2017 Hall of Fame - Football

Over the weekend the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio inducted seven new members into the ranks of its membership.  Those inducted were Morten Anderson, Terrell Davis, Kenny Easley, Jerry Jones, Jason Taylor, LaDainian Tomlinson and Kurt Warner.

During the past 30 years I saw all of them play.  Briefly each of them was unique in their own way in which they dominated the game.

-Anderson impressed me with the longevity of his career. He played for five teams over 25 years and was named to the NFL All Decade Teams of the '80 and 90's.  He scored 2,544 points over that 25 year career.

-Terrell Davis spent his entire career with the Denver Broncos and when he was in the backfield with John Elway the Broncos were a force with which to be reckoned.  When the Broncos won Super Bowl 32 Davis was named the MVP as he scored the winning touchdown with less than two minutes left to beat the Green Bay Packers 31-24.

-Kenny Easley played at Safety for the Seattle Seahawks from the early to mid 80's  I only saw him on television since the Seahawks were still in the AFC at that time and the team I followed at Busch Stadium II, was the old St. Louis Cardinals before their move to Phoenix.  I remember Easley as quick and a hard hitter.  What surprised me was how long it took him to get to the Hall of Fame.

-Jerry Jones, who bought the Dallas Cowboys in 1989 and still owns them today, was never one of my favorites.  When he fired longtime Dallas legend Tom Landry I thought Jones was an ego maniac more interested in promoting himself than helping the Cowboys win.  What I didn't know at the time was he would hire his friend Jimmy Johnson and with Johnson's sills the Cowboys would win three Super Bowls in the mid '90s.  Jones also should be recognized for building a one billion dollar stadium with private funding.

-Jason Taylor was a quick strong defensive end whom I mainly remember from the Miami Dolphins. I never saw him play in person in St. Louis even when he played for the Redskins.  Taylor made six pro bowls and was a first year inductee into the Hall of Fame.

-LaDainian Tomlinson to me was the face of the San Diego Chargers.  I remember watching him play in college for TCU and knew he would be good in the pros.  And he was.  In 2006 Tomlinson rushed for 28 touchdowns and scored three more on pass receptions.  Tomlinson was named to the All Decade team by the NFL for the 2000's.  It's a shame he never got to play in a Super Bowl.

-Kurt Warner as a member of the St. Louis Rams became one of my favorite players and I count myself fortunate to have seen him play many a game for the Rams in their Super Bowl seasons of 1999 and 2001.  To be honest I never thought St. Louis would win a Super Bowl after they lost the Cardinals in 1987.  But, little did we know at that time a young man by the name of Warner would lead them to victory over the Tennessee Titans in Super Bowl 34.  You've probably heard the story of rising from grocery store stock clerk to pro quarterback so I won't re-visit that, but if a Hollywood screen writer had written it, the story would have been dismissed as unbelievable.  Warner quarterbacked "The Greatest Show on Turf" and with his talented offensive teammates, Marshall Faulk, Isaac Bruce and Torry Holt along with the coaching of Dick Vermeil and "Mad Mike" Martz, those teams re-wrote the offensive record books.  Warner, became a role model in St. Louis and he lived his Christian faith and gave back and continues to give to the St. Louis community today while living in Arizona.

The induction ceremony on Saturday night lasted four and a half hours and the speeches were long. I am not going to include videos for all seven of the inductees.  But, because Warner is one of my favorites players I am including the link to his speech.  The NFL Hall of Fame does not permit the video to be embedded into this blog so here again is the link to watch it on YouTube.  It lasts about a half hour but I loved every minute of it.  I hope you enjoy it as well.

Photo courtesy of azcardinals.com

2017 Hall of Fame - Baseball

Congratulations to the newest inductees into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.  John Schuerholz, Bud Selig, Jeff Bagwell, Tim Raines and Ivan Rodriguez are the newest members of the Hall.  I was fortunate to have seen this class play in person or see the game they had touched.

I saw several Schuerholz teams in person namely the 1985 Kansas City Royals and the Atlanta Braves of the 1990s.  As a St. Louis Cardinal fan I was disappointed in 1985 when the Royals came back from a three to one World Series game deficit to beat the Cardinals.  I lived in Central Missouri at the time and the Royals were my favorite American League team and I had seen them play five or six games that season at Kauffman Stadium.  But, when the Royals beat the Cards, especially in game six, it was a tough day.

I also saw Schuerholz teams that knocked the Cardinals out of the playoffs on several occasions in the late 90s. The thing I remember about those Braves teams was the pitching of Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and John Smoltz.  All three of them are now enshrined in the Hall at Cooperstown.

I was never a fan of Bud Selig but ultimately he does belong in the Hall of Fame because of the labor peace that existed after the strike of 1994.  He told those in attendance at his induction speech that was the toughest fall he has ever had.  I am still critical of Selig for letting the greed of owners and players cancel something that neither World War One or Two could terminate.  Selig will also be remembered and have to bear the responsibility for presiding over the games PED scandals of the late 90s and early 2000s.

Jeff  Bagwell was always a thorn in the side of the Cardinals.  It seemed as if each time the Houston Astros had runners in scoring position, Bagwell was coming to the plate at Busch Stadium.  There was a period in the mid 2000's when the Cards and Astros were rivals and seemed to run into each other each post season.  And one of the reasons the Astros were there was because of Bagwell.

I consider myself fortunate to have seen Tim Raines play against the Cardinals at Busch Stadium II on many occasions when the Montreal Expos came to town.  Having watched Lou Brock in his prime I always enjoyed seeing the role that speed played in manufacturing runs.  Raines was one of the best having stole over 800 bases in his career and having a success rate of stealing over 84 percent.  He was a switch hitter and had power from both sides of the plate.  I know because I saw him homer off Cardinal pitchers from both sides of the plate when he played against the Redbirds.

Ivan Rodriguez was one of the best catchers I ever got to see play in person. I did not see him as often as Raines and Bagwell because he played most of his career in the American League.  But, there was one afternoon in 1996 when I was travelling and in Milwaukee.  The Brewers played a day game at old Milwaukee County Stadium against the Texas Rangers and Rodriguez in early July.  Let's just say  "Pudge" owned the day.  He homered in the first inning on a blast into the left field stands and then came back and homered again in the sixth inning and drove in three more runs in what turned into a blowout.  To top it off Rodriguez also threw out a would be Milwaukee base thief and showed off that marvelous cannon of an arm that he owned.  That day made me a fan of Rodriguez for the rest of his career.