Newspapers / The Carolinian (Raleigh, N.C.) / March 3, 1988, edition 1 / Page 19
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OUADiri uni o.— Wayne L. Seals recently announced that the North Carolina Special Olym pics Summer Games will return for a w&Md year to the University of North Carolina’s Chapel Hill campus for the IMS state-level competition. This year’s event will be held the weekend of May 13-15. The Special Olympics Summer Games Committee which will con duct the event is comprised of volunteers from Chapel Hill, Durham, Raleigh and area com munities. The committee expects to host 1,500 Special Olympics athletes from across the state. In addition to the athletes, 500 coaches will travel with the athletes to this year’s three day event. “The special athletes who come here from across North Carolina will have been in competition in their local city or county special Olympics program,” said Seals. They will compete In eight official sports: gymnastics, aquatics, roller' skating, tennis, volleyball, soccer, softball and athletics (track and field). Seals said it is the responsibility ol the games committee to assure that each athlete has the opportunity for fair sports competition. "We also want each athlete to enjoy a safe and exciting weekend and we will need a large number of volunteers to help this event come together,” he said. "Volunteers are being recruited in a variety of ways,” said Cliff Shim mel, coordinator of volunteers for the group. "We'will need more than 1,500 people to help us and we are looking for those people to sign up because they heard about the event on radio, television, newspapers, their church PASSING OFF — Norfolk, Va. - Virginia State’s Chris Holloway passes otf in tm championship game of the CIAA Championship game at Norfolk Scope laturday night. Virginia State won the game. (UPI) ( Mental Abilities Lead To Success In Sports BY RON HARRIS Special To The CAROLINIAN What does it take to make a real champion? “At the world-class level, success in any sport has far more to do with mental abilities than it does with (physical skills,’" says Charles Lake the second ranking gymnast in the United States and one of the favored contenders for the Summer Olympics team. “Personally, I think being a champion is really 99 percent mental.’’ It’s a surprising revelation coming from someone who lias made a name for himself in what is generally con sidered one of tne most physically demanding sports. But Charles Lake certainly has the credentials to know what he is talking about. He was on the U.S. men’s junior national gymastics team in 1981-82, the 1984-8* U S. men’s elite gymnastics team, the 1985 World Championship team, the 1986 Top American Goodwill Games in Moscow, the 1987 Gold Medalist Pan American Games Team, and World Championship team in 1987. “The mental demands in a sport aren’t hard to understand,” says Charles. “A champion has to learn to push through pain and to keep going, pushing the body to the limit and beyond. He has to master the concen tration necessary to accomplish some of the most incredible feats of coor dination and timing. And he needs sheer determination to work day in and day out in his drive to be the best.” Drive Safely Q. How are professional football players paid? Does the money go directly to them or is it funneled through their agents? S. A. Charleston, S.C. A. Most players pick up their own checks. Generally, a player’s salary Is divided into 16 equal amounts, and i,e picks up a paycheck every Mon day. Some teams, such as the Los Angeles Raiders, dole out checks im mediately after each game. Q. Is it true that Julius Erving has offered to buy the Philadelphia 76ers? T. A. Cherry Hill, N.J. a. The Good Doctor has indeed ex pressed an interest in owning the Six ers, but don’t look for it to happen soon. Sixers' owner Harold Katz hasn’t shown any Inclination for sell ing the team, although Erving has in quired. “I asked him if he was in basketball for the long haul," Erving said of Katz. “He said he was. I told him that if he ever decided to sell, I’d be interested.” Q. Any word on how much money Doug Williams will make off en dorsements now that he has led Washington to victory in the Super Sacramento, Calif. A. It doesn’t look as if Doug is going to clean up. When the Chicago Bears won the Super Bowl two years ago, Chicago quarterback Jim McMahon hit the jackpot, earning about $3 miiunn in the offseason. Our best is that so far Williams has maue about $200,000 and probably won’t reach $500,000. Q. Not too long ago, it seemed black athletes could get jobs as actors almost whenever they wanted. I’m talking about O.J. Simpson, Ken Nor ton, Jim Brown and a lot of othei players. Now, you rarely see athletes moving into acting. What’s going on? T.C. Memphis, Term A. That fad has slowed. Athletes just aren’t the drawing card they once .were, although former NFL star Carl Weathers currently has a hit ir "Action Jackson.” Overall, the market is soft for jocks-turned actors, no matter what their race. Q. I see where Mark Jackson of the New York Knicks is still living at home with his parents. How much art the Knicks paying this guy? L.T, Columbia, Md, A. Money isn’t the issue. Jackson, who probably will wind up being nam ed rookie of the year in the NBA, is making $400,000 a year and drives a $50,000 BMW 735i. He simply is com fortable living at home, where h< shares a room with his 15-year-old brother. Last week’s trivia question: Whc was the first black golfer to play in the prestigious Masters golf tourna ment? A. Lee Elder. This week’s question: Who did Muhammad Ali knock out with his famed “phantom pflnch?” Got a sports question? Just write "Ask Barry,” P.O. Box 1161, Orlando, Fla. 32802. bulletins, recreation centers and 'civic clubs.” Shimmel said, "Experience has shown that Special Olympics is a ' cause that people like to get involved with because it is so tangible, people can come out for a few days and get involved with this program and feel good about helping these special peo ple to have a good experience.” Shimmel noted that the surroun ding counties of Wake, Durham and Orange have also begun to recruit volunteers for their local county Special Olympics games. These games will be held in April. People who want to volunteer for the state competition in May are urg ed to call the North Carolina Special Olympics headquarters to obtain a registration form. In Raleigh, call 787-6714 and toll-free in North Carolina, 1-800-843-NCSO. Special Olympics is a sports train ing and competition program for children and adults with mental retardation. , Alex M, Rivera inducted into Hail Of Fame DURHAM—Alex M. Rivera, Jr., director of public relations at North Carolina Central University and a veteran photojournalist and sports publicity man, was inducted into the CIAA Hall of Fame Saturday as the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association basketball tournament approaches its close in Norfolk. Rivera is the only Hall of Famer with an NCCU connection to be in ducted this year, according to NCCU acting athletic director Chris Fisher. Rivera is a veteran in the field of • sports reporting and sports publicity. *In the field of sports publicity, he ■* amounts to a founding father. He first ' worked in that area when the late Dr. James E. Shepard, founder of North Carolina Central University, per suaded the young Rivera—already a talented photojournalist—to leave the Washington, D.C. area to take on a dual role at what was then North Carolina College Rivera was both a student at NCC and its chief publicity agent. He founded the NCC News Bureau, handling publicity for all aspects of the college’s, life—not the least of which was the publicity for the outstanding teams coached by John McLendon and W.E. Burghardt The year was 1939. For just under half a century, Rivera has remained—in one capaci ty or another—actively involved in North Carolina College and North ■Carolina Central University sports ' and public relations. By 1941 he had been given an Associated Negro Press award for the best-publicized college sports program in the nation. After naval duty in World War II, Rivera returned to NCC to serve as head of public relations for the school. The managing editor of the Durham Morning Herald wrote in 1946 that Rivera’s “writing has been good and his pictures excellent.” At the first “Gathering of Eagles,” held for former NCC athletes in 1980, the athletes paid tribute to Rivera by designating him “One of the Greatest Eagles of All.” The words were read by Dr. Helen G. Edmonds, professor emerita of history and board member at NCCU. She included these words, “You have been the well-spring of our hopes, the bearer of NCCU’s message'; and an untiring lover of your Alma Mater.” Rivera was the guiding spirit of that gathering, and of the creation of the NCCU Athletic Hall of Fame, whose annual banquets he has coordinated since us founding. Black Hoops Coach Receives Death Threats University of Cincinnati basketball coach Tony Yates, under pressure to turn around the Bearcats’ program, recently weas forced to miss one of his team’s games after he received racially tinged death threats. Yates, who is black, said his secretary fielded a call from a man who made the threats. The call came Just hours before Cincinnati was to play on the road against St. Louis University. “There were racial undertones,” Yates said. “He used real derogatory language and indicated he was going to kill me. And he said, ‘in St. Louis.’ I took It seriously. After considering everything, I decided not to do it [coach at St. Louis]." Yates remained behind in his hotel room while his team played without incident against St. Louis. It was not the first time Yates has been subjected to racially motivated threats. In 1963, before colleges began using the 45-second shot clock, Yates ordered his team to hold the ball in a game with the University of Ken tucky. Yates’ team lost, 24-11. After UVER PRYOR-Carollna, 21-4 overall, pushed Its Georgia Tech and then Duke. UNC’s Scott Williams scored£0 conference record to 10-2. The Heels are two games in front, points and shot over Clemson’s Jerry Pryor during the win but they will also finish off the regular season on the road, at over the Tigers. 4 Dazzling, Winning Performances 4 In The Olympics Worth Millions BY BARKY COOPER If you were of the opinion that the best amateur athletes in the world competed in the Olympics merely for the sport of it, consider this: When gymnast Mary Lou Redon captured our hearts and souls in the 1984 games, she took a hold of our pocket books, too. Her dazzling gold-medal winning performances, wound up netting her much more than Olympic gold. She soon discovered another col or-green. Retton proved so charismatic, so lovable, that one For tune 500 company after another lined up to gather her signature on en dorsement contracts. By the time the rush was over, Mary Lou had endors ed everything from batteries to corn flakes and was—get this—a reported $5 million richer. Who says the minor sports don't pay? Mary Lou pulled down five million even though she says she turned down one offer after another, accepting only those that she believed in. Other Olympic athletes have turn ed their gold into green. Mark Spitz, a swimmer, won a record seven gold medals at the 1972 games, and his seven medals nearly were worth a million each. Endorsement and ac ting assignments piled up for Spitz. The final haul: $5 million. Of course, not every Olympic athlete becomes a millionaire once the Olympic flame is snuffed out. Case in point is one Carl Lewis, among the finest track and field par ticipants in the history of the games. Spitz and retton are white, Lewis is black. It is a shame that we once again have to examine such issues in black and white, but such is the case Retton and Spitz averaged nearly $1 million for every Olympic gold medal they won. Lewis won four gold medals in the 1984 games. He hasn't said how much money he wound up getting in en dorsements, but he admits he hasn’t seen the kind of dollars that Retton and Spitz raked in. Here’s an educated guess: Lewis, for his four gold medals, probably made $400,000. Did racism have anything to do with that? Ted Koppel, host of the ABC “Nightline" program, asked Lewis that very question. Said Lewis: "1 tend to overlook that (the possibility of racial discrimina tion]. It might have been a reason.” Perhaps color did not come into play in lewis’ case. Certainly the media was not turned on by Lewis. They perceived him.as arrogant and cocky. Lewis: “The media knows me a lot better now. They don’t seem in timidated by me. In ’84, we Were get ting 30-40 interview requests a day. We had to turn down one or two, and they got angry and lashed back at us.” Lewis will try for more gold, and subsequent riches, in the summer wards, rales received a can trSffl'ff man “who was raving.” Yates is having a stormy tenure at Cincinnati. Last year he enjoyed one of his finest recruiting seasons at the school, but then it was discovered that most of the high school stars that Yates signed were academically in eligible. Negative publicity from those casualties has spilled over into this season. The Bearcats have won only eight of their first 19 games. Drive Safety games this year at Seoul, Korea, has touched only those Olympic Perhaps this lime around he will athletes who resemble Mary Lou Ret discover the magic touch that so far .ton and Mark Spitz Black Sports BARRY COOPER Hardship Cases: College loot ball administrators, who stubbornly have fought to keep their players from tur ning pro early, may be about tothrow in the towel. New NCAA executive director Dick Schultz says the time has come to allow players to turn pro whenever they’re ready. Said Schultz: "College [football] coaches are going to have to adjust to it just as coaches in other sports have ad justed." College football is the only major sport where underclassmen currently are forbidden from turning pro early. Schultz has contacted NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle about setting up a special “hardship" or early entry system similar to that us ed in the NBA. Another Blue-Chipper? Bob Wade, now in his second year at Maryland, is the first black coach in the Atlantic Coast Conference That bit of history may soon be forgotten for Wade soon may be better known for his coaching and recruiting abilities. His signees last year were among the best in the country, and word now is that Wade may be closing in on another blue chipper, 610” forward Jerrod Mustaf from Hyattsville, Md. Top Guns: Here's the early line on which players will be most sought after in this year’s NBA draft: Kan sas forward Danny Manning, 6’10”, is a lock to be the No. 1 pick, scouts are saying. None of the other players available are considered to be as talented. Bradley’s Hersey Hawkins is rated as the top shooting guard and Michigan’s Gary Grant is considered the best point guard. Syracuse’s Ron Seikaly and Marist’s Rik Smits head a so-so group of centers. Money in a Shoebox: A controversy could be brewing over the amount of money college basketball coaches are making from shoe endorsements. Bobby Cremins’ deal with Georgia Tech reportedly is worth $160,000, and Georgetown’s John Thompson is said to take in $100,000, Others said to be taking in six figures from shoe manufacturers include North Carolina’s Dean Smith, North Carolina State’s Jim Vaivano, Ken tucky’s Eddie Sutton and St. John's Lou Carnesseea. The coaches, are earning so much money from the shoe deals that some insiders fee! the NCAA may soon place a ceiling on how much the coaches can accept. Off the Mark: Kentucky Wildcats' golden boy Rex Chapman is having a tough time. Wildcats’ basketball fans love Chapman, but Chapman’s rela tionship with Wildcats’ coach Eddie Sutton has been rocky. Sutton! has been upset with Chapman’s shot selection In a loss to Auburn, Chap man hit just five of L> shots, in another loss to Tennessee Chapman was 5 of 15. Chapman: T catch myself going up to shoot now and say ing, ‘This isn’t going to be a good shot.’ Sometimes those will go in, nd sometimes thev won’t.’’ HARD DRIVE - Chape. Hill: Clomson’s Tim Kincaid collides with Carolina’s Ranzino Smith (33) on a drive during first half action. (UPI) >?
The Carolinian (Raleigh, N.C.)
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March 3, 1988, edition 1
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