The Death of Two Coaches From My Childhood

I apologize for the lateness of this but it's finals week. So I lost a couple of sports figures from my childhood last week, and it starts to make me feel old. Danny Ozark was the Phillies manager when I went to my first game. I was a tee ball player who could rattle off Greg Luzinski's RBI's and Larry Bowa's errors in half a second. I was a Phillies fans until Dallas Green went to Chicago and took all my favorites with him, leaving Steve Carlton in Philly. I've been a Cubs fan ever since. Ozark could never get his team to the top of the mountain. He won a few National League east titles, but came up short in the NLCS. It ultimately cost him his job and Dallas Green got it and won the World Series in 1980. The other was Chuck Daly, the great Detroit Pistons coach and the guy who led the original 'Dream Team' in 1992 at the Barcelona Olympics. These guys are among the best who ever played in the NBA and were like rock stars in Spain. Now those of us into sports know Daly battled pancreatic cancer to the end and cancer has touched us all in some way. What's overlooked is what a great coach he was. He had some great players like Dennis Rodman and Isiah Thomas but had great role players too like Vinny Johnson aka The Microwave, who'd come off the bench and knock down 3 pointer after 3 pointer. I believe they beat up the Celtics enough in the '87 playoffs to cost them a title. If it weren't for a Larry Bird steal, the Pistons would have probably won that series. Daly coached the Dream Team also, which is probably the greatest assembling of basketball talent ever to take the court. Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and Michael Jordan are three of the five greatest basketball players to ever play and they were all on one team. The rest of the world had no chance. Daly was a master at meshing these egos. He will be missed. These were two coaches I took a lot from. Until next week, keep learning.