Playing with/against Vols

#51
#51
I played high school football with Shazzon Bradley,he was 1 year behind me. We are still friends. We played Rhea County with Andy Kelly,needless to say they drilled us every year.
Lived 2 houses down from Hubert Simpson's aunt. Met him a few times and got to know him.
 
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#52
#52
Doberman said:
Ok, gotcha.

I was at Bartlett High when former Vol Ronald Davis was there 89-93 (He was 2 years ahead of me, I believe). Best athlete I've ever seen in person. Unbelievable, really. I thought I was a decent athlete until I saw him on the field, and then I knew my true place in the athletic world....a nobody. :eek:hmy:

The big name that I remember playing against was Curtis Alexander of Whitehaven. He went on to Bama as RB.

Then my younger brother got the pleasure of playing against Ahmad Galloway of Millington, who also went on to Bama as RB.
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No story to tell, just want to give a shout out to Doberman, a fellow Bartlettian. Hi, neighbor, I'm just down the street from Freeman Park. We'll have to get together and compare notes some time!!
 
#55
#55
orangemadam said:
No story to tell, just want to give a shout out to Doberman, a fellow Bartlettian. Hi, neighbor, I'm just down the street from Freeman Park. We'll have to get together and compare notes some time!!
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Nice. Thought I may be the only Bartlett guy on here.

I'm down by the fire station at Billy Maher.
 
#56
#56
Played high school basketball against Tracy Hayworth from Franklin Co. Strong dude. Also played pick up basketball with Fred Jenkins in Columbia while i was there at JC. Nice guy
 
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#57
#57
I was on the same practice field with Bruce Wilkerson, I was only a freshman when he was a senior.

Caught passes from David Blackburn in practice, never in a game.

Played with Reggie Brown, best back I ever played the game with. Too bad he had other issues.

Played many years with Cedric Kline.

Played against Terence Cleveland in HS.
 
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#58
#58
Frozevol said:
I once played in a pickup basketball game at the west side Y with former Vol and NY Jet Pat Ryan and Chris (?) Gettlefinger who snubbed the Vols to ride the pine at UK (but got at least one ring I believe). Pat Ryan was a very good player. Even though it wasn't his sport obviously, his athleticism was incredible. Gettlefinger was an obnoxious jerk who thought he was still battling for playing time.
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I played against Gettlefinger in a rec league in Jefferson City, once. He was a jerk. I did score 36 in that game, my all time high, but we lost in OT. He scored like 40, tho, we didn't guard each other, either. He wouldn't even shake my hand after the game and said something smarta$$.

When I was freshman at Fulton, I tagged out AEs Von Reaves(future UT tight-end) trying to steal third.

Not a former UT player. But, we(Fulton) rocked Johnny Knoxville(PJ Clapp) when he pitched for South-Young. I didn't have a hit, but everybody else did. I, also played 2 years of football with PJ(Knoxville) at the Baby Falcons. Believe it or not, he was a chunky offensive lineman

Played against Lang Wiseman and Ronnie Roninson at the BB courts between the tennis courts at UT. Lang killed us, but Robinson was weak for a 6'8 guy. No wonder he transferred after a year or 2.
 
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#59
#59
BigOrangeMojo said:
With a little more than 2 months to the GT game, the offseason threads will (thankfully) be coming to an end soon. I apologize if this has been discussed previously.

Who all in here has competed with or against current or former Vols in any athletic competition? Do you have any stories that you would like to share? I have a couple to share...

My first catch in my HS career came against Jackson Central Merry. I ran a little curl across the middle on 2nd and short and the ball was behind me but I ended up catching the ball and got the first down. Al Wilson was barreling towards me and the reason why I am probably still alive today is that my feet got "tangled up" (OK, I'll admit I went to the ground) before he got there.

My final catch in HS career was against Memphis Melrose where I caught a little short seam deep in our territory when I was hit by Andre Lott and Cedrick Wilson and a LB. Through no ability of my own, I essentially pinballed off all 3 guys and somehow stayed on my feet and I was off to the races (sarcasm noted, given my lack of speed). I was caught from behind by 2 DL that I had a 10 yard head start on.

I remember playing against a much younger Tony Harris in a summer basketball game once. At that point, I realized I had absolutely no future playing basketball.
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The summer going into my sophomore year, I was in the same defensive backs group as Al Wilson at Phil Fulmer's camp. Lovie Smith was our coach. Fulmer was over watching our group quite a bit as it was Wilson's senior year. While we were at camp that week on the UT campus, the whole O.J. Simpson situation was happening. We didn't know about it because we didn't have a tv or cell phones.
 
#61
#61
Anthony Parker and Turk McBride joined my friends playing basketball in HPER one day. Not sure how many people remember Parker, or McBride for that matter, but Parker was a nice interior lineman at UT. McBride played DE/DT. Both guys were huge, but Parker... well, I'll just quote his NFL Combine profile:

"Short and carries too much of his weight around the midsection." Of course, short for the NFL means 6'2", but he definitely didn't look like an elite athlete, and by that time he had a history of knee injuries.

It was embarrassing how much better of an athlete Parker was than me. He didn't dunk, but I swear he could have.

McBride was a beast too, of course. Both guys were shockingly quick for their size. Never fails to amaze me to see football players in action, up close, especially the big uglies. What those guys can do at that size is hard to believe.

Parker and McBride were both easy going, fun guys, too, at least from the short interaction I had with them. McBride had a pretty nice NFL career, but I don't think Parker ever really got much of a chance. His knees caught up with him. Hate that for good college players.

I also played intramural football against the track team once. They're, uh, fast. Not much of a story, but I remember catching a ball shallow over the middle. I was wide open when our quarterback threw the ball, I figured I would run for a first down, at the least. Instead, there were at least three track athletes pulling my flag the instant I caught the ball.

Love the thread idea, OP. I also love to tell these two bad stories, just because it's fun to remember what elite athleticism really looks like.
 
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#64
#64
My oldest son played against JRM for three seasons, twice his SR year counting playoffs. My youngest son, HS Sr., played in a playoff game his freshman year at weak side DE against Hillsboro HS in the playoffs. Made a tackle against Vincent Perry and was blindsided by Kyle Phillips, their SR years, was blindsided and received a concussion for his efforts. And yes no flag.
 
#65
#65
I've got a picture of me attempting to take a charge against "baby shaq" big John Henderson in seventh grade while he was hangin on the rim above me. 6'7" 250 in seventh grade!! Became pretty good friends with him for a cpl years when we played aau ball.
Also was tasked with guarding Brandon Wharton in the state tournament at Overton high when he was a senior and I was a freshman. Didn't go so well for me. Haha
 
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#66
#66
Might be a bit of a stretch for this thread, but I played basketball in Chattanooga, and we won state my sophomore year primarily because of two guys that were absolute beasts at the high school level. One of those guys was Jason Holwerda, who went on to start for some very solid Vandy teams that made at least one deep run in the NCAA Tournament. He was a senior that year, and his dad was the Superintendent of the small school we went to, while my dad was the shop teacher. Even though he was two years older than me, we grew up together, and spent summers working landscaping together at the school, and going to the gym when we finished for the day to practice. Spent a lot of time practicing throwing him alley-oops, mainly for fun, but also because he could jump out of the gym and we thought it could come in handy the following season. Anyway, we were playing Red Bank in a non-district game (they were AAA, largest division in TSSAA basketball at the time, and we were A, the smallest division) at home one night. Gerald Riggs, Jr. was sitting in the front row with some of his friends, as a lot of people came to watch us play because Jason and another guy named Martin would regularly posterize opponents and made us fun to watch. At one point in the second half of what was a close game at the time, Jason was on the opposite wing from where I was, and I had the ball. He faked a cut toward me, which the defender bit on, and went back door along the baseline. All of the time we spent messing around in the summers paid off, as we caught each others eyes for a split second right when he started towards the hoop, and from about 5 feet from behind the 3 point line I threw him an alley-oop. Quite frankly, I threw a horrible pass, throwing it above the square on the backboard. Fortunately, Jason went up and somehow caught it, bringing it down two-handed on the poor soul who came from the weak side and tried to jump and break it up. It was the most amazing thing I've ever seen in a high school game. When he threw it down the entire gym erupted, including Riggs, who was so fired up he ran onto the court and high-fived Jason as he came back down the court to play defense. Sorry for the long post with what I'm sure is entirely too much detail and background, but I'd never before or since seen someone run onto the court to high-five someone before, and I thought it was crazy that it was someone who went to the school we were playing against. After that play, we basically ran Red Bank out of the gym.

On a side note, I've never seen someone who looked more like a man amongst boys in high school football than Riggs did that year. He would truck people, pads popping louder than I've ever heard, and then yell smack talk to the other team so loud that you could hear it from the top of the bleachers. So fun to watch, and I've never seen a RB take so many defenders out of games by lowering their shoulder on them like he did.
 
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#67
#67
I played baseball against Kevin Mays from Kingston.

I also played in a rec league (basketball) in the mid 90's and Fred Jenkins was on the other team.
 
#68
#68
1. One of my football teammates said his dad was Reggie White. Got flak over it for years, and it hurt him to get grief over it, and he stuck with it.. maybe it was true if he went through the unnecessary misery over it.
2. The UT chaplain started going to the church I went to, and I hung out with Eric Ainge one day we and ate a ton of hot dogs. I had no idea who he was at the time. lol He had an awesome buccaneers hat on.....That's about all I remember of it.
 
#69
#69
I (& others) caught rides home after practice in the back of Jimmy Noonan's (Noooooonan! aka Tasmanian Devil) truck. Before college he was the nicest most down to earth guy you would ever come across..... it didn't last. I'm pretty sure his High School major was auto mechanics.........and he continued to fix his teammates vehicles at UT.

I still love the guy!

I'm sorry that you young guys didn't experience the Noooooooonan years at UT.
 
#71
#71
Funny story [to me anyway] In the 70s I was in a bar called Doodles on Kingston Pike. I went to the bathroom and before I could get the door open it swung out and I was staring at a belt buckle. I looked up and it was Dale Ellis. [grins]
 
#72
#72
I played baseball with Todd Kelly Jr. We won the championship that year. TK was one of like 3 people to hit a home run that year as well.
 
#73
#73
Don't exactly remember the year but we used to play in a ton of softball tournaments. Dayton held one every year during the strawberry festival.

We played against on team that had some big guys, they were supposed to be UT players. The only one I know for sure we played against was Benji Shuler. He was definitely not one of the big ones lol. I think he was listed as 6"1 and 200 pounds or so on the UT roster but I believe they took some liberties with both weight and height. The only reason I remember him was we were both playing second base. That was close to what I was back then and I stood next to him and had an inch and 15 pounds on him.

They could play, and their big guys could hit the crap out of a softball... But we had some hitters too and I think we beat them by 6 or 7.
 
#74
#74
Growing up I played baseball against James "little man" Stewart in little league, Babe Ruth ect. He was a year behind me but looked like he was 3 years younger from his size which is where he got his name. By the time he was a Sophmore (me a Junior) and playing with him at Morristown West on the FB team he was far from "little". He made people look stupid in practice daily, was fun to watch.
I remember being in Neyland when it was pouring the rain like out of buckets when he broke that run down the sideline. Went to Canton to watch the Hall of Fame game between Jacksonville and Charlotte which was his first pro game.


Played softball with Heath and Benji shuler for a couple different summers on a traveling team. Both had cannons and could hit it a mile.


Not a Tennessee player but I also played softball with Brent Collins, the brother of Todd Collins(Patriots LB). Could hit a softball easilly 400-420 ft every time he swung.


Edit: Had to edit this. Forgot about playing with Danny Spradlin on a softball team as well.

Another honorable mention to Larry Sauceman. Played at WSCC and Tusculum but was a blast to watch him play with the Lighthouse team. Easily one of the top 3 SS I've ever played against and seen play softball.
 
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#75
#75
buckfama said:
Don't exactly remember the year but we used to play in a ton of softball tournaments. Dayton held one every year during the strawberry festival.

We played against on team that had some big guys, they were supposed to be UT players. The only one I know for sure we played against was Benji Shuler. He was definitely not one of the big ones lol. I think he was listed as 6"1 and 200 pounds or so on the UT roster but I believe they took some liberties with both weight and height. The only reason I remember him was we were both playing second base. That was close to what I was back then and I stood next to him and had an inch and 15 pounds on him.

They could play, and their big guys could hit the crap out of a softball... But we had some hitters too and I think we beat them by 6 or 7.
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Just seen this after I posted. I'm sure I've been on the diamond against you at some point. Loved playing in the Strawberry festival. Nice to sit on the tailgate with a cold drink and watch the parade go by. Just hated the drive back after a long day of drinking, I mean playing. :)
 
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