, takes an accomplished actor and while Bonner may have been stereotyped as Herb Tarlek a bit, I think his portrayal hit home with the average viewer.

If you are 45 and up and you see someone wearing loud clothing, the name "Herb Tarlek" not only is likely to be mentioned- most people of that age will get the reference.

Almost everyone knows a Herb Tarlek and that's where Bonner comes in.

Bonner managed to take a character that could have easily been a stereotype and not only used the obvious to make him hilarious, he occasionally made him human and relatable.

The best evidence of this came in an episode that saw Loni Anderson's "Jennifer Marlowe" finally give Herb Tarlek what he had begged for in every episode of the series- a date with her, despite Tarlek being married.

The show progressed with Herb bragging about his pulling off the thought to be an impossible feat, and the actual date itself, which in the end sees Herb admit that as attractive as he thought Jennifer was that he was going to be loyal to his wife, which was the point of the entire date to hopefully call Herb's bluff and eliminate the constant leering.

But Bonner managed to make Herb sympathetic when lesser actors would have played the final scene as the comeuppance of a buffoon, Bonner didn't play for easy laughs.

Bonner instead showed the pain of a guy who only wants to fit in and be liked, yet doesn't know how to accomplish that and wants to just once be looked at more than he is.

You don't see that often in television, let alone in a sitcom of the 80s and yet Frank Bonner pulled this off in a poignant yet not a typical reach for the heartstrings television moment.

Bonner's Tarlek didn't lack for comedic moments, such as his mixing up the photos for a store display or his commercial jingle (which to this day kills me), but I always admired his skill in making what could have been an unlikeable character and turning him into a beloved one.

Bonner only was part of two other shows after WKRP, one of them the attempted relaunch in the 90s, with the other as a priest in "Just the ten of us" a Growing Pains spinoff, but that could have been wanting to direct rather than act at certain stages of his career.

Frank Bonner bringing an iconic character to life won't be forgotten by me and we welcome him to the Forgotten Superstars universe.

Forgotten Superstars: Lane Smith

    Today we return to the Forgotten Superstars universe with an addition from the acting field and like a previous inductee, Charles Napier, Lane Smith was an actor that appeared in many films or television shows, but many might not recognize the name- but they would easily remember him once they saw his face.

Lane Smith never was able to land the leading role that established him as a star, but his supporting actor roles were memorable and showed the skills that could have made him a star if the right break came along.

The earliest role that I remember seeing Smith in was 1977's "Bad News Bears in Breaking Training" in which as a police officer, Smith finds the Bears team without a chaperone all in a single hotel room. 

Smith's character forces "Kelly Leak " to find the chaperone that he knows isn't there and when Kelly returns with "Mike Leak" played by noted gold shill William DeVane, Smith allows everything to stand and is offered tickets to the game by DeVane.

The other memorable portion of that role for Smith is never explained in the film as Smith is shown several times in the stands with both arms around a beautiful woman.

I'm willing to wager the explanation to that wound up on the cutting room floor.

Smith's starring role as Richard Nixon in the 1989 television movie "The Final Days" was well regarded by critics and I wonder why he didn't receive other opportunities as in a starring role.

Smith worked often in films and television through the 80s, most notably to me as the Russian collaborator mayor in Red Dawn, but Smith's real peak came in the 90s when he gained the role of "Perry White" the crusty editor of the Daily Planet on the Superman vehicle "Lois and Clark".

I didn't watch that very often, but Smith landed five terrific supporting roles in films in the downtime from "Lois and Clark" which ran from 1993-1997.

In 1992-94, those five supporting roles showed the abilities of Lane Smith and wear well if you see them today.

1992 saw Smith as the district attorney in the Deep South opposing Joe Pesci in "My Cousin Vinny", corrupt congressman "Dick Dodge" in Eddie Murphy's "The Distinguished Gentleman" (An underrated film that few mention today), and what might be his most famous role- "Coach Jack Reilly" in the original "Mighty Ducks".

Lane Smith completely nailed the role of the successful youth sports coach ( Smith as Reilly reminded me of one person that I knew during my little league years, even though I never coached against him- the similarities are striking) because everyone that has been involved in youth sports knows "That Guy".

Smith's pride in his program's success, yet arrogant attitude made his character the bad guy in Ducks, but I don't see it completely that way.

"Jack Reilly" may have been a little overzealous "It's not worth winning if you can't win big!", but his seriousness of coaching games and developing players is something that is derided at times in society.

Still, Smith made Reilly relatable to the person watching the film and in my opinion, quietly steals the film to the adult viewer.

Teaching his kids to "Go for the W", Smith teaches his team to strive for the best and to do it through the team system and hard work.

In this clip below, Smith looks at a second-place banner caused by "Gordon Bombay's" missed penalty shot with pain from remembering.

I get it- because I have similar memories.

I coached in a playoff mini-series, best of three, down one game to none in game two and a player (I'm not naming him) that was catching for our team had struggled with pop-ups all season because he wouldn't listen on how to secure them no matter how many times I showed him what to do.

With a slim lead in the final inning, an easy foul should have retired one of the opponent's best hitters, but the catcher loaded out of his crouch and tried to squeeze the ball with the mitt instead of covering up with two hands.

Catchers mitt can be hard to squeeze with one hand and it's easy to have the baseball pop out of them, so covering with the other hand for insurance can go a long way in securing the ball.

Of course, the ball is dropped and a few batters later, the lead, the game, and the series were lost.

I've seen the player a few times in the ensuing twenty years and every time I see him, I can't help but remember that pop-up.

Some of it is the loss of course, but some of it is that I just never was able to get my point through with the player and that's the worst part of all.

Smith added two other memorable roles in 1993 and 1994, first performing as the angry and disappointed father in law in Pauly Shore's "Son in Law".

I can feel his pain there, who would want Pauly Shore for a son in law?!

Smith also was cast as the New York Yankees general manager in the Albert Brooks film "The Scout" and had several scenes with noted thespian George Steinbrenner.

Smith continued to work through the nineties with one notable role as "Emmitt Seaborn", a fictional newsman in the Tom Hanks/HBO miniseries "From the Earth to the Moon".

That ranks at the top of my favorite limited series and Seaborn was composited from various anchormen/reporters that covered the Apollo era, so Smith was seen in most episodes.

Smith continued acting on television including some voice work on "King of the Hill" as "Charlie Fortner", the president of the Texas Propane Association.

Lane Smith was diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease) in 2004 and passed away the following year at the age of 69.

An underrated character actor and the one responsible for one of my all-time favorite characters, we welcome Lane Smith to the Forgotten Superstars universe, where he'll always be remembered. 

Forgotten Superstars; The Masked Superstar

We return to the Forgotten Superstars universe with an actual "Superstar" by name as our latest entry in the series.

The recent passing of Mr.Wrestling II made me think of masked wrestlers and the one wrestler who, for me, deserved to be involved in the Forgotten Superstars series.

You don't see many masked wrestlers anymore, but I always enjoyed the wrestlers who wore the mask as a fan, and it might have been better and more mysterious at that time, as seldom did masked wrestlers wrestle in the Northeast and the McMahon/WWF territory.

Since I couldn't see other wrestling companies (other than the one weekend a year that I visited my Ohio relatives when I would watch Georgia wrestling on WTBS), I relied entirely on the wrestling magazines to gain any knowledge of the happenings around the country and even though the articles were hokey and usually even more fictional than the actual programs (even as a kid and as a regular purchaser of these, it was pretty apparent to see that wrestling wasn't on the level), it was the only way to read about other wrestlers.
I always liked the masked wrestlers because the masks were often colorful and, more often than not, were "rulebreakers" (the term the magazines used for the "heels"), and it was fun trying to figure out any small tip on their "real" identity.

There were many masked wrestlers such as the Super Destroyer, the original Assassin, and his partner Assassin #2, the Masked Grapplers, etc, but for me, three stood out above the rest.

Mr.Olympia was often a "fan favorite", but I liked the mask, and he would eventually turn in the Mid-South area.

The Spoiler had a really menacing look with his vicious finisher- The Claw.
The Spoiler was often managed by J.J. Dillon or Gary Hart, and magazine articles on him would picture bloody grapplers damaged by his fierce grip, but the other was my favorite- The Masked Superstar.
Superstar was a wrestler who stretched the rulebook because he wanted to, not because he had to.
The magazines always stressed the Superstar had the "scientific ability" to win fairly, but he preferred the rougher style of breaking the rules, and that appealed to me!

The Masked Superstar also used several different masks with far more colors than the usual black or white, and those hoods stood out even in the black and white print of the magazines.

The Superstar cemented himself with me on an Ohio visit when I saw him for the first time with his unique interview style because he was a rare entity in pro wrestling.
The Superstar rarely screamed and yelled or made ridiculous threats; he spoke matter-of-factly, as in I mean what I say, take me seriously, he came across as a legitimate athlete, similar to those in other sports, and there was the hook- legitimacy.- The Masked Superstar fit that mold, and his finishing "Cobra Hold" was a little different as well.

The hold and application were similar to the "Cobra Clutch" of Sgt. Slaughter, but the Superstar could use it as a submission hold as Slaughter did, as a "sleeper" hold, and on occasion, even drop the affected grappler to the canvas and pin him as he continued to maintain the cobra.

Slaughter's hold was a bit more flashy, but the Superstar's cobra seemed a bit more realistic and far more versatile in its use.
Superstar brings out his toolbox in this win over Mike Davis, an underrated wrestler who is most remembered for his brief stint as "Dusty Rhodes" (has to be seen to be believed) and as part of the "Rock N Roll RPMs".


Superstar spent almost his entire career under the mask ( Bill Eadie had previously been one of the Mongols) with either the Jim Crockett/Mid-Atlantic territory or the Georgia territory as a heel, but did have brief runs with both companies as a fan favorite in tag teams with Paul Jones (Mid-Atlantic) and King Kong Bundy (Georgia).
Superstar ranked at the top of the list of wrestlers that I wanted to see enter the WWF that I hadn't seen there before, and in 1983, Superstar finally arrived under the tutelage of the Grand Wizard. When the Grand Wizard died in October 1983, Superstar was the last wrestler that he officially managed.

Superstar had to scrap the cobra hold since Sgt. Slaughter was using it there, but using the sweeping neckbreaker as his finisher, he rose to the status of the latest challenger to then-champion Bob Backlund after injuring Backlund's protege, Eddie Gilbert, with the neckbreaker on the floor to boost the heat for the Superstar's challenge.


The Superstar still had the confident, self-assured "real sports" interviews, but other than the Gilbert angle and his two-match set at Madison Square Garden (the unofficial WWF capital at the time), challenging Bob Backlund for the championship, Superstar's WWF tenure likely wasn't remembered as anything special for anyone other than his most devoted fans.

Backlund's November 1983 win over the Superstar was an odd one, as it seemed that Superstar had a solid amount of crowd support, which was unusual, and would be a harbinger of the following month when Backlund's title reign of almost six years was ended by the Iron Sheik.

Had the situation been a little different, Superstar would have been a better choice to be the man who supplanted Backlund, but Superstar was leaving the WWF shortly. If he wrestled as another wrestler (changed gimmick), he couldn't take credit for the title reign anyway.

Sheik was the better choice, but had the WWF chosen a few-month title reign for the conqueror of Bob Backlund, and then lost to Hulk Hogan as the Sheik did the following month, Superstar would have been the superior option.

Ironically, it was the Superstar that would be Hulk Hogan's first title defense, and he received a few title shots around the circuit against Hogan.


For the most part in North America, that was the end of the Masked Superstar.
The Superstar would wrestle in Japan under that mask until early 1986, when he returned to the WWF as one of the Machines (Andre the Giant, Superstar, and Blackjack Mulligan under masks).
After that stint was somewhat disappointing, it was back to the Masked Superstar in the Florida territory in that promotion's waning moments for a program against a young Lex Luger.
Superstar won the Southern title (Florida's top championship) from Luger, lost it back, and then moved back to the WWF as Ax of the tag team Demolition.

Demolition was successful with three championship reigns, but other than an occasional independent show long after leaving the WWF, the Masked Superstar was gone from the ring.

The Superstar did refer once to a possible trip to WCW when Ole Anderson was booking the company, but Anderson wanted the Superstar character, while Bill Eadie preferred to use the Demolition gimmick, and the sides couldn't come to an agreement.

For all of the success that Bill Eadie would have as part of Demolition, Eadie will always be the Masked Superstar to me, and even though the Spoiler is close (The Spoiler could make these pages someday), the Superstar will always be the epitome of the term masked wrestler, and we welcome him to the Forgotten Superstars Universe.

Forgotten Superstars: Randy Gradishar

It's time for a return of what some of you reading have told me is your favorite regular segment- the Forgotten Superstars and today's version is a timely one with the recent announcement of the "Centennial Edition" inductees of the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Once again, Randy Gradishar has been denied deserved induction to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, but Gradishar already has been inducted in the College Football version as he made that grade in 1998 from his days at Ohio State where he was a two-time All-American and finished sixth in the Heisman Trophy voting for 1973 in a year that saw Ohio State place John Hicks (2nd), Archie Griffin (5th) and Gradishar in the top six and essentially hand the award to Penn State's John Cappelletti with three players splitting the Midwest vote.
Gradishar would be the first-round selection of the Denver Broncos in 1974, was a key cog in the rise of the Denver franchise and in his ten-year career, Gradishar would make seven Pro Bowls, named All-Pro six times and would win the AFC defensive player of the year in 1978.
Combine that with a strong case that the AFC defensive player of the year for 1977 could have been given to him and that he was still in his prime when he retired after the 1983 season in which he was named All-Pro, the case for induction is an easy one to make.

I looked back a little at Randy Gradishar in 2016 and I've always thought that he has been kept out of the Hall for a few different reasons.
The biggest reason is that the peak of Gradishar's career coincided with the beginning of the 3-4 defense that Gradishar's Denver Broncos used as their defensive system.
As effective as the 3-4 was and still is, at that time the 3-4 hadn't truly let loose outside linebackers as pass rushers and with two inside backers rather than a middle linebacker in a 4-3, Gradishar had more responsibilities in pass coverage than a middle linebacker of the time and as an inside linebacker rarely rushed the passer to roll up the type of statistics that voters of today value most from a linebacker-sacks.
Even still, Gradishar finished with only 4.5 sacks officially for his career, that is only because of sacks becoming an official statistic for the final two seasons of his career.
Gradishar also intercepted twenty passes in his career, three of those for touchdowns.

When you add those facts to an unprovable one, Randy Gradishar likely finished the 1970s with more tackles than anyone in the decade and has been mentioned as finishing with over two thousand tackles when he retired after the 1983 season, which would be the highest in NFL history to that point.
I believe that is likely to be correct, but it's unprovable because tackles did not become an official NFL stat until 1994.
Taking those two unofficial statistics together, the statistics that would prove Gradishar's worth either worked against his role on the defense that he played for or weren't an official statistic during his career.

Of the great defenses of the 1970s, Pittsburgh's Steel Curtain (5), Dallas's Doomsday (4), Minnesota's Purple People Eaters (3) and even Miami's No-Name defense has Nick Buoniconti, yet the "Orange Crush" of Denver is yet to be represented.
Randy Gradishar should have been a slam dunk, Louie Wright is another player that has been overlooked by voters and Lyle Alzado might have had a chance if not for the steroid admission and controversy from the end of his career.
Check the numbers out of Louis Wright (perhaps a future forgotten superstar?) and compare them to Donnie Shell and Cliff Harris, both inducted in this class and then consider which is harder to find- an elite cornerback or an elite safety (I'd argue that both Shell and Harris were very good players surrounded by great ones) before the easy take of "Super Bowl Rings".
Minnesota has three guys in (all deserving) and they didn't win one, so that standard shouldn't wash.

I've written in the past of my Bronco fandom in childhood and I spent several years with my Bronco jersey with Gradishar's 53 on it from Sears.
Back then, if you wanted jerseys or clothing from teams other than in your area, you had to order from Sears and each team would only have one player available.
It says a lot that the Broncos best player and selection was a defensive player in a day of almost all offensive glamour positions.
As shown in the picture to the right, only one team of the-then 28 teams in the
NFL was represented by a defensive player- Randy Gradishar of the Denver Broncos.

Randy Gradishar may not have received his deserved bust in Canton, but he is now part of the Forgotten Superstars universe, which may not be nearly as prestigious but apparently is better at evaluating deserving members.

Randy Gradishar clips start at around the thirty-minute mark and are preceded by those of Louis Wright.

Forgotten Superstars: Speed Buggy

"Wrench"
"Wrench"
"Socket"
"Socket"

As the opening theme and the resulting assembly of the cartoon vehicle known as Speed Buggy continued in 1973-74 on a Saturday morning on CBS, there was a decent chance that I was in front of the TV watching.
I'm also sure that a better than average chance that my brother (a little over a year old) was somewhere around me, not really caring about Speed Buggy, but there wasn't much else for me to do, let alone for someone of his age to do, so he was likely around the television because that is where I was!

Speed Buggy was a cartoon that basically took the two Hanna-Barbera cartoon hits from the previous few seasons, Scooby Doo (1969) and Josie and the Pussycats (1970), changed things up a hair with the premise (replacing the traveling van or rock band with a racing car), kept what worked (a wacky non-human interacting with teenagers.) and spun it into a "new" cartoon.
After all, if you sat down and watched all three of those cartoons, it would not be difficult to find the common thread in writing and the shows themselves and if you weren't familiar with them going into this 90 minute binge (I'd be hard-pressed to find someone unfamiliar with Scooby-Doo.), I'd bet that they would either like or dislike all three.
Speed Buggy was a talking car with three traveling teenagers (I've never understood how no one ever questioned why so many of these 70s shows had teenagers traveling around the country/world without any type of supervision) on a racing circuit where they raced for championships and yet still had time to defeat various villains on their way to victory despite being deviated from their course on every episode ( I also have never understood why there was no one around from the circuit to disqualify them for not following the correct course.).
Famous voice actor Mel Blanc voiced Speed Buggy, and "Debbie" of the three teenagers was voiced by Arlene Golonka, who was a character actress that had achieved her biggest fame, a few years before as Ken Berry's love interest on "Mayberry RFD", which was a favorite show of Battlin' Bob's.
Speed Buggy can still be seen on Cartoon Network and Boomerang every so often and Speed Buggy made a few guest appearances on cartoons later in the 70s such as Scooby-Doo and Laff-a-lympics as part of the"Scooby Doobies" team.

So, I'm sure you may be wondering why a cartoon that lasted one season (although Speed Buggy episodes were shown for several years following ) and for a total of sixteen episodes (Speed Buggy was seen often on Saturday, they were the same sixteen episodes) has its own post?
Well, I was skimming through the internet and saw the above picture of the very first lunchbox that I owned as I entered first grade in 1974.
Lunchboxes were a very big deal in 1970s elementary school culture and the one thing that made preparing for school shopping tolerable was selecting your lunchbox for the year.
One thing that I could give my mother credit for in these situations was that each year, we (my brother later in the decade as well) would be allowed to pick a new lunchbox.
This was not a small perk, as many kids would use the same box for years, especially considering how many corners that were cut on clothes, shoes, etc.
My mom started to get the hint a little bit about how rough these things could be on kids by the time I hit the upper schools, but in elementary school, lunchbox equality was about all that I had going for me.

Little did I know and in hindsight, why did Hanna-Barbera make this decision and that as I was selecting Speed Buggy as my lunchbox of choice that another Speed Buggy cartoon (other than a guest appearance) would never see the light of day.
Why would you release lunchboxes etc. of a program that you had already decided to cancel?
Merchandise wise, I have a hard time believing that Speed Buggy was going to be a big seller without new episodes on Saturday mornings, so it still doesn't make sense all these years later.
Memorabilia based on Speed Buggy was small, other than the lunchbox, a basic board game, a short comic book run and I think a few years later, the four characters might have been part of a Hanna-Barbera Slurpee cup series at Seven-Eleven, but that's about it from the seventies.
There was a small Matchbook-style car made in 1998 that I think is in the attic with a lot of my stuff that I bought before we moved and I think it's still in the packaging.

It's funny how a picture of something brings long-dead memories back to you.
A school bus, the kid you sat beside because he had a Speed Buggy box too even though you had never met, the times you used it and the time that it was moved aside for other lunchboxes and later to the point of no lunchbox at all.
And sometimes even the person that you used to watch cartoons beside you in a far different place and time comes to mind as well.
I'm sure that Speed Buggy box is still at my parents' house, just about everything from childhood that I didn't bring here still is, I wonder how what kind of shape it's in after 45 years?
1974 and 45 years is a long time to a metal lunchbox after all!
Perhaps I'll drag it out one day and see if it still has any memories left to jump out when I open that lid!

Thanks for reading some memories of a short-lived cartoon and a little kid that watched it on Saturdays in front of the old school floor model television!

Forgotten Superstars: Billy Cannon

We return to the Forgotten Superstars universe to reflect on a player that reached the highest of highest and hit a low depth before paying his debt and redeeming himself with good works.

The 1959 Heisman Trophy winner, Billy Cannon of LSU was more than the average Heisman winner and one could argue that Cannon's charisma was a double-edged sword on and off the field.
Cannon was a star on the 1957 Tigers, but the bigger star was future NFL Hall of Famer Jim Taylor and Cannon was a player that thrived with Taylor drawing the attention of defensive gameplans but was not the focus of those plans with Cannon playing halfback next to Taylor along with defensive back, punter and returning kicks as what scouts would call today a "Swiss Army Knife" of a player.

Cannon would then lead the Tigers to their first national championship in 1958 as Cannon took over for the graduated Jim Taylor as the top weapon for LSU.
Cannon was moved to full-time offense and led the SEC in rushing and touchdowns as he was named the SEC player of the year.
Cannon would finish third in the 1958 Heisman race behind Army's Pete Dawkins and Iowa's Randy Duncan before scoring all seven points in LSU's Sugar Bowl win over Clemson by throwing a touchdown pass and kicking the extra point.

The Tigers didn't defend their national title in 1959, but Cannon gave their fans the play that defined their program on Halloween Night against Ole Miss.
At that time, it was the Rebels, who were the Tigers' top rival, not Alabama as the Tide were a rebuilding former power in their second season under Bear Bryant.
The undefeated pair (LSU #1, Ole Miss #3) moved into late in the game with the Rebels holding a 3-0 lead when Cannon grabbed an Ole Miss punt, broke seven tackles and raced 89 yards for the winning touchdown in a play that is still seen today on television and is replayed before every Tiger game inside Tiger Stadium to this day.
What is often forgotten about that game is Ole Miss driving to the Tigers one yard with 18 seconds to go and Cannon (with help from Warren Rabb) wrapping up a Rebel runner on fourth down to end the game.
The Heisman race was over and despite LSU losing to Tennessee the following week by one point and a Sugar Bowl rematch loss to Ole Miss, it was Cannon winning by a landslide over Penn State quarterback Richie Lucas for the 1959 award.


As Cannon prepared for that Sugar Bowl, he signed a contract with the Los Angeles Rams for the 1960 season, but immediately following the Sugar Bowl, Cannon signed another deal with the Houston Oilers of the brand-new American Football League, which had yet to play a game, under the goalposts ( I did say immediately after the game) for much more money (each deal gave a $10.000 signing bonus, but the Rams total over three years was $30,000 compared to the Oilers three year total was $100,000 plus a new Cadillac) than the established NFL offered.
Even in 1959, the answer to such issues would be in litigation and that's where it ended up with the judge allowing Cannon to take the larger deal with the Oilers and allow Cannon to make history as the first $100,000 football player.

Cannon was one of a handful of players to be part of the entire run of the American Football League (1960-69) with his biggest years with the Oilers as he led the team in rushing in 1960 and the league in the same category in 1961 as the Oilers won the first two AFL titles with Cannon winning the AFL title game MVP in both seasons.


Cannon suffered a back injury that he played through in the 1962 season, would miss most of the 1963 season due to his back problems and would ask for a trade, which he would receive as he was sent to Oakland.
Cannon put together a solid 1964 after playing the year at fullback, but was moved to tight end in 1965 and caught only seven passes in an offense that used the tight end almost always as an extra blocker on the offensive line.
Under new coach John Rauch, Cannon was rejuvenated as he was allowed to run pass patterns downfield as a deep threat.
Cannon would only catch 14 passes, but the catches were for a total of 436 yards and averaged 31 yards per reception and things would only get better in 1967 as Cannon caught 32 passes for over 600 yards and ten touchdowns for the AFL champion Raiders.
Cannon's numbers dipped in 1968 (23, 360 and 6 TD's) and further in 1969 ( 21, 262 and 2 scores), so it wasn't a surprise that he was released in training camp of 1970 after the Raiders had spent their first-round draft pick on a tight end in Raymond Chester.
Cannon was talked into playing for the Kansas City Chiefs by head coach Hank Stram and would play six games, catching two touchdowns, before an injury ended his season and career.

Cannon had studied in the off-season to become a dentist and opened a successful practice in Baton Rouge, but despite his success and fame in the area, Cannon fell into deep financial holes, due to gambling losses and bad investments and made a poor decision.
Cannon became involved with a counterfeiting ring that printed over six million dollars in 1983 and was sentenced to a five-year term and would serve two and a half years of that sentence.
Upon release, Cannon would become the dentist at the Louisiana State Penitentiary as an occasional fill-in and through his work, Cannon would first become the full-time dentist and eventually the head of the entire medical system.
Cannon's problems weren't all his own, his son, Billy Jr, was selected by the Dallas Cowboys in the first round of the 1984 draft, but only eight games into his rookie season Billy Jr suffered a career-ending neck injury.

Billy Cannon's post-prison life was one that saw him working with prisoners, still beloved by the
LSU fans and was rewarded with a statue for the Tigers only Heisman winner that was unveiled in September 2018, four months after Cannon passed away at the age of 80.

We welcome Billy Cannon into the Forgotten Superstars universe as the latest entry and for those of you fans of the rockabilly style of music, Jay Chevalier with his song titled "Billy Cannon".

Bob Kalsu and division

Memorial Day brings thoughts of the Americans that died in battle and the Forgotten Superstars series looks at the only active professional athlete to be killed in the Vietnam War.

Bob Kalsu played just one season for the Buffalo Bills before going to Vietnam and losing his life.
Kalsu had been an All-America guard at Oklahoma and in the waning days of the American Football League, Kalsu was the backup to future Hall of Famer Billy Shaw and was thought to be moving into Shaw's position upon his retirement (Shaw's final season was Kalsu's rookie year and it's easy to assume that would have happened without Kalsu's military commitment)

I'm not going to get into Kalsu's story too much here.
Sports Illustrated and the defunct Grantland did that in the linked articles and very well at that.
However, what it does make me think of is patriotism in the country then and now and how our country is as divided now as it was then, but for differing reasons.
Back then, the dividing line was the Vietnam War and I could respect someone's view on the issue, no matter the opinion.
War is a moral decision and one person's justified encounter can be another's invasion without cause and it is one that can be seen either way.

The Vietnam War divided a nation and yet here we are again with another divided country and the divisive party this time is not as much about a political party as much as it is about one man and his party relentless rolling over to his behavior.
Not that the opposition has done anything to make themselves a viable option other than say "we dislike....." and I think that's the problem in opposition.
Stand for something.
One side stands for keeping power no matter the cost, the other simply in taking that person away without plans for doing so and there is your divide over nothing.
Stand for something.

Bob Kalsu stood for something and left a potentially lucrative career to serve, much as Pat Tillman would do later, but I wonder what Kalsu would say today about the division in our nation.
Would he be as fast to serve again if needed today?
Would he be OK with a country grinding its gears against each other?
I wonder how far we have come in the interim since the Vietnam War and how as a country we haven't seemed to learn about unifying as a nation.
We can have differences in policy, opinions and how we see things, but as a nation, we have never seemed to recover from the cleaving of the nation over the Vietnam War,

That being the case, There are few people alive (and those numbers dwindle every day) that lived during a time that truly was Country first.
Not partisan ideas, Not political parties and certainly not over the political leaders that have been chosen to represent their parties over the last decades.
No matter your side, I'm not sure I'll ever see the days of a united country again unless it's a short term coming together after tragedy.
It's too bad and after a day of remembering lost lives for a country and way of life that the world used to envy, that my thoughts went to division, not unification.
Bob Kalsu and so many others like him., deserve better.

Forgotten Superstars: Toby Harrah

I've written before about my favorite player growing up with the occasional note that I found online, and I've even written about his trade to the Indians that changed my baseball allegiance forever, but I've never devoted a Forgotten Superstars segment to Toby Harrah.

Harrah was my favorite player for no particular reason, really.
My dad had been a Washington Senators and stayed with the team when they moved to Texas to become the Rangers, and even though he would eventually shift to the Orioles as he grew tired of waiting for a baseball return to the District (Ironically, he's never warmed up to the Nationals). When I was picking baseball teams, I selected the teams that he rooted for (Which didn't happen after that, except for the Maryland Terrapins)  in the Rangers and Pirates.

Harrah was originally drafted by the Phillies. But the Washington Senators were drafted away in the minor league draft, similar to the Rule Five draft today, after his first season.

Harrah made his major league debut with the Senators late in the 1969 season, used mostly as a pinch-runner with only one plate appearance, before winning the starting shortstop position for Washington in their final season in 1971.
Harrah would be the final active player to have played for the Washington Senators when he retired after the 1986 season. Still, his rookie season as a Senator was nothing to indicate stardom as Harrah hit just .230 with only one homer in 127 games with 23 errors defensively.

The 1972 move to Texas didn't improve Harrah's numbers appreciably, but a strong first half and the MLB rule to have one player from each team allowed Harrah to make his first of four All-Star teams. For the 1972 season, Harrah's average rose somewhat to .259 and doubled his power numbers to two homers, but in 1973, Harrah's career showed his first signs of being more than an average player as he hit ten homers along with keeping his average in the same area (.260) for the 57 win Rangers in the only season that Whitey Herzog managed in Texas.

It was 1974 that saw Harrah's breakout season as the surprising Rangers under Billy Martin improved their record by thirty games from the previous season (54 to 84 victories), and Harrah was a key player in the upturn as he again finished with a .260 batting average, but hit twenty homers with 74 RBI.
Harrah's time playing under Martin helped him develop as a player, but Harrah was also established as a favorite of Martin's, and seemingly every off-season was filled with rumors and various attempts by Martin's next team in New York trying to acquire Harrah to play shortstop for the Yankees.

It's funny, had the Yankees obtained Harrah, they would have never received the famous 1978 playoff homer from Bucky Dent, or if there is a parallel universe somewhere that has Red Sox fans cursing the name Toby Bleeping Harrah!

Harrah continued to improve his game in 1975 with a career-high in RBI (93) and jumping in batting average to. 293 in making his second All-Star team and would be voted to his only starting All-Star spot in 1976 despite a small slide in statistics to .260 with 15 homers.
Yes, for those of you scoring at home, Toby Harrah's batting average was exactly .260 for three out of four seasons!

In 1977, the Rangers moved Harrah from shortstop to third base, and Harrah responded with his career-high in homers with 27 and led the league in walks with 109.
Harrah's eye at the plate was underrated, but from 1975 to 1985, Toby never struck out more often than he walked, and he was an underrated base stealer as well, as he swiped 27 bases in the second of his three 20/20 seasons (also 75 and 79) in 1977.
Harrah didn't make the All-Star team despite the improved numbers due to the competition at third base in the AL at the time, but despite hitting. 263, this was likely his best overall season as a Ranger with his top Texas OPS number as well at .872.

The 1978 Rangers were favored in some quarters to win the AL West as owner Brad Corbett traded for Al Oliver, Bobby Bonds, and Jon Matlack as well as signing free agent Richie Zisk, but even with 87 wins, the Rangers never seemed to jell and finished five games behind Kansas City as crusty veteran manager Billy Hunter battled with his team all season with Hunter being fired on the season's next to last day.

Toby must have struggled with Hunter as he delivered his career-worst season as well (.222, 12, and 59 with only a career-high 31 stolen bases standing out on the stat sheet), although I've never read a particular problem between the two, only the general problems with Hunter and the team.

I've always wondered how Hunter sat his starting third baseman for both games of a 1978 doubleheader, yet he was healthy enough to pinch-run for his only appearance on my tenth birthday, which my present was tickets to see the Rangers in Baltimore.

The disappointing season for the Rangers meant another shakeup was in store, and the Rangers made several moves that included moving Bobby Bonds after one season and the two most popular Rangers, Mike Hargrove and Toby Harrah.
The three were moved in three different trades, but by June 1979, all three were with the Indians (Hargrove was traded to the Padres over the winter before a June trade to Cleveland).

I've written before about the trade that unofficially sent then ten-year-old Shawn to the Indians as well, with the Rangers adding Buddy Bell in the one-for-one trade.
There has been a small myth that the Rangers "won" the trade, but I'd argue that the trade was pretty even.
Bell was the better fielder and the better hitter for average; Harrah was the superior power hitter (Bell finished with only six more career homers, despite playing two more seasons) and was more of a threat to steal a base.

If Texas had an edge, it was that they had Bell for eight years (.293, 87, 499 RBI, and .782 OPS) compared to Harrah's tenure in Cleveland, which lasted five years (.281, 70, 324 RBI, and .799 OPS), but on average, the two are very even.

The Indians in the '70s and '80s were always a team looking for an identity.
One year, they would build around power, another speed, and in others, pitching.

The Wahoo's would also zig-zag between veteran teams and youth so after the Indians had tried to work with youth for the past few years entering 1979, they were attempting to bring in some veterans to lift the team to respectability and despite finishing sixth in the best division in baseball, they were respectable at 81-80 as had they been in the western division, they would have finished fifth, but a half-game (due to a rainout that was not replayed) out of fourth and only a game in a half behind third-place Texas.

Harrah helped those 1979 Indians, an average team long forgotten by all but the most diehard Cleveland fans, to that record with the final of his 20/20 seasons, hitting homers and steals right on the nose with 20 in each column.

Harrah's numbers dropped in 1980 (.267 and 11 homers) and his average improved in the strike season of 1981(.291 and 5 longballs), but his career season was on tap as in 1982, Harrah made his fourth and final All-Star team as he hit above .300 (.304) for the only time in his career, smacked 25 homers (second highest in his career), knocked in 78 runs from the second spot in the batting order, stole 17 bases, finished with a career-high of .888 and played all 162 games- all at the age of 33.

That was his last big season as in 1983, Toby's stats took a fall (.266 and nine homers), and missed a month of the season, so the time was right for the Indians to move him and finally, after all those years, the Yankees got their man as Harrah was sent to Gotham for reliever George Frazier, outfielder Otis "My Man!" Nixon and minor leaguer Guy Elson.

The Yankees would be disappointed as Harrah hit just .217 and one home run in only 88 games, as it seemed Harrah didn't care for playing in New York and at the age of 36, looked to be through as the Yankees returned Harrah to Texas for outfielder Billy Sample.
Harrah was moved to second base and played pretty well in 1985 (.270, 9, and an OPS of .820) in 126 games, but he would retire after a weak 1986 season at the age of 37, hitting only .218 with seven homers in 95 games.
Harrah would be elected to the Rangers Hall of Fame in  2009.

Harrah would later manage the Rangers for 76 games in the 1992 season to a record of 32-44, which was disappointing considering he replaced Bobby Valentine, who was canned after a 45-41 start.
Harrah would never manage in the big leagues again, but he would manage in the minors and coach with a few teams in the majors, including the Indians with former teammate Mike Hargrove managing and the Rockies with the player that his name is most attached to as the bench boss- Buddy Bell.

Toby Harrah isn't often thought about as a Hall of Fame-level player,  but by some sabremetricians, Harrah's career is more highly thought of, as Baseball Prospectus ranks him as the 25th best third baseman ever, ahead of some Hall of Famers and rated near the top of Wins Above Replacement Players or WAR, five times in his career.

Toby Harrah had a pretty solid career, was my favorite player, and the latest addition to our Forgotten Superstars Universe.

Forgotten Superstars:This Week In Baseball

"Dunnt Dunnt,, Dunnt Dunnt"
Those sounds might not read well on the printed page, but if you grew up in the 70s and 80s and were a baseball fan, I'm willing to bet that you could name that tune in two notes.

The instrumental known as "Jet Set" was just the theme to a game show named "Jackpot" that lasted less than two years on NBC before April of 1977.
And then that theme became a part of the sports fans culture with the start of "This Week in Baseball".

Major League Baseball's film department never approached what Steve Sabol built with NFL Films in the 1970s and I'll always believe that Sabol's work with the NFL was a key reason in football passing baseball as America's most popular sport, but they did make one solid contribution with "This Week in Baseball".
The syndicated show could be bought by any station but was usually purchased by NBC affiliates and placed in front on NBC's baseball "Game of the Week", which at that time was the only national telecast of MLB as ABC's Monday Night Baseball generally televised one of a few regional games.
One couldn't have a better "pre-game" show than highlights that you haven't seen unless it involved your local team that then would happen to have televised that game.
Unless you lived in those days, you cannot understand just how little baseball that fans actually watched live.
You had some road games of your local team, maybe the home opener, the NBC game on Saturday afternoon (and the Monday game in later years) and that was the ball game, so to speak for the available games to see.


The smartest decision that the show made was installing veteran Mel Allen as the voice of the show.
The folksy Allen was known as the "Voice of the Yankees" and between the location of the largest city in the country and in the days when the two participating teams announcers were used for the postseason, the Yankees dynasty meant Allen was extremely well-known by the national audience.
After Allen's surprising firing by the team following the 1964 season (the Yankees would not return to the postseason until 1976 when they had hired Allen back as pregame host), Allen hadn't been seen on the national stage with baseball since.
Scooping the veteran up for the premiere of the show gave the show a veteran presence to older fans, yet his lack of recent exposure allowed Allen to be more of a fresh voice to younger fans than he might have been otherwise.
A comparable example would be Ray Scott, who was the longtime voice for the NFL through the 50s and 60s, but by the mid-70s was considered past his prime and would never have the same exposure even on NFL Films, where he once did their "NFL GOW" in syndication.
Had Allen continued on Yankee broadcasts, he might have never gotten the TWIB position because he might not have been "cool enough" to the younger fans on a Saturday afternoon watching in between cartoons and the game of the week.

From the highlights from teams playing well from around the league to the spectacular plays, all the teams were well represented, which isn't always the case today, let alone in the time of TWIB.
Allen's catchphrases "How 'bout that?" "Hello, there everybody, this is Mel Allen" and of course "This week in BASEball!" became everyday lingo among baseball fans and kids playing pickup games and Allen's narration added so much to the show.
Mel Allen was the key to the show's success as it really suffered after his passing as replacement Warner Fussell, while not doing a terrible job by any means, was never going to be Mel Allen and
Allen may very well have been irreplaceable in the position.

Much like NFL Films, TWIB did an excellent job of pairing music to their highlights with big brassy sounds booming out of the speaker along with Rod Carew slapping a ball into the gap, Mike Schmidt driving a ball into the seats, or George Brett diving into the seats in an attempt to catch a popup.
Half of putting together a highlight video is matching the perfect music to what highlight is being shown and while the NFL version often has to match good and bad results, TWIB usually, with the exception of the blooper segments, were advertising the best in the game and matching spirited, upbeat backgrounds to what is happening on the screen.
Music in these situations set the tone and the right music just makes the viewer feel the anticipation and emotion of the moment.
MLB didn't master the total emotional peaks and valleys with TWIB as the NFL counterpart did, but they were doing a different type of program and what they did the music matched perfectly.

TWIB ran from 1977-1998, but its heyday was from 1977-1989 when NBC held the rights to MLB.
CBS would pay a record amount to move baseball to their network for the 1990 season and then made a ridiculous decision to limit their telecasts to the postseason with the elimination of the game of the week.
Without TWIB being able to slot in as the natural lead-in to the game of the week, the ratings for the show dropped and with exposure dwindling the demise of the show was a matter of time and the 1996 death of Allen (his participation had begun to decrease anyway due to declining health) saw that the end was coming and in 1998 it did so.
Fox revived it in 2000 for an eleven-year run, but times and viewing habits had changed and it never seemed to find its audience as much of its content was old news in an era of cable television and internet.

Still, I have such a fondness for that show which was such a part of my baseball fandom as a fan that didn't root for the local team and between pro wrestling from 11-12, TWIB 12;30-1, the game of the week after and then the various network boxing shows, Saturday's were loaded with things to watch for me and I'm not sure I'll ever have that level of excitement for that type of lineup again.
Whether it was nostalgia for times gone by or it really was fun to enjoy the weekend, TWIB was a big part of those days and it'll always be special to hear that opening blast of brass!