Brushes with sports fame
One of the nice things about living in and around Madison, and working near the university, is that you see a lot of the athletes from the Wisconsin sports teams. After their careers are done, a lot of them stick around the Madison area and you run into them from time to time.
Last night I had a chance to play goalie for a men’s group that I’ve played with in the past. I’ve only been playing in goal for a little over a year now, so I’m still learning a ton about what angles that you need to give to the shooters and I spend a ton of time working on my technique and trying not to flop like a fish when making a save. Honestly, it’s the most challenging position I’ve ever played in any sport and probably the most dangerous one as well, but I love it and really enjoy playing a few times every week.
So I get to the rink last night and see that a former Badger player is going to be skating in our group for the evening. I was excited because he was one of my favorite players on the championship team from a year ago, not because of his scoring ability or anything like that, but because you could see that the guy was 100% hustle all the time.
I won’t go into the whole details of the night, but I was happy to make a few saves on him and get beat…. very badly a few times as well.
So, after the game and having a few beers with him, I wondered how many of you have gotten to play with some of the athletes that we all get to watch, in person and on TV.
I can say that the first time that he was skating down the ice, I wasn’t thinking about trying to show him up or anything. All I thought to myself was, “Don’t screw up… don’t screw up.” After that, he was just another guy. Another guy that could probably crack my sternum with his slapshot, but just another guy.
March 21st, 2007 at 12:49 pm
Never played with an athlete, but I did get to shoot a commercial with Archie Griffin for The Ohio Society to Prevent Blindness. It was about 20 years ago. We played catch with him at tOSU and had blast.
March 21st, 2007 at 2:09 pm
I had the fortune/misfortune of playing a few pick-up games against Allen Iverson and a few of his friends in the spring of his senior year in high school. I was bigger, stronger, and a few years older, and he still took me to the rim and dunked. I got my shots, a few blocks and a steal, but I think in 5 games to 21 he averaged about 14.
My friends thought it funny to stick the lumbering guy with two bad knees on the fastest player on the planet. I didn’t find it funny at the time, but in hindsight I’m glad I got that hour or so on the court with him. He thought he was something special - which he was - but besides the usual trash talk of streetball he was really a nice guy.
March 22nd, 2007 at 9:25 am
I went to a lot of hockey camps growing up and the highlight was being on the ice with Bobby Orr. He has a camp in Ontario that I went to one summer. I can’t really beat that in hockey terms although I have been on the ice with Don Cherry too!