The Baltimore Orioles of the 1960s and early 1970s boasted a roster busting with stars from top to bottom. While Brooks and Frank Robinson were the two best players on the team, the most imposing figure was a 6-foot-4, 240 pound first baseman who hit towering home runs and picked throws out of the dirt with ease. It was that player, Boog Powell, who became a favorite to many young fans, including myself.

It is hard to believe that today is the 80^th birthday for one of the great sluggers of his era and we at Sports Then and Now want to wish a Happy Birthday to one of our all-time favorite players.

Given the super-sizing of professional baseball players in recent decades, Powell’s size may no longer seem all that special, but in the 1960s and 1970 when most players were shaped like string beans, Powell was hard to miss. With tree trunks for arms that looked even larger when wearing the Orioles tight fitting gray uniform top, he spent more than a decade launching mammoth home runs and playing first base for the Baltimore Orioles.

A fair-skinned giant with reddish hair, Powell looked like a farm boy from the Midwest, but actually was born in Lakeland, Florida and grew up in the Sunshine State. Though his given name was John Wesley Powell, he earned the nickname “Boog” as a kid due to his mischievous nature. He seemed to always be getting into something and became known as Booger, as in, “What’s that little Booger doing now?” The nickname was eventually shortened to Boog, probably around the time he got big enough to beat the snot out of anyone who would dare call him Booger.

Powell’s prowess on the baseball field was evident from an early age. In 1954 he was part of the Lakeland Little League squad that played in the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

Signed as a free agent by the Baltimore Orioles in 1959, Powell quickly made his way to the majors. He led the International League in home runs in 1961 and made his major league debut that September.

The next season he became the starting leftfielder for the Birds and was an important reason the Orioles were steadily moving from perennial doormat to contender in the American League. Powell blasted 25 home runs in 1963 and the following season hit 39 homers and led the American League with a .606 slugging percentage despite missing several weeks with a broken wrist.

The Sports Then and Now Vintage Athlete of the Month is a former NFL wide receiver know as “Mr. Clutch” for his penchant for making big receptions at crucial moments of the game. After waiting for more than 30 years, he is finally earning his rightful place in the Pro Football Hall of Fame as a member of the 2021 Hall of Fame Class.

During his decade with the Dallas Cowboys, Drew Pearson had a habit of making the big catch at the right moment to help the Cowboys time and again snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

The favorite target of Hall of Fame quarterback Roger Staubach, Pearson was widely recognized as one of the great receivers of his era. Though at the time of his retirement many expected Pearson to easily breeze into the Hall of Fame, his enshrinement was derailed by changes to the game which artificially inflated receiver stats and made the numbers he produced during a time when wide receivers weren’t catching 100 passes a season seem inferior.

With 17 enshrinees in the Pro Football Hall of Fame among players, coaches, and executives who spent their whole careers or made their primary contribution with the franchise, the Dallas Cowboys have always been well represented in Canton, Ohio. This coming weekend of Aug. 7-8, three more primary Cowboys and a fourth who spent only one season in Dallas will be enshrined in the hallowed hall where their busts and bios will be preserved forever. These four Cowboys are part of 19 individuals who will be officially inducted this year. Dallas is one of several franchises with multiple enshrinees this year. Other franchises with multiple inductees who have at least some ties to them include the Pittsburgh Steelers, Indianapolis Colts, Oakland/Los Angeles Raiders, Chicago Bears, Detroit Lions, and Green Bay Packers among others. Both the classes of 2020 and 2021 are being inducted this summer due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic that forced the 2020 enshrinement to be cancelled. The two classes total 28 inductees, nine who were elected posthumously. Special video tributes of these nine will be shown between the live speeches during the two enshrinement ceremonies. Each of them were enshrined in a separate ceremony on April 28 at the Hall of Fame.

Jimmy Johnson, Harold Carmichael, Cliff Harris, and Drew Pearson are the four former Cowboys being inducted this weekend who played or coached in Dallas. Harris and Pearson played their entire careers with the Cowboys and were teammates for much of the 1970s when Dallas appeared in five Super Bowls and won two. Johnson made his mark as head coach of the Cowboys for five seasons from 1989-93 leading them to the franchise’s only back-to-back Super Bowl Championships following the 1992 and ’93 seasons. Johnson also was the head coach of the Miami Dolphins from 1996-99. Carmichael played only one season for Dallas which came in 1984, his final season as a pro after playing 13 years for the Philadelphia Eagles.

Sports enthusiasts bet on sports games as a hobby, for fun, or as a friendly pastime. It’s something that will require time and responsibility, sometimes a bit of luck. It involves a series of small bets and adds up over the season to an overall gain. The reason people play in the first place is to go on a trip, meet new friends, and soak up the atmosphere. They love playing with cash. Due to their limited liberty to move, they tend to use the internet for playing games. 

There are various types and techniques one can make huge money out of in sports betting. Firstly, one must understand the betting strategy. Money Lines is about addition and subtraction among numbers. It’s all about how much to bet to win such an amount. One can begin any sport through point spreading and parlay betting. For instance, parlay betting will involve multiple types of bets in a single game. It often requires large payouts and needs a lot of accuracy. The next thing is to understand the odds in betting rather than your emotions. This simply means betting with your head instead of your heart. In another way, betting on something that symbolizes a better value is better than in favor. Sometimes a chosen team is favored based on popularity rather than skill, so it is wise at times to bet on the underdog team for it does not necessarily mean that the favored team always wins. Lastly, it is a strategy to make smart bets and walk away from bad bets. Take advantage of risk-free bets in gambling by posting your money for both feasible results of the game.

After a year-long delay due to COVID-19, the Tokyo Olympics officially start on July 23^rd and will run until August 8^th. However, there’s still a couple of weeks until the event, and with certain obstructions to the Games popping up, such as the banning of spectators due to a rise in COVID cases in Tokyo, it’s an excellent time to go over the Tokyo Olympics—the games being shown and how the Olympics have adapted to COVID.

The Tokyo Olympics: Changes

The major change to the Tokyo Olympics will be the aforementioned banning of all spectators during the event. The reason for this ban is because Tokyo will be under a state of emergency throughout the event. Instead of delaying the event yet again, organizers will reduce the risk of infection during the Olympics by ridding the arenas of spectators.

Along with the ban, athletes will be tested for COVID every day of the event. However, athletes will not be required to receive their vaccinations, though the IOC expects most athletes to have received their vaccinations by July 23^rd.

The Tokyo Olympics: Sports Highlights

Not all changes to the Tokyo Olympics revolve around COVID, however. A few new sports and disciplines will be shown at the event, and they are definitely worth mentioning!

In total, six new sports will be broadcasted during the event, and out of those six, four will be making their debut.

Two of the “new” sports, baseball and softball, were previously cut from the Olympics in 2005 after a vote from the IOC. They will be making their long-awaited return in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.

Over the last couple of decades, veganism has been a major topic of discussion in the athletic arena. While motives vary widely from anti-animal cruelty to enhanced recovery after rigorous training and exercise, there are many different athletes who tout the benefits of a vegan diet.

The trend toward a plant-based diet is more than just a fad. There’s compelling science that supports the consumption of a diet rich in plants. In fact, several of the world’s top athletes have discovered advantages in experimenting with plant-based nutrition, and they’re realizing profound recovery and performance benefits as a result.

From accelerated recovery to reduced inflammation, apply the right balance of a vegan diet can help optimize athletic performance in more ways than one. Before we dive into the world of veganism as it pertains to sports, below we share a brief bit about the background of how veganism came to be.

A Brief Background on Vegan History

Living a plant-based, cruelty-free lifestyle dates back many centuries to Ancient India cultures, particularly Buddhism and Jainism, which would go on to influence the vegan diet trends of Asia and Europe. Buddhism and Jainism, which are two religions that both emphasize non-violence, are widely considered the origin of veganism.

However, those concentrated populations of India were likely not fully vegan (that is, they still used and consumed some animal products), but they provide evidence of expansive, healthy populations being supported with starches and grains. Fast forward to more recent times in history, and the manner in which a meatless diet unfolds tells an increasingly interesting story.