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Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

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    Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

    Today in front of the post office, this guy saw the William & Mary shirt I was wearing and said “hey, I was at William & Mary.” This is a rare event, since it's fairly small school in another state and its always great to talk to oldtimers, so I pressed it a bit and asked him when and so forth. Then I realized I was talking to the great Harry Groves, track coach at Penn State for a million years, who is, I'm told, a bit of a legend in US track & field (athletics). I knew he’d been at W&M, but it took me a moment to recollect that. He never said “I’m harry groves” and I never said “I know who you are,” so it was weird, but he went on about how he started the Colonial Relays and how the College president at the time told him it was such a great event to get alumni and politicians in Richmond to care and how he’s going back for a reunion and how they want him to officiate the Relays. Really friendly guy.

    He's retired. But he was wearing a stop watch. A fancy one that was so big that it looked to be causing him to lean forward slightly.

    #2
    Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

    Maybe he's looking for a new career:

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      #3
      Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

      It was kinda like that, except not gold.

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        #4
        Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

        That's even more minor than me sitting next to Peter King on a plane, and telling him that I thought the Lions would win the 1991 Super Bowl.

        Well, they did make the NFC Championship. And he gave me an autograph on his card after realizing he had to shift his fat ass through the coach seat to get his card out, taking a breath to see if it was really worth it, then doing it anyway. I'll always appreciate the effort, Pete.

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          #5
          Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

          Did this happen before or after 1991?

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            #6
            Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

            In 1989, I played cricket against Richard Ellison's brother, Charles- he was a very tidy fast-medium bowler, ex Cambridge blue, I think. In the clubhouse afterwards, Richard turned up and smoked and drank shorts. I didn't speak to him. South African Breweries wouldn't have had great confidence in their investment.

            Ellison was a rare posh fast bowler.

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              #7
              Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

              I played football against intermittent Peterborough United starter Ashley Carr at our annual six-a-side tournament on a number of occasions in the mid-90s.

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                #8
                Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

                A couple of Fridays ago, spurred on by a friday night of beer and seeing Somerset chase down a mammoth 20/20 score including Treschotick reaching 51 in just 13 balls, I found myself in the same pub as half the team and thus decided to go and how well I thought they'd played and what a great match it had been.

                A collective glaring/blanking of me ensued, quite rightly given my drunken slurry nonsense.

                Anyway, Arul Suppiah later said it was fine and they hadn't understood what I was saying.

                A moment that make us proud of beer I'm sure.

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                  #9
                  Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

                  Summer of '91. On the flight back from Japan.

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                    #10
                    Meeting minor sports celebrities (No. 70)

                    Why was he in Japan? Trying out for sumo? HAHAHAHAHA

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