On this date in 1986, Warner Wolf talks about the New England Patriots being the first NFL team to publicly admit wrongdoing. Also, the Plays of the Week features basketball brawls between 7-footers, hockey brawls that are now catalogued online, and a football brawl involving a Colombian kicker and his mother. Let's go to the videotape!
The New England Patriots weren't always perceived as cheaters. The legend began at the infamous Snowplow Game in 1982. When the Patriots lined up for the game-winning field goal in a blizzard, snowplow operator Mark Henderson, a prisoner on work release, plowed a clear spot for the holder to place the kick. Opposing coach Don Shula cried foul, and even refused (on moral grounds) a similar opportunity to plow the snow for their own field goal attempt.Thus began a pattern for New England Patriots football. Through cleverness and gamesmanship -- and skirting the edges of legality -- the Patriots always find a way to gain an advantage over their opponents. While fans and players of other teams cry foul, Patriots fans revel in their ingenuity. In fact, the snowplow from that 1982 game is proudly on display at Patriot Place.
However, this pattern took an unfortunate turn in January 1986, after the Patriots lost to the Chicago Bears in Super Bowl XX.
In a surprise move, Coach Raymond Berry chose the Monday after the Super Bowl to admit to the media that many of his players had struggled with drug abuse. Reacting to this shocking news so soon after the big game, many fans had the knee-jerk reaction of blaming the Patriots' loss on drug distractions -- you can imagine a similar outcry on social media if the incident happened today. Only later did the facts come to light: seven out of their 50 players tested positive for cocaine and marijuana before the season, and none tested positive during gamedays. Still, the Patriots themselves so felt the impact of the problem that they became the first NFL team to independently volunteer for drug testing.Warner's "Boo of the Month" addresses the subsequent response of the NFL Players Association, who immediately denounced the move, and filed charges against the Patriots to stop it. In 1986, Warner took a black-and-white stance on drugs, saying that playing professional sports is a privilege, and "if a player's not willing to keep his part of the bargain, then get another job." The Players' Association, however, feared that the Patriots' unilateral move would put all teams and players in jeopardy. Likewise, unilateral moves by the NFL to institute a league-wide drug-testing policy were also shot down, and even contributed to an NFL players' strike the next season. It wasn't until 1990 that the Players' Association and then-new NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue were able to negotiate a successful drug-testing protocol.
What went unsaid in 1986 -- and what we can only know in hindsight thirty years after the fact -- was how drastically all parties underestimated the scope of drug abuse in professional sports. Indeed, even commissioner Pete Rozelle believed that drug use was on the decline in 1986, based on anonymous opinion surveys of players at the time. Only later did the overwhelming influence of steroids and performance-enhancing drugs begin to overshadow concerns about cocaine and marijuana. A casual fan in 1986 might recoil at reading the roll of disgraced athletes who have since been busted due to drug abuse: olympic sprinter Ben Johnson, whose 100-meter gold medal was rescinded; Raiders linebacker Lyle Alzado, who believed his terminal brain cancer was caused by two decades of drug abuse; baseball sluggers Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, and Barry Bonds, who each broke home-run records while on steroids; WWE wrestler Chris Benoit, who committed suicide after killing his wife and son, with a testosterone level 10 times normal; cyclist Lance Armstrong, who won the Tour de France seven times before admitting to doping; pitcher Roger Clemens, who was among 89 MLB players named in a Congressional investigation in 2007.
Today, even with increasingly lax societal attitudes toward drugs, professional sports leagues have tightened the lid on drug abuse by athletes. Offenders are punished in stages, but also offered treatment and rehabilitation. Guidelines are publicly available, as are lists of offenders. It's no longer a grand shock when players admit to drug abuse; it's merely Step One of a story toward redemption.
So be thankful that, in the 21st century, the Patriots only have to deal with accusations regarding spy cameras, odd formations, or deflated footballs.
Where Are They Now?
Plays of the Month: January 31, 1986
0:55 Herb Williams, who made that 81-foot shot for the Indiana Pacers, was traded three years later for Detlef Schrempf. He never played on a winning team until landing with the New York Knicks, where he was a player, assistant coach, and interim head coach. He now is an assistant with the WNBA's New York Liberty.- 0:55 How about those baby blue Sacramento Kings uniforms! It was great news when they brought them back for 2015.
- 1:07 Dan Roundfield, or "Rounds", was near the end of his illustrious career when he missed that dunk for the Washington Bullets. He died tragically in Aruba in 2012, drowning in an attempt to save his wife.
- 1:41 The fistfight between David Dunn of Georgia and Kenny McClary of Florida was big news in 1986. Though the fight started with Florida's Vernon Maxwell and Georgia's Patrick Hamilton (who were both ejected), David Dunn got the worst of it, requiring three stitches afterwards. Dunn ended up playing basketball overseas, and even tried out for Buddy Ryan's Philadelphia Eagles, before becoming a high school and college coach in Georgia. Kenny McClary, who also played basketball overseas, is the stepfather of current NBA star Trevor Ariza.
1:49 Certainly the two tallest players ever in an NBA brawl, 7' 7" Manute Bol and 7' 0" Jawann Oldham both had memorable NBA careers and notable activism internationally. Bol advocated for his native Sudan until his death in 2010, and Oldham helped to found basketball leagues in Korea, China, and Dubai.- 1:55 It's also interesting to note the fines that Warner mentions after these NBA fights. While the amounts may have changed, the biggest difference in the past 30 years is the emergence of social media. Check out what NBA players are being fined for today -- for making comments, for using inappropriate language, or for criticizing the refs. It seems that in the Twitter era, players and coaches are more likely to be fined for what they say, rather than what they do; for example, in September 2015 the NBA fined Markieff Morris $10,000 for "a public statement detrimental to the league," when he tweeted his desire to be traded.
- 2:10 Mark Johnson, who went blue-line-to-blue-line on the highlight reel, is a veteran of the 1980 "Miracle on Ice" Olympic hockey team. He went on to coach the US Olympic women's team in 2010, and now coaches at the University of Wisconsin in his hometown of Madison, where his daughter Mikayla is a starting forward.
2:21 Well-matched hockey fighters Pat Verbeek and Marc Bergevin are now both NHL general managers -- Bergevin with the Canadiens, and Verbeek with the Lightning (as an assistant to his former teammate Steve Yzerman).- 2:28 Warner loved showing hockey fights, like the Leafs-Red Wings tussle on January 13, 1986. But thanks to 30 years of technology advancements, the details of every hockey fight in history have now been meticulously catalogued! Check out the hockeyfights.com page for this particular battle.
- 2:42 It's understandable why Dolphins kicker Fuad Reveiz and Patriots linebacker Don Blackmon might have had a dust-up. A month earlier, Fuad kicked the winning field goal to beat the Patriots in their penultimate regular season game, meaning the Dolphins had home-field advantage for the AFC Championship rematch. When Fuad missed a 31-yarder in that game, Blackmon taunted him, and Colombian-born Reveiz did not back down. Blackmon reported that he merely said, "Good kick, Fuad," while Reveiz claimed that Blackmon "questioned my mother's profession."
- 2:50 What did the above slap and Ronnie Lippett's Super Bowl hit on Jim McMahon have in common? No flags were thrown, and no fines were levied for either incident. Try getting away with that in today's media-churned NFL.
3:10 Larry Nelson, who hit that chip shot out of the water, has had an incredible career. But read this Golf Digest story where Larry talks about serving in Vietnam, leading search-and-destroy missions during the Tet Offensive!- 3:18 Every so often a sports highlight reel will show a horse like "Tribute to Ted," who wins a race after shedding its jockey (no surprise, since they're 100 pounds lighter than the competition). But could this actually be the future of racing? It already is in the Middle East, where racing camels are now remotely directed by robots, from the comfort of an air-conditioned suite.
- 3:27 Boxer Greg Haugen gained his first of two world titles in December 1986. He is best known for his 1993 fight against Julio Cesar Chavez in Mexico City -- the most-attended fight in boxing history, with 132,000 spectators. Haugen had made some not-too-flattering comments about Mexicans before the match, and as a result, the ring was surrounded by a moat and barbed wire!
3:34 In 1986, Hulk Hogan was at the height of his popularity, in the middle of his 4-year reign as WWF Heavyweight Champion. Macho Man Randy Savage would later claim the title himself in 1988, only to lose it a year later to Hogan at Wrestlemania V. 30 years later, both are also well-known for their activities outside the ring. Hogan showcased the insanity of his family in a regrettable reality show; while Savage faced off against Spider-Man and became inexorably linked to Slim Jims, before his death from cardiac arrest in 2011.
