In the year 1947, Jackie Robinson took to the field for the Brooklyn Dodgers becoming the first African-American to play in Major League Baseball. Here are a few facts about his life:
Jackie Robinson was born on January 31, 1919 in Cairo, Georgia but raised in Pasadena California.
Jack Roosevelt Robinson was named after Teddy Roosevelt.
Jackie Robinson was the youngest of five children.
His older brother Mack, a silver medalist in track and field at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, inspired him to pursue his interest in athletics, and the younger Robinson ultimately earned varsity letters in baseball, basketball, football and track while at John Muir High School.
Also, in high school, Jackie Robinson played on a team with other future Hall of Famers Ted Williams and Bob Lemon.
He became the first UCLA Bruin to earn varsity letters in four sports — the same four in which he starred in high school — and he won the NCAA long jump championship in 1940.
Jackie met his future wife, Rachel, while at UCLA.
He spent two years playing semi-professional football for integrated teams in leagues in Hawaii and California before being drafted into the U.S. Army in the spring of 1942.
In early 1945 he was signed by the Negro League team the Kansas City Monarchs.
As a Dodger, Robinson would go on to hit .311 over a 10-year career.
He became the first Black player to win the National League Most Valuable Player Award in 1949, when he led the league in hitting with a .342 average, most stolen bases (37) and achieving career-high 124 RBI.
Robinson was an All Star every year from 1949-1954.
He led Brooklyn to a World Series championship over the rival New York Yankees in 1956.
After retiring from the Brooklyn Dodgers, Robinson acted as a sportscaster, worked as a business executive at Chock full o’Nuts, and was active in the NAACP and other civil rights groups. Meanwhile, the Dodgers moved to L.A. in 1959.
Weakened by heart disease and diabetes, Robinson died in 1972 at the age of 53 from a heart attack suffered at his home in Stamford, Connecticut.
His number 42 has been permanently retired from baseball and April 15th is designated as Jackie Robinson Day.
1940 was the first National Championship for Indiana in basketball, following a 60-42 win over Kansas. Coach Branch McCracken led the charge and established the scoring mark that has proven to be magical in Hoosier round-ball history. No one has ever worn jersey #60 in basketball, but it just might might deserve future consideration. It’s the number the team needs to get to first to assure a win, as proven through years of game research. However, back in 1940, the championship game was the first time they ever actually got to 60-points in 20 victories that year. Sixty is not necessarily an offensive goal, but rather a defensive standard.
In recently talking with Jeff Oliphant, a member of the 1987 National Champions, he indicated that Coach Knight would often write the number 63 on the strategy board as a defensive goal, much as Coach Woodson in his first year quickly enforced lap-running penalties for turnovers over 12 in his first year of coaching. This was talked about frequently by the game announcers early in the season. I wondered if “The General” was as conscious of the importance of 60, as I was as a fan, and was his number of 63 an adjustment after the shot clock and 3-point shot came into play? Even without those new rules that favored more offense, Jeff and I watched the Maryland victory together, as the 2022 team held the Terps to 55 points while committing only 10 turnovers. At the midpoint of the season, it was easily their best performance so far and my 60-point level still commanded a timeless place in securing victory.
Woodson has added a welcome spark to a program that has badly suffered since the Knight era. Mike Davis capitalized on Knight recruits to get to the final game in 2002. Then came Kelvin Sampson and recruiting violations, Tom Crean who missed the tourney five times in nine years, and Archie Miller who couldn’t beat Purdue or even make the NCAA field of 68. Strong defense has once again become a I.U. priority, but they allowed Syracuse to get to 60 first and lost in double overtime. They then got stuck on 59 for the last three minutes of the game against Wisconsin and they cruised by us for the 64-59 victory. This is an excellent example of how important that magical 60-mark is in closing out a game.
IU did not get to 60 in the 61-58 loss to Penn State, while Iowa held them at the 57-threshold for nearly two minutes and eventually passed them up for victory 83-74. The Hoosiers hit 57 against rival Purdue at the 10:28 mark of the second half with an 8-point lead and finally got to 61 at 7:34 on a Race Thompson dunk, then held on for victory, snapping a 9-game Boiler winning streak. Even in the early stages of the Woodson campaign, the “rule of 60” has already played a significant role. Quite simply, if the Hoosiers get to that pivotal point first, they win.
2021-22 defensive averages are some of the best in team history, dating back to the fifties. So far, IUD has limited opponents to 63-points per game. Only the Mike Davis finalist team of 2001-02 at 62.6, Tom Crean’s 2012-13 average of 62,1, Kelvin Sampson’s 2006-07 61.8. and Bob Knight’s 1980-81 championship team at 58.5 have been better on opponent points per game. All of those teams had at least first round tourney success. Averages then predictably swelled into the 70.0 range with the addition of the 3-pointer in 1986-87. Steve Alford used it to perfection in winning our 5th National Crown that year, but it has appeared to be our nemesis ever since.
Data provided by Gracenote, A Nielsen Company. Copyright © 2000-2022 Sports Reference LLC. All rights reserved.
Back in 1998, nearly 24-years ago, I started to write a book about IU basketball. I was on my way back from the Maui Invitational after a 76-63 Hoosier loss in the finals to Syracuse. It was revenge for the Orange who fell in heartbreaking fashion to the Hoosiers back in the 1987 NCAA Championship on the last second shot by Keith Smart. The Maui Championship was little compensation for that setback, but would finally get their overall crown in 2003 with Jim Boeheim still at the helm. Mike Davis had taken over as the Hoosier head coach after Bob Knight was fired in 2000, so Maui was the last matchup between these two coaching legends.
In the Maui game, Syracuse got to the sixty-point mark first, my personal measure for what it takes to beat IU. Over the next two years, I began to research this theory through several trips to the IU Sports Information offices in Bloomington. What I found is that Sixty is truly a magical number when it comes to analyzing IU victories. If they get there first, they usually win – it’s as simple as that!
After a visit from a friend these past few days, I’m suddenly revitalized in my efforts to finish this book. With this former IU basketball player’s help, I now feel that I can gain the credibility to get the “Magic of 60” published.
I realize that most of my posts this week have not been necessarily humorous, as is my writing goal every morning. After all, I should be in a good mood after such a brilliant game (or at least first half) that I.U. played in defeating conference foe Penn State, but I’ve been troubled with serious matters like finance, death, family, and neighborhood issues. Life is not always a “Box of Chocolates,” as Forrest Gump’s Mom might remind him. I actually watched a Tom Hank’s movie, Cast Away, this week on Free Form out of boredom. It was his serious side of acting and something I hadn’t watched in a long time.
I’m actually getting an early start to this blog because we’re picking up friends at the airport this morning. It will be a shortened run on day 4,779 of The Streak. “Run, Forrest, Run.” I’m borrowing my son’s car for the weekend, so we’ll have plenty of room for luggage and guests. We have dinner reservations and games to watch, as one of our guests is a former I.U. basketball player. Blogging my not be as automatic each morning with my home routine gladly disrupted.
On Matinee Monday, we saw the movie, The King’s Daughter, because that’s how we usually start every week of retirement and since it’s still free! We had seen most everything else, and this one turned out to be a bit of a surprise, with memories of our visit to the Palace of Versailles a few years ago. It was not a historical piece as expected but instead a fantasy about mermaids and their gifts of healing immortality. The phrase, “Love is Immortal,” struck my wife as very romantic and inspired some poetry on my part. It’s not the usual sing-song, humor that I write, but rather a reflection on the word IMMORTALITY and its impact on long-standing relationships like ours:
I Love You, Sweetiepie,
More than words can Express.
Measured through years,
Of Knowing the True you.
Real beauty seen inside and out,
Trusting you always to be Mine,
And part of me Forever.
Love for us will Never end,
Immortality is Ours.
Timeless treasured Twosome,
You and I eternally One.
You never really lose someone that you LOVE!
Copyright 2022 johnstonwrites.com
I have been to many IU-Purdue basketball games in my lifetime and have never seen the Hoosiers lose – neither at Mackey Arena or Assembly Hall. Of course, I haven’t gone in many years, especially during this recent streak of 9-straight Boilermaker victories. I would have liked to have been there last night when the Hoosier fans stormed the court, something that Bob Knight would have never have approved of doing. His philosophy was to conduct yourself as if you’re expected to win. However, considering the past five years, I admittedly had no expectations for a win.
The #4 Boilers have bullied the Hoosiers of late, and Rob Phinisee knows better than anyone, having never beaten them in his four years of school. He grew up a Lafayette kid and raised eyebrows with his decision to go to Bloomington. Last night, for the first time, he felt that he had finally made the right choice. His heroics of “Rocky-like” proportions, ended the Black & Gold domination. “Phin for the win!” It was perhaps even more dramatic than Christian Watford’s dagger against top-rated Kentucky eleven-years ago, but nowhere in comparison to “The Shot” by Keith Smart to win the 1987 National Championship. I was there in New Orleans for that historic moment.
It was JUST Purdue this time, another BIG Conference victory, but for hungry, deprived IU basketball fans, it was the sweetest moment ever. It might mean an elusive NCAA Tourney bid for the Hoosiers, regardless of the outcome of the re-match at Purdue, a team that could go on to win it all. After all, the 1981 I.U. National Champs lost at Purdue by two-points, before the 3 was ever a factor, and cruised through the tournament. I’m actually hoping for the same thing to happen for Purdue this year. They are a good enough team to finally hang their own banner. However, let’s take this moment to celebrate. Take that you BIG Bully!
On June 19,1926, DeFord Bailey became the first African-American to perform on Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry. The Opry house has since moved to Opryland, but the historic Ryman Theater, that housed the Opry acts through 1974, is celebrating its 130th anniversary. It will be part of our summer tour up through the Midwest that also includes Panama City, Tuscaloosa, Indianapolis, Mackinac Island, Cleveland, Canton, Asheville, and Hilton Head. We plan to take the Nash Trash Tour, a comedy show on wheels through the key sights of the city on that Tennessee stop along the way. A night at the famous Grand Hotel is our ultimate destination, and the northernmost point on our drive. Other Michigan city destinations will include Ludington, Petoskey, and Traverse City.
We just returned from Vanderbilt Beach and Bonita Springs after an overnight stay with Indy friends and lunch with hometown Elkhart acquaintances. My wife is hosting a bridge club this afternoon, while I try to figure out what happened to my whiskey delivery from Flaviar? They report it delivered and signed for two weeks ago. I have video of the delivery person who set off my Ring doorbell and walked away with the box since no one was home. It required a signature, so I’ve been waiting for the second attempt, but Sonic Transportation claims the delivery was made. Someone will probably lose their job over this, but I hope they enjoyed my spirits.
I probably would have needed that sedative spirit tonight for the I.U. vs. Purdue basketball game, but I have other liquids to ease the pain. I have a bad feeling about this one after nine straight Hoosier losses. It will be tough for the Hoosier big men, TJD, Durr, and Race, to contain the #4-ranked Boiler twin towers of Williams and Edey. The “Good Guys in Crimson” also have Jaden Ivey and Sasha Stefanovic in Black & Gold to contend with on the perimeter. I’m certainly tired of losing to Purdue, and the only hope is that IU has not yet been defeated at home this season. When I most desperately need them – Where are my spirits?
It is a cloudy “Matinee Monday,” a good afternoon for indoor entertainment. Tomorrow, we head to Vanderbilt Beach, about an hour-and-a-half south of us for a reunion with Indianapolis friends. We got together last year about this time of year, as they take a two-week break from the cold before heading back to WORK. I can barely remember the meaning of that four-letter word. Obviously, they are a bit younger than we are. We’ll spend the night, with Tally staying with a new sitter, a neighbor from the dog park. The folks from “Schnauzerville” where she likes to go are on a cruise, but it’s good to have multiple options for pet care as much as we’d like to travel. On Wednesday morning we’ll drive into nearby Bonita Springs and meet some hometown friends for lunch. She was the wife of a good high school friend who died several years ago and has been in a new relationship for awhile. I’ve yet to meet him, but soon will, since they too are getting away from the chilly Indiana weather.
Florida is a great place to renew acquaintances with the Midwest snowbirds. I guess at one time I could have been considered such an animal, but I’m now a full time resident. I was pretty far removed from my Hoosier friends, living both in Austin and Portland for the last dozen years. Only rarely did we have visitors, but I had the good fortune of knowing several Oregon Hoosiers, dating back to high school. I miss hanging out with them, especially “Leadership Meetings” at Buffalo Wild Wings. They’re coming down here for Spring Training, plus I’ll visit them in Portland come September.
We got some of the fliers out yesterday for the Neighborhood Meet-up in a few weeks and will see a lot of them tonight at the events center for a movie one of them produced. It could be two movies in one day for my wife and I! As a result, I will miss some of the IU basketball game tonight, but have a feeling that this may be a good thing – we have little to gain and a lot to lose. The team has not won a BIG road game in nearly a year, plus Nebraska is last in the conference. If we lose this one – all hope is gone. It will be better to simply monitor the score and keep my comments to myself. Getting together with these new neighbor friends will be a welcome distraction.
Another decade has passed in “Blog World” as I move into the “Roaring Twenties.” In the real world I’m also in the Twenties – year 2022. “The Roaring Twenties, sometimes stylized as the Roarin’ 20s, refers to the decade of the 1920s in Western society and Western culture. This period saw the large-scale development and use of automobiles, telephones, films, radio, and electrical appliances in the lives of millions in the Western world.”
I live in many worlds, including those revolving around writing this blog, the Ban(n)ister family, my running streak, sports, reading, and watching TV. However, in reality, it’s all about my marriage, my son and his family, as well as getting settled in a new home. Tonight will be “Date Night,” but I will not be my wife’s date and we missed “Sunset Tuesday” and “Tourist Thursday” due to other obligations. The upcoming weekend is completely free for once.
I gave blood yesterday, while my wife added another bridge class as she continues to learn the game. She’s out the door again for an Aqua Fit class after her morning routine with Tally at the dog park. This afternoon she has a tap class and in the evening an event at the Venice Art Museum with girlfriends. She’s incredibly active in retirement, while I limit my exercise to an early morning run and swim. Interaction for me is limited, while she drives our social engagements. We’ll soon be having another “Meet The Neighbors” gathering in early February. I’m in mourning after last night’s IU basketball loss at Iowa, something I’m getting used to, although it’s unsettling to be frequently on the losing side.
USC and Baylor, the only undefeated teams of the early 2021-22 basketball season, both fell this week. This preserves the multi-decade streak of the 1975-76 Indiana University Hoosiers, the last college basketball team to finish the regular season and tournament unblemished at 32-0. It’s now been 46 years since this unbeatable perfection has been tied. “Five teams have finished the regular season undefeated since 1976 — with the most recent being Wichita State in 2014, Kentucky in 2015 and Gonzaga in 2021. Two of those teams — 1991 UNLV and 2015 Kentucky lost in the Final Four.” UCLA is the only other university to have achieved this level of NCAA greatness – 1967 (30-0), 1972 (30-0) and 1973 (30-0). The record lives on, at least another year.
After two straight BIG home victories, the Hoosiers seem to be back in winning form this season and competitive in the conference at 2-2. After their recent performances, many expect them to finish in the Top 5, while the top half would get them in the Big Dance for the first time since 2016. They still have to prove they can win on the road to earn an evasive NCAA tourney bid (their 40th in history), and they have to break Purdue’s recent domination that now stands at an embarrassing 9-straight dating back to 2016. That sole Hoosier victory was in Bloomington, stopping another 3-game Boiler winning streak. It’s hardly the perfection that I once experienced watching them lose only one game in two full years just after I graduated.
Coach Mike Woodson, not to be confused with fellow Hoosier (Martinsville and Purdue) John Wooden, has produced a remarkable start in restoring the “Glory of Old IU.” Woodson has legendary status as a player, but far from achieving that level as a coach, and probably never to be associated in the same sentence with names like Knight and Wooden. Right now, all we can say is that he’s a few letters from being Wooden. Also, as we all know, it was Coach Wooden that directed those great UCLA undefeated teams.
“1914 saw the beginning of what became known as World War I, after Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the Austrian throne was assassinated by Serbian nationalist Gavrillo Princip. It also saw the first airline to provide scheduled regular commercial passenger services with heavier-than-air aircraft, with the St. Petersburg–Tampa Airboat Line.”
As Wikipedia went on to point out: “The St. Petersburg–Tampa Airboat Line (SPT Airboat Line) was the first scheduled airline using a fixed wing aircraft. The airline provided service between St. Petersburg, Florida and neighboring Tampa across Tampa Bay a distance of about 23 miles. It was in service from January to May 1914.”
The route that this flight covered is now drivable over the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, the modern link between Tampa and St. Petersburg. We drove it last weekend to get to Comic Com. It goes right past Tropicana Field where the Tampa Bay Rays beat the White Sox last season. “On May 9, 1980, Harbor Pilot John Lerro was guiding the ship MV Summit Venture under the Sunshine Skyway Bridge when storm winds pushed the vessel into the southern span. A chunk of the span came down. Vehicles fell into the water- a truck, five cars and a Greyhound bus. Thirty-five people died,“ once again according to Wikipedia. I can’t help think about it every time I cross.
As the war raged on in 1915, “the second year of the First World War, included the first German Zeppelin raid on England, the Gallipoli Campaign and the Battle of Loos. The first German Zeppelin raid on the east coast of England; Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn are both bombed.”
Speaking of a different kind of war, I watched the Paramount Plus adaptation of Stephen King’s The Stand, reminiscent of our current battle with Covid. King happens to live in this part of Florida, at least part of the time and is just as vulnerable as the rest of us. Fortunately, Coronavirus isn’t as deadly as Captain Trips, the fictional illness that he created.
We had lunch at Brown’s Food Factory, another mobile restaurant that visits our resort community on occasion. Today, it was a spicy breaded tenderloin that pleasantly didn’t include a long wait in line. We’re still looking for something to match the Indiana tenderloins that we enjoyed at places like the State Fair, Murphy’s Steakhouse, and The Mug & Bun. The closest we’ve found so far is nearby Darrell’s Restaurant.
Georgia is the new NCAA National Champion in football, a status that had eluded them since 1960, sixty-two-years ago. They gained revenge over an Alabama team that had beaten them for the SEC crown a month or so ago. Maybe 2022 will also be the year of the White Sox, as we once again cross the Skyline Bridge to watch them play?
