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RIP Jim Brown (1936-2023)


dogwelder

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7 minutes ago, supremebve said:

This needs a thread of its own. 

Just said that to Rippa

I almost lost my breath from laughing the first time I heard the Jim Brown/Brick/Spider Monkey call back. 

Edited by odessasteps
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I’d heard of Jim Brown on and off through the years while watching football and knew he was really one of the greatest players ever. The first time I really became familiar with him though was when he was doing commentary on those really early UFC shows.

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A serious debate could be made about whether Walter Payton first and then Emmitt Smith later would have been able to break the rushing yards record if Jim Brown didn't retire so soon in his career.   I believe he was only 30 when it happened still in the prime of his career with another 3 or 4 years of over 1000 yards.  But he wanted to be an actor and he wanted to be more of an activist and Art Modell being the dumb ass he was gave him an ultimatum and you don't do that shit to Jim Brown.

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I was born in Northeastern Ohio in 1981, and for most of my formative years I lived with my maternal grandparents.  So, when I took interest in sports, the person who taught me the most about sports was my grandfather, and to hear him tell it, there was no greater athlete than Jim Brown.  Jim Brown is the most legendary athlete of all time in my eyes.  He's bigger than Babe Ruth, Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, Bill Russell, Jesse Owens, and everybody else.  My lifetime Browns fandom has much more to do with Jim Brown than it has to do with any player in my lifetime.  He's was a flawed man, who had some pretty terrible moments over the years, but he was also someone who dedicated most of his life to helping others.  I don't know what he means to anyone else around here, but this is a pretty huge loss for me.  I lost my grandfather in 2021, and when I got this news it put me right back in his living room watching Bernie Kosar or Emmitt Smith, or Barry Sanders, and my grandfather telling me, "those guys are good, but you should have seen Jim Brown."  He was a hero to me, despite the fact that I never seen him play.  If the man I respected the most respected Jim Brown, that's all I needed to know.  The world legend gets thrown around a lot, but there are very few people that have absolutely earned it.  Jim Brown earned it.  We lost a legend today, there have been plenty of great players over the years, but very few transcend to the mythical realm of legend.  If there is a Mount Rushmore of American sports figures, Jim Brown's face needs to be on it.

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Next pod will be a cursory look at Jim Brown in popular cultures, which will likely be playing a lot of blaxploitation trailers and maybe some 80s stuff. Still deciding. 
 

I can’t remember if I’ve ever seen Tick tick tick before, but watching the trailer makes me think I would not have forgotten it. 

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People forget that he is also one of the greatest lacrosse players ever as well. In fact many feel he was even better at lacrosse than football.

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1 hour ago, sabremike said:

People forget that he is also one of the greatest lacrosse players ever as well. In fact many feel he was even better at lacrosse than football.

My two holy grails of sports footage are Jim Brown as a lacrosse player and Jackie Robinson as a football player.  Jackie Robinson was a 4 sport star at UCLA, and all reports say that football was his best sport.  Not only that, he shared the backfield with Woody Strode and Kenny Washington, who were first two black players to integrate the NFL.  

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On 5/20/2023 at 12:50 AM, supremebve said:

My two holy grails of sports footage are Jim Brown as a lacrosse player and Jackie Robinson as a football player.  Jackie Robinson was a 4 sport star at UCLA, and all reports say that football was his best sport.  Not only that, he shared the backfield with Woody Strode and Kenny Washington, who were first two black players to integrate the NFL.  

There is some footage of Jackie playing football at UCLA (highlights/clips) on YouTube; no footage of his basketball/track stuff, though.

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3 hours ago, Hamhock said:

There is some footage of Jackie playing football at UCLA (highlights/clips) on YouTube; no footage of his basketball/track stuff, though.

I just watched it,  and it's cool to see. With that said, it's still so little because nobody seemed to value game footage until NFL Films came around in the early 60s.  We really owe a debt to the Sabol family,  because they valued footage in a way that made every sports league outside of the ABA,  and to a certain extent the NBA, value footage enough to keep it. 

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