Two Sport Stars
August 29, 2000
The two-sport star who's gotten the most attention this year is Michigan QB Drew Henson. George Steinbrenner apparently told Drew to choose a sport, and Drew wouldn't do so, so George traded him. And that's where it gets confusing.
Steinbrenner traded Henson to Cincinnati. Except Cincinnati had drafted Akili Smith as their QB of the future, so why would the Bengals go after Henson? Especially when they already have the Stormin' Mormon, Scott Mitchell, as a backup.
And isn't Floyd Carr upset that Henson is risking his amateur standing by playing both college and pro football at the same time? And maybe the daily commute from Cincy to Ann Arbor is the reason for Henson's foot injury? That's a long drive to make every day, the accelerator foot is bound to get stressed.
Henson should have done what those old-time athletes like George Gipper did and played pro ball under an assumed name. Something catchy, like Dana Stubblefield Junior.
Multi-sports stars are nothing new in the world of football. You might remember the world's greatest athlete (no, not Jan-Michael Vincent), Jim Thorpe. Thorpe was a great star in football, a decent baseball player, and a great track athlete (he got robbed by the judges in Stockholm in 1912. I never knew why they scored track races like figure skating back then. Poor Jim was the victim of the Soviet and East German judges and their anti-American bias).
Not as many fans know that Thorpe is also famous for INVENTING a sport. One day in 1917 Thorpe was taking batting practice and noted drunk bigot Ty Cobb came charging out of the stands, screaming "you dirty injun". The two proceeded to have a donnybrook for the ages, as all the other players gathered to watch, surrounding the batting cage and the two men pounded one another's heads against home plate.
The fight officially ended in a draw, but the legend of the fight as well as its fenced-in location, led to the beginnings of a new sport. After his baseball career and football career were over, Jim Thorpe's final athletic claim to fame was as legendary steel cage wrassler Bobo Brazil.
And now you know the rest of the story.