Who is the most successful person you’ve met?

The most successful I've met outside of my work in journalism was Mario Lemieux. My mother used to handle the travel arrangements for his annual charity golf invitational back when it was a huge deal. It was stars from all sports. Michael Jordan was the biggest name who usually attended. The funny part was my mother knew nothing about sports. She would call me and asked me who they all were. "Who is Marcus Allen? Who is Chris Chelios?" This is when both guys were still playing. She loved Allen because he was always polite and friendly. She couldn't stand Chelios because he was rude, often asked to change his plans multiple times only to cancel at the last minute. She couldn't have cared less about their athletic accomplishments, but she liked impressing her son by meeting those guys.

She didn't play golf, but they kept bugging her to at least go to the banquet and silent auction the night before the tournament. She just had no interest in going. One year she sent me in her place along with my girlfriend, who eventually became my wife. Most of the athletes weren't particularly interested in us, but Lemieux made sure to say hello. It was cool to meet him, but I was far more excited when he gave my mother an autographed game jersey the next year. She had it framed and gave it to me. That is still one of my most prized possessions.

 

Jerry Buss
Peter O'Malley
John Wooden
High school classmate of Maidie Oliveau, a leading sports attorney and, since May 1997, an arbitrator on the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). That's the panel that rules on Olympic doping cases.
Met Ted Turner, President Ford, a bunch of people associated in sports.

 

Went to high school in Podunk, Tenn., but our class valedictorian was determined to go to Harvard and become a pediatric surgeon. He did exactly that, and is now a professor at a Big 10 medical school to boot. And his parents still considered him a mild disappointment next to his big brother, who was also a valedictorian and got a West Point appointment.

 

I’ve met a lot of big-time athletes and coaches, but Paul Newman might be my winner.

 

Our current VP, and former Jr. Sen of California

 

I spent 12 years working very closely with one of the guys who invented Trivial Pursuit.

Most successful athlete I met? Probably Bobby Orr, Sugar Ray Leonard would be next.

 

Racing was only peripherally involved with my brush with Newman.

I was covering the Falcons in 1987 — the strike year — and back then their team headquarters and practice facilities in Suwanee were adjacent to a hotel the team owned called the Falcon Inn.

In the weeks leading up to the season, the possible strike was the biggest story in the sports world. One day, a week or two before the opener, several of the beat writers who covered the team were eating lunch together in the Falcon Inn restaurant.

Then Paul Newman walks in. As he passes our table, he sees our notebooks on the table and hears us talking about the Falcons and the NFL labor situation.

He stops, walks up to us and asks, “Are you guys sportswriters?” Then he starts asking us what’s the latest we’ve heard, and whether we think the players are really going to strike.

Turns out he was staying at the Falcon Inn because he was going to be racing that weekend at Road Atlanta in Braselton, which is sort of nearby (if you consider 20 or so miles nearby).

Anyway, he seemed like a cool guy during our 5-minute conversation.

 

George HW Bush
Terry Bradshaw
Bob Costas

 

What’s funny (to me, anyway) is back then Suwanee was considered WAY out of town — barely in the Atlanta metro area. It always seemed like I was driving way out in the country to get there. We ate at the Falcon Inn because there was almost nothing else out there.

Now there’s heavy commercial development out to Suwanee and beyond.

 

I've met a lot of successful celebrities but the most successful people I know are on the local level. A few in Trenton come to mind.