If You Build It, They Will Come

     Profile Wait, what?  Heisman Trophy winner Joe Burrow was born in Ames, Iowa and spent his first four years in Iowa.  He is the son of Jimmy Burrow who was a coach at Ames High School and an assistant coach for both Iowa State and the Iowa Barnstormers.  Joe started his college career with Ohio State and won the Heisman and the National Championship with LSU.  He was selected #1 by the Cincinnati Bengals in the 2020 NFL Draft*. * Iowa players from the 2020 Draft (Hawkeyes: Tristin Wirfs, A.J. Epenesa, Michael Ojemudia, Geno Stone, Nate Stanley) Historical Significance Iowa has produced a number of Heisman trophy winners, National Championship players, and NFL players.  However, until Joe Burrow, there was no Iowa born #1 overall draft pick... 🔔 Joe Burrow 2019 Select is the first Iowa Born #1 Overall Draft Pick card. 🔔 Exciting, I know.  You may think I may be stretching my categories to mark each player I write about as being historic...

        Profile George Williams* was a catcher for the Oakland A's and San Diego Padres in the late 90s, mostly as a backup catcher.  He accrued a 1.5 WAR over his career.  He started his college career at Des Moines Area Community College** before ending up at the University of Texas Pan America.   *  Not George Williams , nor George Williams , nor the six other minor leaguers named  George Williams , nor George Williams , nor ... ** Four DMACC players played in MLB: Corey Koskie, Scott Schebler, George Williams, and Paul Wilmet.  Personal Notes DMACC is one of a ton of community colleges in Iowa, the largest of the CCs ahead of Kirkwood.  CCs remain a difficult piece to the Iowa Collection, as they tend not to be a person's last stop.  George Williams started there before MiraCosta College in California before ending up in UTPA.  CCs can't hold elite players as they move on to bigger schools for exposure, or they ma...

 The Super Bowl is played every year, and every year there is a winner.  The right team doesn't always win though.  No, sometimes the universe makes a mistake and the wrong team wins.  But how do we know who these "Misplaced Winners" are?   Well, this blog circles around one thing, and that's the Iowa Connection.  So, obviously every Super Bowl should have at least one Iowa Connection, but not every one does.  Either I've missed the connection (possible!), or the universe messed up.  Thanos snapped his fingers and the Patriots won.  So lets look at those Iowa-less Super Bowl winners and see who it should have been. Note : Of the 55 Super Bowls, only 8 have been Iowa-less. (Maybe less, I'm always finding connections) Update 1: Removed 1982 (Washington has Joe Bugel ) Update 2: Removed 2016 (New England had Brendon Daly) Update 3: Removed 2007 (New York had Pat Flaherty) Update 4: Removed 1977 (Dallas had Jim Myers) Update 4: Removed 2002 ...

  Championships Note: Updating this page as I go, but NBA/NFL/NCAAF/CFL/Arena/MLB are pretty close to being complete. Note: I include anyone who coached/played for the team during their championship season.  I don't know who has received rings, but everyone who was with the team helped that team.  Butterfly effect, yada, yada.  So A.J. Derby played for the 2016 Patriots and was traded mid-season but being an Iowa Connection his time with the team helped them become champions. NBA Champions 6 - Jimmy Rodgers , Asst. Coach, Iowa (1981, 1984, 1986, 1996, 1997, 1998) 5 - Don Nelson (1966, 1968, 1969, 1974, 1976) 3 - B.J. Armstrong (1991, 1992, 1993) 1 - Talen Horton-Tucker, Iowa State (2020) 1 - Nick Nurse, Coach, UNI (2019) 1 - Nate Bjorkgren, Coach, Buena Vista (2019) 1 - Harrison Barnes , F, Ames (2015) 1 - Donnie Nelson, GM, Iowa City (2011) 1 - Terry Stotts, Asst. Coach, Cedar Falls (2011) 1 - Matt Bullard, F, Iowa (1994) 1 - Bob Hansen, G, Iowa (1992) 1 - Ron...

        Profile David Johnson is a running back from the University of Northern Iowa, arriving there from Clinton*, Iowa.  After a successful career at UNI, David was selected in the third round of the 2015 draft by the Arizona Cardinals and was an All-Pro** by his second year in the league.  He currently plays for the Houston Texans. * Other notables from Clinton: Duke Slater (UofI CFB HOF), George Stone (MLB), Lillian Russell (Actress), George Nelson (Astronaut), Peggy Moran (actress) ** Three All-Pros from UNI: David Johnson, Kurt Warner and Bryce Paup Personal Notes This isn't a collection story, but an economics note.  It's about diversification, and how I like to spread out my pain and joy evenly.  I am a Vikings fan, and in the early 2000s they drafted a running back named Michael Bennett in the 1st round.  I was big into fantasy football by then, and drafted him onto many of my teams.  Well, he was mediocre, which is not great fo...

        Profile Cloris Leachman was born and raised in Des Moines and went on to become an award winning actress in both movies and television.  She won an Oscar in Best Supporting Actress for The Last Picture Show*, and eight Emmys for shows including The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Malcolm in the Middle**.  Cloris passed away this year in California. * Other candidates for that award were Ann Margaret and Ellen Burstyn ** Full list of Emmys were from : A Brand New Life, The Mary Tyler Moore Show (x2), Cher, Screen Actors Guild 50th Anniversary Celebration, Promised Land, Malcolm in the Middle (x2) Personal Notes Cards depicting actors and characters from movie and TV have been around for a long time, but they do not always match up to talent or even popularity of an actor.  Its really about the IP associated.  You can find Harrison Ford because of Star Wars, and you can find Whoopie Goldberg because of Star Trek.   Cloris has a few cards...

        Profile Mike Boddicker hits the triple crown for his Iowa cred: born in Iowa, attended Iowa, and had his life saved in Iowa.  Mike was born in Cedar Rapids and raised in Norway.  He attended the University of Iowa*, bypassing the Montreal Expos who drafted him out of High School.  He had a pretty successful career, winning an ALCS MVP, a World Series**, a Gold Glove and is in the Orioles Hall of Fame.  However, just after his career was over he discovered a lump in his neck and doctors at the University of Iowa help defeat his cancer.   * Boddicker has the 2nd highest WAR of any Hawkeye (31.3), just behind Jim Sundberg (40.5) and just above Cal Eldred (15.8) ** Boddicker is also the 2nd Hawkeye to win the World Series (1983).  First was Jim McAndrew with those Miracle Mets of 1969, and just beat out Sundberg who won with the Royals in 1985. Personal Notes A fun oddity in collecting players who aren't super stars is you somet...

     Profile Gayle Hopkins was a track athlete from Davenport who went on to have a successful career at Arizona and competed in the 1964 Olympics*.  Gayle broke Jesse Owens' long jump record at the Drake Relays**. * Olympics were held in Tokyo, and introduced Judo and Volleyball as medal events.  ** I mean any time you get to mention "broke Jesse Owens' ... record", that means you're pretty good Personal Notes When building my personal database, I've used a bunch of resources, starting with Wikipedia, BaseballReference, Football Reference, etc.  The additions I enjoy the most are the random ones I find reading an article about someone else.  I was researching James Jones for a previous post, and they were mentioning other famous athletes from Davenport, including Gayle Hopkins.  I bring up his wikipedia page and find it having very little info, so I had to dig to find he was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, raised in Iowa, and attended college in Colora...

    CBA Draft Iowa Connections I'll be filling these in as I post in the blog.  I'll link to the players as they each get a post.  For full draft list visit NBA Hoops Online . 1985 None 1986 None 1987 None 1988 Lafester Rhodes, 1st, ISU Bill Jones , 1st, Iowa Gary Thompkins, 5th, ISU Al Lorenzen, 7th, Iowa Kevin Van Veldhuizen, 7th, Northwestern 1989 Bart Friedrick, 9th, Drake 1990 Matt Bullard, 3rd, Iowa Jason Reese, 4th, UNI Alessandro Donaldson, 6th, Drake 1991 Doug Collins, 8th, ISU 1992 James Moses, 5th, Iowa 1993 Justis Thigpen, 2nd, ISU 1994 James Winters, 6th, Iowa Randy Blocker , 6th, UNI 1995 Fred Hoiberg, 1st, ISU Loren Meyer, 7th, ISU 1996 Russ Millard, 4th, Iowa Chris Kingsbury, 6th, Iowa Kenyon Murray, 6th, Iowa 1997 Andre Woolridge, 2nd, Iowa Kenny Pratt, 6th, ISU C.J. Bruton, 6th, Indian Hills Dedric Willoughby, 7th, ISU 1998 Ryan Bowen, 2nd, Iowa Jess Settles, 10th, Iowa 1999 J.R. Koch, 4th, Iowa 2000 Cory Hightower, 5ht, Indian Hills Ernest Bro...

    Profile Davenport's own James Jones is a defensive tackle who played for Northern Iowa in the late 80s and early 90s.  Jones was drafted by the Cleveland Browns* in 1991 and played 10 years in the league amassing 3 catches for 4 yards and two touchdowns (plus 37 sacks and 432 tackles).  Jones remains the highest drafted UNI player at #57**.  * His head coach was Bill Belichek and his DC was Nick Saban  ** While Jones was 3rd rounder, he was still drafted higher than Brad Meester (2nd Round) who was #60 overall Historical Significance Northern Iowa has had a number of NFL players, including a Super Bowl MVP (Kurt Warner), DPOY (Bryce Paup) and current NFL players (David Johnson, LJ Fort).  Before James Jones, there were two UNI players that were drafted highly (Randy Schultz in the 5th in 1966, Bryce Paup in the 6th in 1990).   Neither had a Panther cards, so I think I can reasonably declare that: 🔔1991 Wild Card Draft was the first UNI P...