As a New York sports fan, I’ve got to chime in with a few I haven’t seen mentioned so far…
Joe Namath. I think he takes the cake as far as beloved NFLers. I’d watch this Pennington kid for 10 years and get back to this though. If you venture into coaches, everyone loves/hates/repects Parcells.
Don Mattingly. The legendary Yankees of days past are more that than beloved sports figures. The current crop of sports fans really love Donny Baseball. I’d also say Jeter is in the process of taking over this spot, we’ll look at it in a few years & see if he [Mets fan rant]doesn’t turn on his adoring public after being constantly compared to the great and powerful A-Rod. [/Mets fan rant] To pick a Met, you’d have to go Tom Seaver, Tug ‘ya gotta believe’ McGraw & Mookie Wilson.
The Hockey names I’ve seen mentioned (Messier/Trots) seem right on. Maybe Mike Richter & Dennis Potvin should be included in this as well.
Hoops goes back to the old Knicks. I’d pick Walt Fraizer. No one loved Ewing. Which is sad, but true.
As someone who was born and raised in Green Bay, I have to object to its inclulsion in any list of major cities.
Favre is pretty darn popular in Green Bay of course, but as Jerrybear said the old-time Packers are the truly revered guys. I would have to say that Ray Nitschke is probably tops (as far as players go). To a lot of fans, he just radiated the Packer essense, much like Butkus did for the Bears. He was a true Green Bay icon.
But the ultimate top guy is Vince Lombardi. Yeah, I know the OP was asking about players and not coaches, but it’s definatley Lombardi all the way. I mean, the guy has a middle school named after him, fer cryin’ out loud.
Born and raised in San Francisco. I think it starts off
Willie Mays
Joe Montana
and then you can start talking about others. Jerry Rice, Cepeda, McCovey*, DiMaggio (a North Beach, San Francisco kid). Oh, and don’t forget He Hate Me.
Troy, I must respectfully disagree. A previous poster described Hank Aaron/Atlanta as “prickly”, and I think that describes Mays’ relationship with SF. I think he was revered and idolized, but never really loved. The building of Pac Bell Park (never will I say “SBC”…) was seen by the Giants management as an opportunity to rehabilitate his image and get him on board. It worked, and it’s all good, but I think the fans loved McCovey in a way they never did Mays.
I’m not from Calgary, but living in the neighbouring province, I feel obliged to at least take a fairly confident stab at this one: it’s Lanny MacDonald, right?
I mean, it’s hard to hate a guy who not only played crazy hockey without a helmet, but also had a flaming red handlebar moustache that, by all accounts, could be observed from the International Space Station.
Well, I was yet to exist while he played, so I suppose I should defer ;), but the legend of Mays was alive and healthy well before Willie Mays Plaza was conceived of.
Ballparks should be named after (a) geographical landmarks; (b) dead sportswriters; (c) beer companies; (d) if all else fails, the team.
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“3Com” pissed me off because “Candlestick” was the name chosen by voters of San Francisco. Plus, we haven’t bothered to reinstate the “Candlestick” name now that 3Com let the name lapse. “Pac Bell” I didn’t mind because they paid a shitload of money to build the damn place, not just rename it. SF citizens paid no taxes to build the ballpark. I’ll forfeit a name for a ballpark. “SBC” sounds worse, but, egh, it’s not like “Pac Bell” was a revered image to start with.
The team owner should be somewhere in that heirarchy, as long as he/she genuinely cared to put an entertaining/winning product on the field for the fans. As a Royals fan, I think it’s great that Royals Stadium was re-named Kauffman Stadium, and I’ve never heard anyone complain about the names of Jacobs Field in Cleveland, Turner Field in Atlanta or Comiskey Park or Wrigley Field in Chicago.
While I liked the man (my paternal grandfather delivered mail to him for many years at the Kauffman’s house in Mission Hills, and my maternal grandfather’s company had a box at the stadium–by which Ewing would occasionally stop), I grew up knowing it as Royals Stadium, so I didn’t care right away for the change. It is fitting and honorable, though; however, that honor is ruined by the way they insist on calling it “The ‘K’” so as to sound young and hip, and help bring in the younger folks.
It’s not as bad as the stadium being named after a company, but the nickname completely takes away from the honor itself. I’m hoping that “The ‘K’” eventually fades away (and the quicker, the better).
ok, I’m willing to accept the amendment to jsc1953’s law – but only after the owner has owned the team for 20 years or so. I think somebody might complain if Donald Trump bought the Mets and renamed their ballyard Trump Stadium.
Is that really so? My impression was that he was always familiarly referred to as “Mr. K” himself. If so, using that same nickname for the Stadium would seem to me to be rather fitting.
(Of course, I didn’t know him personally as you did. My only visit to Kansas City was June 18, 1997, well after he’d passed on and the stadium re-named in his honor. I’m just going by how he’s referred to in Royals-related publications, of which I have quite a collection.)
Gotta chime in here re: San Francisco. It’s not Mays or McCovey, because neither of those guys brought the city a championship.
No, this one’s all Montana. Say it with me: FOUR SUPER BOWLS. And those are still the only championships San Francisco has won.
Jerry Rice is up there . . . but he needed someone to throw to him. And he’s now playing for Oakland, so we can’t consider him for the top spot until he retires and sufficient time has passed that the taste of him in a Raiders uniform no longer rankles.
Steve Young? Respected, sure, what he did was extraordinary in succeeding a Hall-of-Famer (think Dimaggio to Mantle), but he’s behind by about three Super Bowls. Besides, he’s outed himself as a Republican, which doesn’t really fly in the Bay Area.
Some other nominations: Will Clark, Barry Bonds (talk about prickly, though), Ronnie Lott (but he played his college ball at USC and finished with the Raiders), umm . . . Dimaggio doesn’t count since he did most of his thing in New York . . . can’t think of too many others.
And let me nominate some folks for Los Angeles. (Back off, I lived there too.) John Wooden and Jackie Robinson (who played college ball at UCLA). Maybe Tommy Lasorda or Chick Hearn.
There are huge generational differences in the way people think about athletes. I mean that in two very different ways. First, there’s the obvious fact that a 60 year old sports fan is likely to have a very different set of favorite athletes than his 16 year old grandson. Second, the 60 year old is far more likely to sentimentalize, and therefore love his favorite athletes than his grandson is.
Times have changed, the business of sport and the media have all changed drastically over the years. The 60 year old fan grew up at a time when it was possible (with the help of the media) to view a sports hero as the embodiment of virtue, and when the absence of free agency allowed him the illusion that his favorite athlete was an integral part of his community- heck, practically a member of the family. That makes it a lot easier for him to “love” the sport heroes of his youth than it is for his grandson today. A 16 year old today has no illusions about the players on his favorite teams. He KNOWS that man of them are scum (so were many of Grandpa’s heroes, but Grandpa was spared that knowledge at the time), and he KNOWS they’re nothing more than mercenaries, who’d abandon him in a second if he could get a dollar more someplace else (again, many of Grandpa’s favorites would have LOVED to earn more money elsewhere, but that wasn’t possible… so Grandpa had the comforting illusion that his heroes actually felt some kind of loyalty to him and his community).
I bring this up ONLY to explain why my list is a bit more retro and weighted to old-timers than I’d like. I don’t believe that athletes of old are more WORTHY of love than the modern ones- I simply note that, for all the aforementioned reasons, older fans were able to form sentimental, emotional bonds that most young fans will never have for even their favorite athletes.
New York: My hometown! And I can attest that, for reasons I don’t fully appreciate, Mickey Mantle was loved by New York fans in a way that Gehrig, Dimaggio and even Ruth never were. When DImaggio died, people mourned quietly. When Mantle died, 50 and 60-something year old men blubbered openly.
Boston: Definitely Carl Yastrzemski, with John Havlicek a distant second.
Dallas: Roger Staubach, hands down. Dallas fans a re a cold, unsentimental, what-have-you-done-for-me-lately bunch. Ask Troy Aikman, who was pilloried by sports talk radio fans the last few years of his career. Roger Staubach was the one athlete Dallas fans never wanted to let go.
Among elderly Dallasites, Doak Walker was much beloved, but he’s still a very distant second.
Houston: Nolan Ryan didn’t start or finish his career in Houston, but he owned that town while he played there.
Pittsburgh: Close call, but I’d say Willie “Pops” Stargell edges out Jack Lambert, a Penn State boy who epitomized what Western Pennsylvanians wanted a football player to be.
Philadelphia: Tough call, becauase Philly fans are notoriously unsentimental. They respected Mike Schmidt and Steve Carlton, but never loved them. They never fully embraced Dr. J either, regarding him for a long time as a post-season choker. The only Philly sportsman who ever commanded wha tseemed like genuine affection was Richie Ashburn, who wins by default. But among younger fans, Allen Iverson strikes a chord, so he could be the one before he’s through… assuming the 76ers never trade him.
Chicago: Now, Chicagoans are VERY sentimental, so there are a lot of good choices. Overall, though, I think the little-boyish “Let’s play two” enthusiasm of Ernie Banks makes him the most beloved figure in Chicago. Jordan commanded awe, but I think Banks commands more love.
Cleveland: Even among fans so young that their PARENTS weren’t around for the Browns’ glory days, Otto Graham is a beloved figure. But probably not quite as loved as local boy Bernie Kosar, who got the Browns close to the Super Bowl several times. I’ve heard loads of Cleveland fans say, “God, if they could only have grafted Bernie’s head on Testaverde’s body!”
Gotta agree with astorian and others - it’s not that close between DiMaggio and Mantle. DiMaggio was idolized - but Mantle was beloved. There’s a difference. The passage of time has dimmed Ruth’s star - 30 years ago it would have been him, I would guess. Unfortunately he died so relatively young…
If you restrict it most beloved living athlete - I really don’t think it is close. I don’t see his name mentioned anywhere yet, but there’s no doubt in my mind that Yogi Berra is the most beloved living New York athlete. Walt Frazier and Joe Namath are probably next, followed by Whitey Ford, Phil Rizzuto and Tom Seaver. The football Giants have some very rabid fans - but I can’t think of one former Giant who stands out as beloved. Phil Simms? Harry Carson? Neither sounds right. Once upon a time it was LT, not anymore.
Most beloved active athlete is hard, because of the split between Yankees/Mets fans (and Giants/Jets fans). It’s probably Jeter or Messier. John Franco is another candidate - much more so than Piazza, IMO. Mariano Rivera is incredibly popular, but I don’t think he is “beloved”.
Three years ago, it’s not even close. Paul O’Neill surpassed all of them.
Detroit fans are some of the most passionate anywhere, and they certainly have a lot of worthy candidates for love… but among the Michiganders I’ve known, the most beloved sports figure isn’t an athlete: it’s Ernie Harwell, the sportscaster.
I should have clarifed this right away, but the extent to which I mostly remember him was that I occasionally saw him interact with my maternal grandfather. I was young at the time (around 8-9 years old) and based my liking him off of him being a nice old man. Plus, heck, trick-or-treating at his house was a blast–and very, very crowded.
So, you may very well be right: the shortened “The K” could be in honor of him. If it is, however, they didn’t advertise that at all (not that I remember or could find; on the Royal’s site on the ballpark info page, they lapse in and out of calling him Mr. K) or I completely missed it. Mike Hendricks, a Kansas City Star columnist, claims that “the uncouth call [the stadium] ‘The K’”, so I’m not the only one who dislikes the name!
I just sent an e-mail to the Royals:
So, hopefully they’ll let us know! (I much prefer your explanation, to tell the truth.)
Having lived my first 18 years in St. Louis and the last 16 in San Francisco, I may as well add my two cents.
St. Louis: Stan the Man. In my mind, no question about it whatsoever. Everybody loved Ozzie, that’s true, but I equate him more to all the other players that Cards fans have loved. Red Schoendist, Mike Ssshhhannon, <urp>, Lou Brock, Pedro Guerrerro, MacGwire, and so on. Stan transcended his generation. Everybody loves him - young and old.
Blues: Garry Unger, Brian Sutter, the Plager brothers, Bob Gashoff and Bernie Federko. In that order.
San Francisco: Are we really having this conversation? Willie Mays over Joe Montana? Wille McCovey over Joe Montana? Steve Young, Jerry Rice, over Joe Montana? Anybody over Joe Montana? I think you guys are forgetting the whole Giants vs. Niners popularity thing. C’mon guys - nobody touches Montana. From the jokes of Kezar to 4 Superbowls - you can’t touch that.
Messier is a good pick for beloved Rangers in NY, but I think Mike Richter would be #1 by a decent margin, and Brian Leech would tie with Messier for second.
Regarding all NY athletes…no love for Broadway Joe? Poor Jets are always considered an also-ran in Gotham.
I’d say LT is in contention, but Bavaro probably gets the most love from Giants fans.
But sadly, NY is mostly Yankee town, so it’s gotta be a Yank. For the 30-something crowd and younger, I can’t imagine it being anyone other than Jeter.
New York fans are passionate about football, but I don’t think there’s been any one football player that New York fans have truly embraced and loved. Not in the past 40 years, anyway.
Joe Namath isn’t all that widely loved, mainly because he played for the Jets, who have ALWAYS been an afterthought among NEw York’s football fans. Even when Namath and the Jets were at their peak, Jets games almost never sold out, while Giants games were always sold out during their many years of woeful play.
And yet, Giants fans dole out love grudgingly. Even the Giant squads that won Super Bowls didn’t command great love. Many people admired L.T., but none loved him. Many respected Phil Simms, but none loved him.
To find football players that New Yorkers LOVED, I think you’d have to go back quite a ways. I’m pretty sure Y.A. Tittle, Sam Huff, and guys from that era still get a lot of love from the older fans who remember them. Otherwise, New York’s football fans aren’ty all that sentimental.
