BYU Football: The Ones that Got Away Pt.1

    Without a doubt, winning the close games can make the difference between greatness and also-ran status. In college football, the one that got away can haunt individuals and teams and schools for a lifetime.

In the case of the Brigham Young University Cougars, I am going to look back per year all the way to 1922, and see which opponent may have been their best chance to win one more and what their record would have been had they won that "one that got away". Incidentally, I acknowledge that the pure point tally is not always the best indicator of which game was the closest, per se, but I will try my best. Also, I will leave the pre-1997 ties as they are, only reversing the closest loss.
Hypothetically, if just one game per season could be re-engineered in this respect, imagine the 91 plus wins (no games for three years during WW II) and how it would have impacted the program in terms of its success... Ah, Cher sang a song that got on my nerves ...
"If I Could turn Back Time" --What Might Have Been!

Also, some of these opposing teams do not seem to exist anymore, or at least are smaller schools not eligible to play a bigger school, which is interesting unto itself.

1922 [1-5] (Played in 3 states)
BYU played Wyoming twice its inaugural season, beating the Cowboys in its only win, 7-0, but losing the last game of the season 0-13 to the same squad. Two Utah and two Colorado schools ended up handling BYU with no problem on the scoreboard in the other 4 defeats, the Cougars having a hard time putting points on the board. Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 2-4, first year. All things considered, the Y seemed lucky to get that one win through a single touchdown to nothing for their new rivals. The Cowboys of Laramie.

1923 [2-5] (4 States)
BYU lost to Colorado State by the score of 6-14, an improvement from losing by 0-33 the year before. BYU escaped by one over Montana State 7-6 (wherever that is), and blanked Western State 19-0 (whoever that is). Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 3-4, second year.

1924 [2-3-1] (3 States)
The Cougs lost to Utah State 9-13 in its third season. This pretty close loss would have given them their first winning season, and an all time best three victories. Shucks! They barely beat Northern Colorado 3-0 while pounding on Western State 26-0. I just looked up that they, also known as Western, are now a Division II program and are located in Gunnison, Colorado. Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 3-2-1, third year.

1925 [3-3] (3 States)
Again, so close to overall victors in their fourth year, I imagine a few seniors felt that! The closest loss was 0-14 to Utah State. BYU beat California-Davis in a squeaker 7-6, for its first opponent outside the Inter-Mountain West, meaning not a team from Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, or Montana. Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 4-2, fourth year. Oh, those Aggies!

1926 [1-5-1] (3 States)
Thank goodness for Western State, BYU's only victim that forgotten year! Their closest loss was at Northern Colorado, 0-12. Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 2-4-1, fifth year. The Cougars got roughed up with a new generation of guys on the gridiron. Maybe a religious school should stick to the books. Notre Dame?

1927 [2-4-1] (3 States Total, California First time)
The closest loss was to Northern Colorado, 7-21. At least they tied California-Davis. Does anyone know their mascot? Western State and Colorado Mines seemed to be BYU's sure things. Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 3-3-1, sixth year. Still only one California school competitor outside of the four core Rocky Mountain states. Was Heber J. Grant and other LDS administrators trying to widen the influence of the school? Methinks so...

1928 [3-3-1] (5 States Total, Idaho First Time)
So close! BYU tied arch rival Utah 0-0! But beside that bittersweet outcome, the closest loss was 0-10 to Utah State. Notably, the Cougars added a new state to their competition in a 9-6 opening win against the College of Idaho. Who is that now? Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 4-2-1, seventh year.

1929 [5-3] (6 Total States, Nevada First Time)
Success! It took eight years! It was the fall of the stock market crash but it was a breakthrough winning season for the Y. There was a close 12-13 loss to Montana State, but the Cougars got their first winner overall:  Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 6-2, eighth year. .380 winning percentage after two generations of players. Probably mostly members of the LDS faith. And they played in Reno, continuing to spread the culture of the Inter-Mouintain West ...

1930 (5-2-4) (7 Total States, Hawai'i First Time)
 Not half bad. Quite a few ties, but overall winning.  They played at Mount St. Charles and Regis, which I have to look up to see where those are located. (Montana and Colorado, respectively). Both losses were not close but the closer spread was 7-24 to Utah. Four ties in one season is kind of nutzo. The last game of the season the Cougars got pasted by the Rainbow Warriors, 13-49. That will not be the last time to be ambushed in Honolulu. But at least they got to visit the islands in December! Maybe they were distracted. Then again, maybe some Polynesians started paying attention to American football. Thanks, Heber J.!
Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 6-1-4, ninth year.

1931 (4-4) (6 States Total)
BYU played the UAY All-Stars in Provo to kick off the season, which they fortunately won 7-3. There is not a lot of Google knowledge about that team. The closest loss was against Northern Colorado, 0-6. The first 10 years, BYU was shut out  22 times. BYU in the 21st century is not known for getting goose eggs; it broke the all time consecutive game scoring streak from 1978 or so until 2003. But that is a chapter of BYU football for another day.
Buyer's remorse with the reverse loss: 5-3, tenth year. Close but no cigar. Not much tobacco at all, in fact.

Ten year total: 28-37-8, for a .431 winning percentage.

BYU accomplished a bit of good its first decade as a football program. I have written about the inspiration and insight of President Heber J. Grant in a blog with Foxsports, but I am not sure if that exists or is retrievable anywhere since they killed those blogs back in 2009 and 2010. I had been faithful to it from 2006 to 2009, it was quite disappointing. It was on papaclinchsaints'it blog or something like that. 

Anyway, the Cougars began with some humble beginnings and success but I think there were a few early flashes of what the program might someday do.

Win on the gridiron, play some big boys. And let people know about the the Honor Code and the LDS faith.
  

Bryce Moves Up the List with Another Dinger

Harper hit his 112th career home run, in Chavez Ravine, another opposite field smash. Interestingly Kyle Singer in his sixth year (Bryce in his 5th) is one home run behind Bryce all time.

He has a joined a list of a few notables, Sandy Alomar being one, who did that in a 20 year career:

723.

	Sandy Alomar (20)	112	R	HR Log
	Curt Blefary (8)	112	L	HR Log
	Jackie Brandt (11)	112	R	HR Log
	Jeff Cirillo (14)	112	R	HR Log
	Bryce Harper (5, 23)	112	L	HR Log
	Dave Hollins (12)	112	B	HR Log
	Gil McDougald (10)	112	R	HR Log
	Jim Morrison (12)	112	R	HR Log
	Alexei Ramirez (9, 34)	112	R	HR Log
	Chris Speier (19)	112	R	HR Log			Only 722 players have hit more in the history of the game.

Congrats to Cleveland: History Made, Local Boy Does Good

      Congrats to Cleveland: History Made, Local Boy Done Good!

     The man and legend known as Lebron James has done it. He is approaching the elite status of luminary names as the more recent Kobe Bryant, and before him Michael Jordan, and before them Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, and before them Kareem Abdul Jabbar and Bill Russell.

     Legends of the roundball all, signified and punctuated with multiple championship rings. For those like me, it conjures up hushed tones of reverence, because I and a few others respect the effort, focus, and sheer power required to make a team of people running and jumping on a 97 foot wooden waxed floor score more points than the whole rest of the world in a system known as the National Basketball Association.
    Be the best, play the best, overcome all other limitations. It took the city of Cleveland and their native son from Akron decades, a whole life time to finally pull it off.
   
    Lebron and his not to be ignored teammates have done it, and in historic fashion. 32 previous times NBA teams had fallen down 3 games to 1 in a series and did not win game seven. The Cavaliers just did. Impressive, and against a worthy champion caliber foe. 2016 will go down in history similar to how the Boston Red Sox reversed the curse in 2004 and upset the New York Yankees being down 3-0, remarkably coming back in baseball in the American League Championship Series and then cruising through the Fall Classic to win one for Beantown, for those long-suffering Red Sox fans of most of the 20th century.  Some teams are known for their futility in not winning, or having very talented teams and never achieving the final crown. Boston made a lot of people weepy back in 2004.
     But Cleveland had a different type of futility than Boston. Cleveland did not have the all-time champions in the Boston Celtics in basketball, or the best NFL team of the 21st century New England Patriots, or the sometimes victorious Boston Bruins in hockey. The city of Cleveland's last championship in professional sports occurred in 1964, before the Super Bowl existed. And to make things more confounding, its star back then, running back Jim Brown, took early retirement and let the Browns flirt with glory and ignominy enough to lose its team to Baltimore decades later, where the Ravens were able to achieve the ultimate success in football while Cleveland was left with the Browns, often called the Clowns.
     Poor Cleveland! For years back in the 1990s,  the baseball games were sold out; I couldn't order tickets in 1997 to see my favorite player's team visiting there, they were so good. But no, the Indians could not get it done.  Cleveland revived the Brown's franchise, but a whole lot of losing there has been their byword. The Ravens of Baltimore took all their luck and mojo, it would appear.

    In a stinging sequence of drama, native son and wunderkind Lebron James "took his talents" to Miami and managed to win two championships in 4 years. Cleveland fans burnt his paraphernalia in effigy and cursed his name. He became a traitor of the ilk of Benedict Arnold, he had betrayed his home.
    But in retrospect, most observant spectators saw Lebron's heart and mind and knew he never left his home state and region behind. James magnanimously developed school programs and scholarship programs in down-and-out poor neighborhoods of Akron and Cleveland, all while playing for the Heat and reaching the championship every June he played there. Lebron looked to reach out to and inspire youth who were born and raised in less successful circumstances like he was, and more importantly, he would fund deprived youth with the outreach of his influence and largesse.

    

     And then: he went back! Wow. This took some heart and will. 

    They immediately became one of the elite teams of the league, but with less star power than Miami.  They made it to the finals his first year back but fell to the upstart Golden State Warriors, who simply outproduced a talented Lebron-led team missing two key players to injuries. This year the fates were turned as the Warriors dealt with injury as Cleveland remained whole.

    And Cleveland, for the first time since 1964, prevailed as the champs.

    Congratulations to Cleveland. Now I hope a few other never-have-won cities can enjoy some of the same results. Seattle? San Diego? There have to be at least have dozen more, plus even more individual franchises. 

    Thanks Lebron; hope restored.

    In a world where serious events lead to disaster and ruin, where there are failed states across the Middle East like Libya, Somalia, Yemen, and Syria, where Iraq and Afghanistan deal with daily threats of attacks and bombings and all types of strife against poverty (millions suffering privation and worse), a less-than-stellar city in the American mid-west now shines a bit of life on possibility. In a political atmosphere where a US socialist has galvanized millions to share more wealth to the masses (read: Bernie Sanders), but cannot overcome the established traditional parties in power, Lebron and the Cavaliers perhaps can inspire many to look deep within and dig deeper, try harder, "represent the people", stand up for the less fortunate, and shoot for the stars. And make it!

    Thank you Cleveland. Thank you Lebron. He is the best we now have on the court.  Best of this century, or at least this decade (Kobe, you owned the 2000s) Kyrie Irving, clutch shooter, JR Smith, sometimes maligned but a deserved champion, also maligned Kevin Love for being too slow, hugely vital Tristan Thompson, aging veteran Richard Jefferson, hustling Imam Shumpert, and some bench players, particularly Matt Dellevedova who spelled a lot of tired legs most of the season and showed a lot of spunk and fight, and other role players who also contributed like surprisingly hot for a spell Channing Frye, and the supporting presence of Timofy Mozgov, Mo Williams, and Jermaine Jones.

    Lebron needed all of you, they needed him, and Cleveland and the seemingly forgotten needed the Cavaliers. 

   I am glad this season has ended this way. Next year, I hope another team finds its way to the promised land of NBA glory. Paul George and the Pacers, I would be happy to see the Clippers or any other team to win it all. De-thrown the current champs, take Lebron down a few pegs as happened to Kobe and Michael and Larry and Magic in generations passed. There will be a new champion of the people to inspire the rest of us.

    But for now, Lebron is the chosen one. Thanks for giving back to those who look to you as a servant for good. You have done this in your own neighborhoods, the place you hail from and will not forsake! Congratulations for helping entertain all of us, showing us greatness and grace and power, and not forgetting that there are millions of us hoping to achieve our own dreams, giving many more a chance to do the same. 

Blog on, EMC

Bryce Hits Towering Opposite Field Homer for 732 All-Time

He joins these two former players at 111 all time. He had been on a slow pace since getting his 14th of the year. He still needs to get hot to catch up with Mike Trout, and Ryan Zimmerman has been hitting a few lately so Bryce may take a few more seasons to catch up with him for Nats all time clouters.

732.

	Max Alvis (9)	111	R	HR Log
	Greg Gagne (15)	111	R	HR Log
	Bryce Harper (5, 23)	111	L	HR Log

Nats are doing well, winning a lot of games, even some dramatic endings.

Crying for Mom Part 1: Spring

  Three times as an adult I cried for emotion and nostalgia, a sweet melancholy thinking of mom. Well, three times not directly related to her death over two years ago (2014). Three times that illustrate something special for me as her son, a guy who looks to her as a citizen of the world.

Mother's Day in Mulchen Spring (their fall)1990
St. Jerome's in Jerusalem  Summer              1995
Fall 1995--My friend Jacy
Bloomington, Indiana        Winter                2004

Maybe I need a fall to complete the set...Hmmmmm: think, remember. (Use Jacy)
If only I could write with the "tongue of angels" and correctly, appropriately, or magically express in prose how this has worked, or what was involved,the feelings and thoughts that truly touch on how the heart and the mind works. It might be of value to others beyond me and my family, perhaps to others. Do those tears, the sentiments behind them, matter beyond me? Is there a greater power at work?

     Looking back currently in my mid-forties, safely judging that I have achieved my middle age years, as my wife, who is 3 plus years younger than me, believes she has reached, as our high school daughter asked her this morning: what is the "middle ages"?; I can perhaps more deeply reflect on the shedding of tears for the notion of my mother, the idea and bond with her no matter where we are... No matter how far away. Maybe when we cry for the notion of anything there are deeper issues involved...

     Distance takes us far from home. It has happened a few times for me, I have been taken far from my family over the decades. Is it possible that some souls travel farther across time and distance, perhaps across expanses of human history and its travails? I think this might be so. Perhaps certain minds, imaginations, understandings are capable of this. Or maybe this is a mere stretch of the imagination.  Nevertheless, the soul and spirit delve into paths unknown, as poets and writers tend to do.
________________________________________

      As a child I had been separated from my mom for weeks at a time; I guess that has its effect. I recall seeing her airplane take off from a tarmac at the Indianapolis airport, the plane becoming tiny at the edge of the horizon, me at the age of 3 or 4, thinking that that is pretty long and far to be away from someone I was that so close to and dependent on. I was her only son, there were two older sisters and my dad. She was my mom; I was not close to my grandparents, they were still alive then but they lived 900 miles away and were very old.
     Into my teenage years in the 1980s, that unique status of her only son took on more meaning. For most of my teens I lived in different houses from my mom but we would visit at least twice a week. Maybe in some ways I grew closer to her spiritually or emotionally because of that separation in households, I don't know. We did some fun things together, we had some good trips. She re-married when I was 16, I got along well with her new husband, my new step-father.
    The summer after high school graduation I went away to Spain for three weeks. That was the longest I had ever been away from all my family by three times. Not much longer after that I was able to travel to New England and Canada with my mom and Terry, my step-dad. I was preparing to go away for a two-year mission; it was a good-bye tour to my extended family in Massachusetts, people who my mother was intrinsically connected to for life. Saying farewell to them was in a way cutting myself off from my mom as well.
     By November of 1989 I was away in far off Provo, Utah, embarking on the mission. My mother had given me a map of South America two years prior (I like maps a lot, if you did not know) and she had put a question in hand-written pen off the coast of Chile on the map, in the Pacific Ocean blue part of the map: "Where will you be?"
     It turned out I ended up not far from where she had written that question on that wall map:
    South-central Chile. I arrived there about two years later, after that serendipitous gift from her for my 17th birthday.

     I arrived in Chile in January of 1990, in the heart of the summer time.  I spent my first weeks and months seemingly acquiring a new look on life, new feelings and tasting and thinking through new realities. What were we humans? Who were we? Were we really all the same, despite the linguistic and cultural differences? What was this foreign culture, this friendliness, this strange but beautiful culture where people seemed in some ways more real than anything else I had known? Cultures are different, and it was an amazing experience trying to absorb it, to take it all in. And this task is incredibly difficult, after all. Even apprehending the smallest things can be frustrating and exhausting.
     I was in the last few weeks of my four plus months in the town of Mulchen, my first area and first real exposure to the culture and people of this part of South America. Mulchen (pronounced MOOL CHEN) was an isolated area of  some 20,000 or so in the 8th Region. I later learned that many LDS elders (and maybe some sisters) started there as new missionaries, probably because it was a safe and somewhat welcoming place, probably better than most in our mission, or maybe more preferable than anywhere in the whole country, for all I know.  I was with my third consecutive Chilean companion, each of them teaching me aspects of the language and culture that was necessary to try to comprehend and accept. Or to survive and thrive in. The goal of any good foreigner, right?

     Which brings me to this question: how long does it take to understand any culture?  Forever, really. How do we ever really know anything? Familiarity is one thing, but knowledge ...
     I had met most of the members of the ward, both active and less active. There were hundreds. My three consecutive Chilean companions and I had spent hours and days in their homes, sharing lessons, stories, films, and all types of cultural nuances. I really enjoyed these people. We prayed together, sang together, laughed and joked together. I loved them, and I felt that they loved me.Oh, and of course they were very generous with their food and drinks.

     Around my last week or so living in the area, as missionaries come and go, the Mulchen Ward had a talent show combined with a mother's day celebration. I knew most of the people there, some were newly taught and baptized in the months I had been present. I felt a bond with almost everyone.
     One sister, I will call her Lucy-- was particularly unique to me and I might assume to others. She was gifted as a comic of sorts: at the party in the upstairs of the chapel that weekend evening she put on a comedy routine and perhaps impromptu acting, much of which I did not understand but I was impressed by how much laughter she received. She was silly and clever, a regular local Lucille Ball. I had no idea she had that much of a gift for entertainment.

     I had spent my visits in her humble house, made of wood and nothing too special like so many Chileans occupied throughout their hundreds of years of history, a nation in many ways older than ours (United States), as far as traditions and long held cultural norms. Lucy was a vivacious young mother in the ward, like many others, but it was not until that party that I realized her unique talents. Her husband was a bonified Communist, which was a little shocking and distressing to me. Communism was anathema to believing in or trusting in God, as I understood, and that did not bode very well for Lucy's progressing membership as a Latter-day Saint.  How to address this concern? Could I, the new and only American gringo in Mulchen, have any chance at swaying him towards our beliefs, beyond the socio-political miasma of Marxism and its effects across our planet? This man was a man who had lived life and worked. He was slight of frame but had dark, serious eyes, large eyebrows over a thin face with piercing eyes that made me nervous. He certainly knew things that I did not, and his reference for a better world was socialism/Communism. He was a young father, and me a young man who had recently left my parents' surroundings.  He had lived in a country and time where thousands had disappeared and been buried by soldiers of the military junta, others tortured and violated, a generation brutalized and suppressed, and these were his compatriots, those who he would suffer for and mourn, and join in continuous solidarity.
     Chile was a unique place when it came to its Marxist history: while in my third month there Agusto Pinochet had officially stepped down as their strong-man dictator of 17 years. The transition was relatively peaceful; I saw many red communist flags flying through the streets of Mulchen that day that the left wing candidate Patricio Aylwin took office.  People, young and old, some too young to remember the dark days of the coup d'etat of 1973, but certainly impressionable through the reign of oppression under General Pinochet, yelled for joy and their vindictive sense of defiance that historic March day in 1990, which the world has seen few like or before since.
     A dictator peacefully transferred power, very few casualties happened in the last years of his regime.  
    And there I was, an impressionable young man with deep ingrained beliefs of politics and religion and history already imprinted on my soul, dealing with these people collectively and individually that endeared themselves to me.  These Mulcheninos had become my people.
    The people who accepted baptism, shared in our laughter and solemn promises, came to the second story church for that culminating barrio celebration, this is who I had become.
    I had forgotten about so many things that only 8 months prior were of utmost importance: the news, Indiana basketball, football of all types, movies and television and music and other sports. Instead, my life as a young 19 year-old had become the lives of these people, their world and their faith, the co-mingling in the efforts and struggles that my Chilean companions and I had tried so hard to espouse to them. It was very much all encompassing, a daily struggle and joy, an overwhelming passion of what I felt was living in the moment, forgetting about the outside world that was then out of reach. 
     I received letters from my mom, who had promised to send one per week, and other family and friends, but based on the post office dealings of South America the postal correspondence would bunch up and arrive together in batches that made it seem much more intermittent than her regular steady pace.
    
    My feelings and perhaps deferred longings of connection to home and my old life may have culminated that Mother's Day talent show night in Mulchen. With all these swirling sentiments of a new culture, a new language and people, people that I had grown to know inside and out, and perhaps a suppressed awareness of being away from my origins, this was a night where my tears caught up to me.
     At the end of the show where I myself had sung a sentimental church song in English to thunderous applause, heightening my own emotions, I watched as Lucy's little son, the embodiment of the skinny mustachioed father who so concerned me as far as their family unity and future, in themselves a representation of the future of the country, took a single delicate rose to his mother on stage. His name was Luis or Rodrigo or Pablo, I cannot remember. He was tiny and little and had the sparkling in his eyes of his parents, the active Mormon comic and vivacious lady on stage and the more reserved, serious and perspicacious Marxist of the street some 8 blocks away.
     It was a beautifully poetic and powerful moment. Perhaps for me more than anyone else.
     Mom! I love you! I am this little tiny person in this vast sea of people, in a night that stretches on forever and I don't know very much, but I know what I feel for you.
     This rose is for you, for your sacrifices and patience and willingness to help this little guy get along.
    I love you, Mom. I miss you. You are with me across thousands of miles of distance.

    I am not sure how long I wept, but I knew it was intense and real, and most likely necessary. A catharsis of emotions, if you will. 
    An R.E.M. favorite song of mine is entitled "Talk about the Passion", where the repeated chorus invokes,"Not everyone can carry the weight of the world."
    I know I did not carry much of the world's weight that evening, but somehow, in my own way, I felt a significant part of it was my burden and my passion. And like any true Christian, knowing the solemnity and sanctity of the role of Mary, I know that in my case, me bearing any part of the feelings of worldly longing that happens in our hearts and minds inevitably involves the love of a mother.
    Thanks to my mother, and those that mothered me in Mulchen, and all Godly mothers across the heavens. We think of you that night and all the vast nights across the universe.
    
     As little Luchito did, we offer a velvet rose up to our larger than life mom. With smiles and tears.

My Tribute to Cassius Clay, Muhammad Ali, Jack Johnson

     Thinking about Lives Lived--The Greatest of All Time?

Who Are We: Did He Show Us Greatness?

      In remembering Muhammad Ali, born Cassius Clay in 1942, (two years after my mother was born) in the early era of World War II, I cannot help but think that Jack Johnson still has not received his due as an American, perhaps more importantly, an African-American athlete and pioneer.
     For all the accolades that Ali has and will receive for his many feats as an athlete and humanitarian activist, Jack Johnson lived almost two generations ahead of him in the United States; I cannot see Cassius arriving to where he did if it were not for the historic earlier American pugilist Jack Johnson. While Johnson was maligned and denigrated for being black long before Jesse Owens and Jackie Robinson, and arguably Johnson had many character flaws that were unflattering, he helped break down so many color barriers, he was arguably the best, proving a black man, an African-American, even deserved to be in the conversation as a human being who could compare to whites, despite deranged so-called scientifically progressive Darwinists arguing there was a superiority among humans of different hues.
     Don't get me wrong, Muhammad Ali was great, always will be. He proved the credo of Martin Luther King, Jr: we should be judged on the merits of our character (and achievements).  For this Ali certainly was great, even as a simple person being true to his own conscience.
     I read  a tribute shortly after his death a couple days ago that earlier in his career as a boxer Muhammad Ali fought a guy who caught him with a left hook and almost knocked him out in the fourth round.  That was known as the "split gloves fight" because Ali's manager argued to the referee that Muhammad's boxing glove had a tear in it and needed to be replaced, and even though the referee refused, it bought Ali valuable recovery time and Ali went on to win. Muhammad, or Cassius then, I guess,  comically said, " He hit me so hard my ancestors felt it back in Africa."
     And in a few ways, Clay was fighting for his African-American people and for the ancestors from whom they hailed in Africa.
      Which brings me to a greater historical point:
      Much of the experiment of the United States of America is to figure out what and who we are, what is our shared humanity. Is it only male white Anglo-Saxon Protestants? No, obviously not. Kennedy proved that Catholics clearly belong, too. Abraham Lincoln and Harriet Tubman and a horde of others made their mark for and behalf of blacks who were mostly slaves. Many women, famously Susan B. Anthony and countless others; but it has taken a long time for blacks to feel equal. One might debate that the struggle continues in the 21st century with the treatment of blacks by law enforcement. But other minorities have had their decades of struggle for equality or a voice to be heard. Latinos, Chinese, Filipinos, Vietnamese as well. Jews and Mormons and Muslims, we have all felt a struggle to be a part of the "melting pot", a place at the table.
     So we credit Mohammad Ali for breaking a lot of barriers. Perhaps he was "the Greatest", as he claims. But there is a nagging reminder of one who broke down some amazing barriers before him.

    Don't forget Jack Johnson. He got there first in many ways, as a boxer, as a minority, as a black man too often not allowed to compete in the American or world arena. He set up a world where Cassius Clay could arrive. 
     In the end, everyone has his and her own fight, so we all fight and strive for what we believe we deserve. American, Mexican, Irish, Macedonian, Korean, Congolese. Collectively and individually, we all are making our own way through the rings of the next match. Floating and stinging, crashing and mending from our wounds. And moving on.  Progressing with our own fights in our own respective lives, on the shoulders of giants, these all-time bigger than life greats.
    We, too, can be the greatest. Thanks, champs, for your legacies that I and millions of others will not forget.