Can You Imagine Brian Bosworth with Twitter Back in the Day?

 

Brian Bosworth has never shied from confrontation and 25 years ago this week was no exception.

He loved confrontation at the University of Oklahoma during his sophomore and junior seasons, when he was twice voted a unanimous All-American. He relished it on the sidelines during the 1987 Orange Bowl against Arkansas while wearing a T-shirt with the initials NCAA that read “National Communists Against Athletes.

The staunchly pro-capitalism Bosworth is at it again, this time co-authoring a soon-to-be released expose of the Sooners’ football program that’s sure to sell plenty copies. After hearing about the book’s allegations, Oklahoma head coach Barry Switzer (a former Hog and Crossett native) said he was greatly disappointed in Bosworth and that his former superstar had severed all relations – present, past and future – with the program.

So, what exactly goes down in “The Boz: Confessions of a Modern Anti-Hero”? A story about former Oklahoma wide receiver Buster Rhymes firing a machine gun from the balcony of the athletic dorm, for one.

For two, Brian Bosworth claims players freebased cocaine on game days. He reserves special ire for the University of Miami guys he feels went a little overboard with their recreational cocaine use. He recalls a few Hurricane on the powerful stimulant during their 1986 game against Oklahoma.

“I didn’t like a few of their guys because I could tell they were all coked up,” Bosworth wrote. “Their eyes were as big as spaghetti plates. I’m not lecturing people about coke, but if they want to do it, do it after the game.”

Brian Bosworth also says Oklahoma coaches committed or allowed NCAA violations ranging from extra recruiting visits to a free plane ticket to pay-offs from boosters. He claimed nobody ever questioned how he could afford to live in a $500-per-month condominium and keep two expensive cars.

Switzer responded: “I’m not naive enough to think that people don’t help someone in a program. People like to help sports personalities all through the country. If Brian got something, he got it on his own. A lof kids do that everywhere.”

To put a bow on things, Bosworth also accused his Sooner teammates of popping steroids like aspirin. Bosworth was one of three Sooners who were suspended from playing in the 1987 Orange Bowl after testing positive for steroid use. Arkansas senior David Dudley was also suspended before the game after testing positive for anabolic steroid use. Dudley, 6-foot-3, 211-pound linebacker, had 27 tackles for a Razorback defense that allowed only 12.9 points a game and ranked 5th in the nation.

Razorback nose guard Tony Cherico said steroids use has “crossed a lot of college football players` minds. They figure, ‘If I take it now, it will increase my value at [NFL contract] signing time. Since it`s legal in the NFL, the players say, ‘What the heck, let`s do it. You can`t have it in one organization and not the other.’” [August 9, 1988; Associated Press]

If people think Johnny Manziel has ruffled feathers with his social media antics, just think what The Boz could have done with Twitter back in the day. He’s on Twitter now, though.

[tweet https://twitter.com/GotBoz44/status/347473173316509696]

10 years ago…

Jermain Taylor won his first professional title after defeating Freddie Cuervos for the WBC Continental Americas middleweight belt in North Little Rock. Taylor (17-0, 12 KOs) won all 12 rounds on all three judges’ scorecards but couldn’t knock out Cuervos (25-6-1, 16 KOs) despite throwing 677 jabs – the most thrown by a middleweight in the nearly 20-year history of Compubox. Taylor landed 243 jabs, second-most ever by a middleweight.

“I hit him with the kitchen sink and he just stood there,” Taylor said. “I hit him with the knobs.”

Now that the Little Rock native has dispensed with Cuevas, a phone technician from Chicago, his sights are set on Fernando Vargas and William Joppy. Later, Oscar De La Hoya and Felix Trinidad could be in the mix, his team said.

“I’ll promise you this: I will be world champion,” said the 24-year-old Taylor.

To do that, Taylor will likely have to go through Bernard Hopkins, the IBF and WBC middleweight champion and WBA super champion who is 38 and not active. “One thing Hopkins is doing is sitting on his ass and letting his skills erode while Jermain is one of the most active fighters in the world,” said Taylor’s promoter Lou DiBella. “Maybe in a year he’ll be ready for Bernard Hopkins.” [August 8 and 9, 2003; Arkansas Democrat-Gazette]

Taylor-Cuervos was fought in front of 5,374 spectators at what was then Alltel Arena. It improved Taylor’s record in his native state to 3-0. Since then, Taylor (31-4-1) has fought – and won – twice more in-state.

***

The Arkansas Twisters’ Mark Norris kicked an 18-yard field goal as time expired for a 63-61 upset victory over the Quad City Steamwheelers in an Arena Football 2 second round playoff game in Moline, Ill. It was the first time in five games the Arkansas franchise had beaten Quad City, which was riding a 14-game winning streak and had been aF2 champions in 2000 and 2001.

That didn’t matter much to Kahlil Carter, the Twisters cornerback who this season set a league record 14 interceptions in 14 regular-season games. Before the game, Carter, a former Razorback, told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette’s Robert Turbeville he compared the Steamwheelers to Ricky Schroeder’s character in the early 1980s TV comedy Silver Spoons. Schroeder played a rich child.

“”They’re Ricky Schroeder, Silver Spoons types. We envy them a little bit, but we know when it comes to game time, it’s all out the door, fancy uniforms and everything,” Carter said. “We’re licking our chops right now. We want them. We don’t want no easy road. … Quote me. We are licking our chops. Tell them to bring their game to Kahlil Carter and see what happens. … They’ve played some mediocre teams.”

Twisters quarterback Ricky Hebert passed for six touchdowns, but it appeared he wouldn’t have enough time for anything more when the Steamwheelers took a 61-60 lead with 19 seconds left in the game. But Arkansas’ Lennie Johnson ran the kickoff from the end zone to the Quad City 4-yard line.

Mark Norris’ ensuing field goal attempt sailed through the middle of the uprights. It was Quad City’s first playoff loss in franchise history.

The Twisters (11-7) next play at Tulsa in the National Conference championship game. If they make it beyond that, they may have to replace their clutch kicker. The league title game will either be on August 21, 22 or 23 and Norris is scheduled to report to Harvard University on August 21 to continue his studies, Arkansas coach Gary Anderson said. [August 9 and 10, 2003; Arkansas Democrat-Gazette]

50 years ago…

LITTLE ROCK – The head basketball coach of Texas Christian University told an audience at the annual coaching clinic of the Arkansas High School Coaches’ Association that the Southwest Conference needs to desegregate to help the quality of its basketball programs.

Coach Buster Brannon said the SWC would never be as good as the Missouri Valley, Big Ten or other top conferences until it begins recruiting black athletes. He said one of the best prep basketball teams he’d ever seen was a black school in Fort Worth which won the Texas negro championship. “They are more predominate in basketball than football,” Brannon said. “They’re more suitable for it, with longer arms, more reach.”

Brannon, a Pine Bluff native, predicted TCU would be one of the last SWC schools to desegregate athletics and that the state schools would go first. [August 9, 1963; Associated Press]

Private schools actually got the ball rolling in SWC athletics desegregation. It started a couple years after Brannon’s speech at SMU under  former Arkansas assistant coach Hayden Fry. Fry would later coach Bret Bielema at the University of Iowa.

***

Blytheville won its first state baseball championship since 1928 when its American Legion team beat Little Rock’ s entry 11-2. The win capped the first state Legion tournament ever held in Blytheville and was an especially emotional for Blytheville coach Jim Fisher, who hadn’t won a state title in 16 winter of basketball or 15 summers of baseball in the town.

This team, known as the Casons and sponsored by Dud Casons Post 24, would be different.

Dud Casons emerged as the only undefeated squad in the five-day, double-elimination event. It won four games, starting with an 11-7 romp of El Dorado. Attending the event was El Dorado native Donna Axum, who’s the reigning Miss Arkansas and National Cotton Picking queen. On the tourney’s last day, she threw out the first ball and presented the state baseball commissioner Fred Williams with an honorary cotton-picking citizenship of Blytheville. [August 12, 1963; Blytheville Courier-News]

***

Yes, all you trivia fiends, Brian Bosworth actually did involve himself in a movie called “Stone Cold” that was filmed in Little Rock and involved a character named “Trouble Owens.” Also, yes: Evin Tweets.