Fairborn commencement
Badin graduation
Division I regional track finals
Award-winning columnist Tom Archdeacon — an old-school storyteller in a brand-new venue — writes about sports, the city, southwest Ohio and anything else that catches his fancy… or yours.Home > Blogs > Through the Arch > Archives > 2009 > August > 13
Thursday, August 13, 2009
COLUMN — OSU’s Spitler: Hillbilly Strong and About to Shine
COLUMBUS — Kurt Coleman, the senior safety and Northmont product, was doing a live TV interview in the south end zone.
Zach Domicone, the freshman defensive back from Beavercreek High, was near the 30 yard line, posing for pictures with his arm around his girlfriend as his diamond-like earrings sparkled in the last rays of the day’s sun.
Not far away, Jake Ballard, the Springboro tight end, stood with three generations of his family. To his left, a fellow Ohio State football player was introducing his parents to his coaches. Beyond them, two new players in their scarlet jerseys and gray pants gawked around the Horseshoe and just fanaticized.
And then there was the bemused Austin Spitler, whose mom had just read him the riot act.
This was the scene at OSU’s annual Media and Photo Night — which drew 550 family members and 175 media types — Thursday, Aug. 13, at Ohio Stadium.
Spitler, the fifth-year senior linebacker from Bellbrook, was finally in the spotlight — after a red-shirt season and three as a back-up, he’s going into two-a -days as a starter — and that’s why Mom was on his case.
She didn’t like what the bright lights were picking up — specifically his new beard.
“It’s just a (pre-season) camp look and being lazy, but everybody’s giving me crap about it,” he laughed. “My mom was really mad that I didn’t get lined up for picture day. But what you gonna do? You can’t make ‘em happy all the time.”
He shrugged and admitted the new look might soon be gone: “Coach Tressel wants things trimmed up.”
So what you see with Spitler isn’t always what you get.
Someone mentioned that he’s one of the strongest guys on the team and he just shrugged:
“Yeah, that may be one of my strengths…no pun intended. Guys on the team call me ‘hillbilly strong.’ I guess it’s probably because there aren’t many farm and country boys on the team — though that’s not saying I am either …My parents live in (Bellbrook) now.
“But I have baled hay. And everybody thinks I’m country ‘cause I like country music and drive a big truck (a silver Dodge Ram).
‘I’d say there are maybe just five guys on the team who truly enjoy and are heartfelt about country music. But my mom worked for a country station, so I was brought up on it. It’s all I knew.”
He said he and some of his buddies went to the Country Concert in Fort Loramie last month. As for his favorite country artists, he mentioned Sugarland and especially Brooks and Dunn:
“Their song ‘Believe’ has always been one of my favorites.”
And since becoming a Buckeye in 2005, he’s had to believe. The past few years he played in the shadows of All American linebacker James Laurinaitis and it wasn’t always easy.
“It’s been frustrating — especially sophomore season knowing this guy in front of me was playing just unbelievable football and it wasn’t looking too great for me.
“But (Laurinaitis) helped me pull through it, so did some other guys and the coaches. And it ultimately comes down to what’s best for you and the best place for me was right here.
“That’s when I decided to work as hard as I possibly could and if it didn’t work out in the end, well, I’d know I gave it my all and showed them my very best.”
And that’s where Mom took exception.
To her, he still needed a razor and some shaving cream for that.
TweetBronson Arroyo talks drugs, supplements and feeling like a “monster”
In one of the most candid interviews I’ve read from a baseball player in a long time, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Bronson Arroyo talked to USA Today’s Bob Nightengale about drugs, supplements, vitamins and other things ball players use and said the notion that teams have ever been concerned with anything other than wins, losses and money is absurd.
He noted how the Mark McGwire-led St. Louis Cardinals and Barry Bonds-powered San Francisco Giants sold thousands of seats and won lots of games.
The big story and pictures of Arroyo appear both on the front cover and page 2A of today’s USA Today,
Arroyo is one of my favorite Reds players because he’ll always make time for you, he can talk to you on a myriad of topics and he is candid. Sometimes may a little too candid.
I don’t agree with some of the things he tells Nightengale, but I give Arroyo credit for not trying to dodge the issue or flat out lie like many of the big leaguers have done in the past. He said he quit taking various things when Major League Baseball put them on the banned list.
I’ve got a certain appreciation for Jose Canseco, as well. Sure he is a pumped up peacock, has an ego that dwarfs his bulging, once chemically-infused bicep and brags, but it turns out he was telling the truth when he blew the whistle on baseball players and steroid abuse.
Arroyo’s interview doesn’t quite go down that path, but some of the points Arroyo makes are spot on.
Here are some snippets of his conversation:
— “You think the country really cares about what ballplayers put in their bodies? If we really care, why are we pumping Coca Cola in every kid’s mouth and McDonald’s and Burger King and KFC? That (stuff) is killing people.”
— “I can see where guys like Hank Aaron and some of the old timers have a beef with it. But as far as looking at Manny Ramirez like he’s (serial killer) Ted Bundy, you’re out of your mind. At the end of of the day, you think anybody really cares whether Manny Ramirez’s kidneys fail and he dies at 50?”
— Arroyo said he took androstenedione — made famous by McGwire during his big home run season — from 1998 until it was banned in 2004: “Man, I didn’t think twice about it. I took androstenedione the same way I took my multivitamins. I didn’t really know if this was a genius move by Mark McGwire to cover up the real s—- he was taking, but it made me feel unbelievable. I felt like a monster.”
— “I have a lot of guys (in the locker room) who think I’m out of (my) mind because I’m taking a lot of things not on the (MLB-approved) list. I take 10 to 12 different things a day and on the days I pitch, there’s four more things. There a caffeine drink I take from a company that that (former teammate) Curt Schilling introduced me to in ‘05. I take some Korean ginseng and a few other proteins out there that are not certified. But I haven’t failed any tests, so I figured I’m good.”
— “I think I could have had the same career without andro. The best years of my career have been after they enacted the steroids policy.”
—“I do what I want to do and say what I want to say…I’ve always been honest, I’m not going to stop now.”
TweetCOLUMN: Bill Powell - Wilberforce’s PGA history maker
It was late afternoon and his daughter said he was finally resting in a chair in his Minneapolis hotel room.
It had been a whirlwind day, beginning before dawn back home in Canton. Then came the drive to Pittsburgh — where, on an airport TV, he saw himself featured on Good Morning America — and a flight to Minneapolis.
Tonight, August 12 — in a gala gathering before Thursday’s start of the PGA Championship at Hazeltine — 92-year old Bill Powell will receive the PGA of America’s highest honor — the PGA’s Distinguished Service Award
So late Tuesday, his daughter Renee planned to field the phone calls. That worked until the topic was Dayton and Wilberforce. Suddenly you could hear him in the background.
“Guess he’s not sleeping,” she laughed.
Powell came to Wilberforce from Minerva High east of Canton in 1937 and with his older brother Berry and two others, formed the school’s first golf team, which made history when it played — and beat — Ohio Northern in two matches that year.
It was the first time ever that white and black college golf teams faced each other. One match was in Lima, the other in Dayton at the now defunct Miami View course , where Wilberforce practiced.
Powell eventually left college for World War II, but when he returned to Ohio, he was denied access to certain courses and when he applied for a GI Loan — which he was due — he was denied.
Unbowed, he borrowed money from two black doctors and his brother and bought a run-down 78-acre dairy farm in East Canton.
Working nights as a security guard, he spent his days — for two years — clearing the land, building tees and greens and seeding fairways with the help of his wife Marcella.
In 1948 he opened the nine-hole Clearview Golf Club. Buying another 52 acres , he expanded to 18 holes 30 years later.
Today Clearview is the only golf course in the U.S. that was designed, built, owned and operated by an African American.
Bill’s son Larry is now the greenskeeper and Renee is the head pro after spending 13 years on the LPGA tour.
One of only three black women ever to play the tour, Renee said it wasn’t always easy: “I started in the ’60s and there were some problems with the hotels, restaurants and locker rooms. And there were some threatening letters.
“But from my dad I learned to stick it out and never give up. He had wanted to build a course that — no matter what the color of your skin, your religion or nationality, if you were Greek, Irish or Italian — you had a place to play. And that’s what Clearview is.”
Powell’s efforts have been recognized by Wilberforce — which awarded him an honorary doctorate in 2001.
And Tiger Woods — recognizing that Powell helped pave the way for him — awards a William and Marcella Powell Scholarship every year.
Now comes the PGA’s highest honor, which is descried as going to “an outstanding individual” who, among other things, has “a real enthusiasm for golf.”
And that enthusiasm showed itself again late Tuesday when — as the conversation turned to Dayton and Wilberforce — Bill Powell chose reminiscing over rest
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