I went to the same high school (20 years later) and was best friends with Vai Sikahema's cousin. As many of you know he is a former NFL player and Sports broadcaster in Philadelphia.
Years ago I spent a weekend with Vai in Utah he was there to speak at a BYU homecoming event and to try to recruit future NFL star Haloti Ngata to BYU.
I can tell you that Vai was a very uncomfortable person to be around because he is full of 2 things himself and S*%#
One of the things that he did was give me a half hour long lecture about how good he is with people and about how out of line that I am about something.
I am not at all surprised that he is now an area authority and suspect that he will go higher. Also I suspect that the reason he was "called" was because he is famous.
If anyone on here has any experience with Vai Sikahema I will listen.

It's my experience that a number of the elite level athletes I've met are full of themselves to one extent or another. Not all, but a number of them.

I've seen this quality sometimes propel them to make poor decisions in their post-athletic careers, at which point they learn to check their egos to at least some degree.

I once played a round of golf with OJ.

Yes, he had a wicked slice!


Okay, that was the obligatory joke.

He was fun to be with, in an 'everyone look at me!' kind of way, and he beat me out of $3.00.

Joe Montana waved at me as he drove by when I was standing outside at a shopping center.

I was at the grocery store the same time Steve Young was doing his grocery shopping. I passed him in the aisle.

Shaun Tomson, one of the worlds best surfers, drove me to the grocery store when I was at BYU Hawaii. I didn't know who he was till I picked up a Surfing magazine and saw his picture.

Those are my encounters with the elites of the sporting world.

heartbroken Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Joe Montana waved at me as he drove by when I was
> standing outside at a shopping center.
>
> I was at the grocery store the same time Steve
> Young was doing his grocery shopping. I passed him
> in the aisle.
>
> Shaun Tomson, one of the worlds best surfers,
> drove me to the grocery store when I was at BYU
> Hawaii. I didn't know who he was till I picked up
> a Surfing magazine and saw his picture.
>
> Those are my encounters with the elites of the
> sporting world.

In the Mormon sporting world, I have met Danny Ainge and Fred Roberts, back when they were both with the Celtics. I was in Washington, DC, attending church with some close family friends. The Celtics were in town to play the Washington Bullets (as they were known at the time), and the two of them came to church that morning. I had gone out to use the restroom at one point and nearly walked right in to Ainge as he was wandering the halls, also looking for the restroom. Being a teenager from New England, needless to say, I was a star struck. But for that brief, awkward encounter, Ainge seemed nice.

In the early 1990s, I was living in Jacksonville, Florida and Greg Kite attended my ward once. Other than his stature, he also seemed to be relatively low key.

In non-Mormon sports, in the late 1990s I was working as a flight instructor in Daytona Beach, and our flight school was located right above one of the FBOs (Fixed Base Operator - a company that provides handling services for aircraft). I was working there during the summer NASCAR race, and all the teams and drivers were flying their aircraft in, and using the FBO right below us. As I was an employee, I had a pass to be able to drive in and park right next to the facility. So one day around the race, I pull in and see one of my friends talking with a guy one the walkway. I end up chatting with my friend and this guy for about 15 minutes before this other guy says that he has some things he has to take care of, but wished us both a good day and hoped we'd get to enjoy the race weekend. After he walked away, my friend looked at me with a huge grin, and stars in his eyes, and said "I can't believe we just got to hang out and talk with Cale Yarborough for like 20 minutes, that is so cool!". I was not a NASCAR fan, so I didn't know who he was by seeing him, but I definitely knew the name. But he seemed very cool and down to earth.

One other second hand story. During the time I was living in Jacksonville, I had a flight instructor who had spent years as a minor league baseball player. He was sort of like Crash Davis from the movie "Bull Durham" in that he bounced around the minor leagues for many years, most of them in triple-A ball. But he never made it to the majors. But during his time in the minors, he got to know many guys who would go on to the majors. He even spent two year rooming with Brett Butler, who had a successful major league career with the Dodgers and Giants. My instructor said that most guys, including Butler, became arrogant jerks as soon as they got called up to the majors. He said he ran in to Butler a few times during spring training in subsequent years, and he wouldn't even say "hi" to my instructor. But one guy my instructor said was always cool, and he got to know pretty well over the years when they were both in the minors, was Wade Boggs. By the time my instructor was deciding to end his career, Boggs was a well established major league star. But my instructor said every time he would see him, Boggs would always say "hi" and chat with him for a bit. When my instructor told him he was going to retire, he said Boggs actually seemed genuinely disappointed that he wouldn't get to see him around playing ball any more, but wished him all the best in the future. He always held Boggs in very high regard because of how cool he was to minor league guys.

Oh, almost forgot, ran in to Ryne Sandberg, Hall of Fame second baseman for the Cubs, in the Albany, NY airport at the end of his Hall of Fame induction ceremony weekend. I was working for a small airline and based in Albany, so I was in uniform when I saw him. I just said "congratulations" to him, and he nodded at me and said "thanks captain".

Only famous Mormon athlete I ever met was champion boxer Gene Fulmer. He was a humble guy...with a handshake that felt like it could crush a golf ball..



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/07/2022 06:25PM by Lethbridge Reprobate.

Did he happen to grow up on a dairy farm?

He very well might have. Haven't read his bio in a while. He was built like the proverbial "brick $hithouse".

I was a missionary for a few months in Vai's ward when he was bishop in the late 1990s. He was nice, his wife was super nice. Had a mustache and wore a sport coat instead of a suit on Sundays, which was out of the norm for a bishop, at least in that era.

> ...his wife was super nice. Had
> a mustache and wore a sport coat
> instead of a suit on Sundays

You confused me, who had the moustache?

...it doesn't matter; they both had the spirit.

Ha! Several of my roommates at BYU were athletes. Yup. HUGE egos but man did we have girls coming to the apartment. The girls love athletes and they treated the girls like shit.

I can confirm that. I once went out with some dude at BYU who went on to play with NY Jets. I won't say his name here. His idea of the evening was to take me to his apartment, lounge on the couch, watch sports and pressure for sex.

This sounds terribly judgmental, but most of the athletes I met there were dumb as a bag of air. By my 3rd year at BYU, I hung out at the Honors Library to flirt with smart guys.

Ah-hah!

Now your attraction to RfM is revealed!

...a return to the couch...

Did the football player's strategy work?

Don't leave us hanging!

Let's just say neither of us got what we wanted.

I wrangled my share of octopus guys at BYU, including a married guy from my parasitology class (I didn't know he was married).
I was bound and determined to find my EP (eternal partner) and go to the temple. So special!

I don't think I would like to relive those BYU coed days again. Cringe.

My adventures were nothing compared to the frolics of you and Jesus, I'm sure.

> My adventures were nothing compared to the frolics
> of you and Jesus, I'm sure.

Well, I have had some wild times although none in the presence of (either) Jesus.

Someday you and I should swap stories over a very, very Irish coffee.

Jesus was always watching you. He's a voyeur.

I'm not sure if I should try Irish coffee, considering how wild we both get. It would be fun!

:-)

I played a pickup basketball game with him in a stake center. It was a long time ago...The only thing I remember about it was thinking that he was awfully small for an NFL player.

I never knew anyone. I don't have many friends you know.

But are you estranged from yourself?

That's when things get ugly...

I don't do football, absolutely detest it. However, I met two former NFL players and did not know who they were. Others had to tell me..... Earl Campbell and Warren Moon.

At both occasions, everyone was so astonished that I didn't know who these men were.

Whoopty-do. *shoulder shrug*

I sold a 1969 convertible Camaro to Jay Chesseman. A late 70's or early 80's BYU star.

He had been hounding me for years to sell it to him, and I finally did. But he didn't pay for it all.

He paid me the bulk of it up front, but I gave him 30 days to pay the rest off, but he said he'd have it paid a lot earlier. I had surgery and needed money bad, so called him up for payment. He kept saying he would send a check, and then didn't.

After 30 days, I went to his rich house in Orem and took it back in the middle of the night. He came out and jumped on me as I was backing out (the top was down). We fought, he gave up, and I drove off.

He followed and saw that I took it to my Mil's house. She was an avid police scanner listener, and said that the cops were down the street waiting to pull me over as soon as I left. I put it in the garage and had it towed on a tow truck the next day and resold it.

He sued me, had a better lawyer and claimed that I took it a day early, even though it was after midnight when I took it. I bankrupted his judgment out of principle. He put a lien on my house. Ten years later I sold it and showed his lawyer that the bankruptcy said that it couldn't be collected. He claimed that it could. I didn't want to spend the money to fight it, and paid it.

That's the long story of how BYU hero Jay Chessman stole money from me lying that he pay me the rest of the money on good faith.