Wisconsin Football Vault

Somehow, some way, my mom keeps finding new Badger-related reading material for birthday and Christmas gifts. Bless her heart!

This year for my birthday she gave me the University of Wisconsin Football Vault, written by Pat Richter, Vince Sweeney, and Justin Doherty.

At its heart, the "book" is a historical look at the program, with few new facts or anecdotes. Stories about Pat O'Dea, Ivy Williamson, Rufus Ferguson, et al, are well-known to any of us who have read Badger history books before. The pictures and layout are really nice, afforded by the large format.

What makes this offering outstanding, though, is the Badger football "artifacts" littered throughout the book. These are reproductions of game programs, a letter from O'Dea to Yale's athletic director, a Daily Cardinal song supplement, tickets, media credentials, O'Dea's Hall of Fame nomination, schedules, roster sheets, and camp brochures.

This stuff is really neat, worth the price of the book. The artwork on some of these things is phenomenal, and the language is interesting. I'm going to try to scan and post some of the artifacts, particularly the game programs, you'll enjoy them.

Check it out, you can buy it through Amazon.

Wisconsin's all-time Top 10 athletes

Last week my brother-in-law Nick (Sorgi-Romo) Barbera emailed me a link to an SI.com feature on Wisconsin's Top 10 all-time athletes. It's interesting -- here's the list:




10. Joe Thomas
9. Tony Granato
8. Pat Richter
7. Michael Finley
6. Red Below
5. Mark Johnson
4. Alando Tucker
3. Ron Dayne
2. Suzy Favor-Hamilton
1. Alan Ameche



Here's my top 20:
20. Gene Englund
19. Lee Kemp
18. Joe Thomas
17. Mark Johnson
16. Sara Bauer
15. Chris Solinsky
14. Al Toon
13. Alando Tucker

12. Amy Wickus
11. Cathy Branta
10. Kathy Butler
9. Robert Butler
8. Arlie Mucks
7. Pat O'Dea
6. Dave Schreiner/Pat Harder
5. Alan Ameche
4. Mike Eaves
3. Ron Dayne
2. Pat Richter
1. Suzy Favor-Hamilton

Don't know some of these names? Visit www.uwbadgers.com and do some research. Please return and discuss.

Good to Great

About a month ago my company scheduled an offsite strategic planning meeting. Part of our preparation for the planning was to read the Jim Collins book Good to Great, so I did on my flight to Germany. Then the meeting got canceled. Still, it was a good read, and I thought sevearl of the book's main tenets are applicable to Badger sports.

In a nutshell, the book was a scientific analysis of why some companies, like Kimberly-Clark, Phillip Morris, and Walgreens, outperform the market after years of middling results, while other comparable companies plod along. Some of the traits these successful companies shared were humble leaders, people put in the right places, and focusing on something they can be the best in the world at. Let's look at this from a UW athletics point of view.

Humble leaders: I'm going to put Pat Richter in this class. The guy is obviously incredible, from his days as an athlete to his days in business to his days running our athletic department. Yet you never heard him glorifying himself in public. Barry Alvarez had/has an ego, but you didn't hear him using the first person to describe the program's accomplishments. Dick Bennett and Bo Ryan are as self-effacing as they come.

Put the right people in the right places: Credit Donna Shalala for this one, getting Richter on board to lead the resurrection. But there were lots of other people responsible for doing off-the-field work required in a successful athletic program: Al Fish, Joel Maturi, Jamie Pollard, John Chadima, Steve Malchow, Rob Jansen, and lots of others. ;) These are the ones who monetize all of UW athletics' assets, who communicate a consistent message to the public, who hire other talented people at the lower levels.

Do what you can be best at: In the book the author cites Phillip Morris, which decided to be the best damn tobacco company in the world, not one that got distracted by diversifying into peripheral businesses (although they did that successfully later). No matter how you feel about the ethics of this, you can't deny that they've succeeded, and been immensely profitable along the way.

Let's apply this to UW sports. What could they be best in the world, or at least one of the best in the country, at? Alvarez built the football program with the goal of being the best in the country at running the ball. He figured that he could get linemen from the Midwest and a few good backs and build an identity. Sure, many talented receivers languished under this offensive approach, but it lifted the program to three Rose Bowl titles in six years, unprecedented success.

The basketball program under Bennett and Ryan has been the best in the world at defending and controlling tempo. Sure, many talented offensive players have had their games suppressed under this approach, but it lifted the program to a Final Four and a string of 20-win seasons and NCAA appearances that would have been a pipe dream 20 years ago.

Running a successful athletic program is like running a successful business, and we should be thankful that ours has been run as one of the best in the country for the last 18 years.

Big thanks to my brother-in-law Tony Sorgi, er, Nick, whose computer I'm using to write this.

UW football and basketball books

The holiday break gave me a chance to read two other Wisconsin sports books by UW alum Dave Anderson. The books cover the Badgers' football and basketball history.

While these books will help fill out the UW section of my bookshelf, I can't in good faith recommend buying them - save the combined $30. Instead, buy The World Without Us (read it over Thanksgiving, still getting my thoughts together for a review), and download the history sections of the media guides posted at uwbadgers.com. Because that's all these books really are: a collection of team, stadium, and athlete pictures from the UW archives accompanied by redundant captions that often contain errors. There's no new analysis or historical context.

The first thing I said to Jana about them was "I can't believe this guy got paid to put these books together," and then kicked myself for not getting there first. In fairness, Anderson probably didn't set out to write a Halbertsam-esaue tome about his alma mater's athletics, and my expectations shouldn't have been to receive anything along those lines. Also, having been exposed to so many media guides over the years, I probably know more of this historical stuff than the average fan.

Anderson does make the good point that while the last 15 years or so have undeniably been a Golden Era in UW athletics, it wasn't always as bad as the preceding couple decades. In fact, UW athletics in the first three or four decades of the 20th century were pretty damn good, with plenty of conference titles, All-Americans, and even a few national titles. Then we hit a 50-year dry spell with a good season here and there.

What happened? Good question, and one that's not answered in these books. My thought is that the coaches of the times did not adapt quickly enough to changes in strategy and recruiting; the radical/turbulent nature of Madison during the '60s and '70s scared off many kids who weren't up for that kind of college experience; and a bad football team drags down everything else. Without the '93 Rose Bowl, does the Kohl Center get built?

Also took the time to read Game Day: Wisconsin Football by Athlon Sports. A much better book, it had lots of color photos and in-depth sections on players, coaches, games, rivalries, etc. If you're a true Badgers fan, you need to learn about Pat O'Dea, Pat Harder, Dave Schreiner, Crazylegs Hirsch, Alan Ameche, the Hard Rocks defense, Dan Lanphear, Ron Vander Kelen, Pat Richter the athlete, Dennis Lick, Ray Snell, Mike Webster, Tim Krumrie, Matt Vanden Boom, Al Toon, Ivy Williamson, Harry Stuhldreher, Milt Bruhn, Dave McClain, and the other men who made Badger football great in previous generations.

I recommend taking the time to learn UW athletics history. It does, in fact, predate Barry Alvarez and Dick Bennett.

Luke Swan jersey

Here's a fun fact: In my post job, I had a blog that ran for about 11 months and 280 posts. I probably got 10-15 legitimate non-spam comments, and a handful of meaningful, pointed emails. Three days into Badgercentric I got an email, and not even from a friend or family member!

It came from a woman who was looking for information about my Luke Swan jersey. I go mine at Scheel's, a huge sporting goods store in Appleton, in January, and Polzin and Mertzy say there are plenty available at the University Bookstore. But here's a secret: I think my #1 jersey was leftover from Brandon Williams' standout senior season.

#1 should always be a decent number to have, much like Schwalbach's #2. My other Badger jersey is a Pat Richter throwback, #88, but every time I wear it we play like crap, so it's a non-gameday choice. Yes, I'm insane.

This little exercise got me thinking: what's the best number in recent UW history? I'd say it's #2 (Schwib's jersey): Casillas, Calhoun, Starks, Fletcher, DeRamus. Probably forgetting someone, but that's a damn tough group to beat.