Vocation : Sports Business : Coach/ Manager/ Owner

Walt_Alston

Walter Emmons Alston (December 1, 1911 – October 1, 1984), nicknamed "Smokey", was an American baseball manager in Major League Baseball who managed the Brooklyn / Los Angeles Dodgers from 1954 through 1976, signing 23 one-year contracts with the team. Regarded as one of the greatest managers in baseball history, Alston was known for his calm, reticent demeanor, for which he was sometimes referred to as "the Quiet Man."
Born and raised in rural Ohio, Alston lettered in baseball and basketball at Miami University in Oxford. A journeyman whose MLB playing career consisted of only one game–two innings played, and one at-bat with the St. Louis Cardinals in 1936–Alston spent 19 years in the minor leagues as a player, player-manager and non-playing manager. His service included a stint as manager of the 1946 Nashua Dodgers, the first U.S.-based integrated professional team in modern baseball. After six successful seasons as manager of Brooklyn's Triple-A teams, the St. Paul Saints and Montreal Royals, Alston was promoted to manage the Dodgers in 1954.
As a major league manager, Alston led Dodger teams to seven National League (NL) pennants and four World Series titles, including the only championship title won while the club was still in Brooklyn. After 23 seasons, Alston retired with over 2,000 career wins and had been selected as Manager of the Year six times. He also managed NL All-Star teams to seven victories. Alston's number 24 was retired by the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1977. In 1983, he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame but was unable to attend his induction ceremony after suffering a heart attack that year and being hospitalized for a month. He never fully recovered and died in Oxford, Ohio, on October 1, 1984.

Robert_Mathias

Robert Bruce Mathias (November 17, 1930 – September 2, 2006) was an American decathlete, politician, and actor. Representing the United States, he won two Olympic gold medals in the Decathlon, at the 1948 and the 1952 Summer Games. As a Republican, he served in the US House of Representatives for California's 18th congressional district, for four terms from 1967 to 1975.

Rafael_Everton

Rafael Everton Lira (born 27 January 1989 in Recife, Brazil) is a Brazilian professional football coach and manager. He was the former head coach of the Nigerian Professional Football League club Akwa United F.C. He was appointed coach of Akwa United F.C. on 5 November 2018. He has resigned from the head coach of Nigeria National League club, Vandrezzer FC.

Gary_Colson

Gary Colson (April 30, 1934 – November 3, 2023) was an American basketball coach and executive. The Logansport, Indiana, native guided several college men's basketball teams, including Valdosta State University, Pepperdine University, University of New Mexico and California State University, Fresno. He compiled a 563–385 (.594) record over 34 seasons of coaching between 1959 and 1995. In 2002, he joined the Memphis Grizzlies' front office as Assistant to the President of Basketball Operations. In his later years, Coach Colson was a basketball instructor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Coach Colson earned his bachelor's degree in health and physical education from David Lipscomb College (now Lipscomb University) in 1956. He was inducted into the Lipscomb Athletics Hall of Fame in 1998 in the "Athlete" category.
Colson died from lymphoma in Santa Barbara, California, on November 3, 2023, at the age of 89.

Don_Veller

Donald Arld Veller (May 20, 1912 – November 10, 2006) was an American football player and coach of football and golf. He served as the head football coach at Hanover College in 1946 and at Florida State University from 1948 to 1952, compiling a career college football record of 35–15–1. Veller died at the age of 94 on November 10, 2006, in Tallahassee, Florida.

Bob_Pfohl

Robert Stormont Anderson "Stormy" Pfohl (May 21, 1926 – May 11, 1996) was an American football player who played at the back position.
A native of Vincennes, Indiana, he attended Goshen High School and then played college football for the United States Merchant Marine Academy and the Purdue Boilermakers.He was selected by the New York Giants in the seventh round (46th overall pick) of the 1948 NFL Draft. He opted instead to play in the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) for the Baltimore Colts during the 1948 and 1949 seasons. He appeared in a total of 26 AAFC games, 21 as a starter. In one of his first pro games, he scored three touchdowns, including a 92-yard punt return.After retiring as a player, he served as head football coach at Marion High School in 1950 and 1951. He also worked for the Bell Fibre Corp for 30 years, retiring in 1980 as vice president of sales. He was inducted into the Indiana Football Hall of Fame in 1986. He died in 1996 at age 69.

Johnny_Logan_(basketball)

John Arnold Logan (January 1, 1921 – September 16, 1977) was an American professional basketball player and coach born in Richmond, Indiana. A 6'2" guard who played at Indiana University, Logan played for four seasons with the now-defunct St. Louis Bombers, and a fifth season with the Tri-Cities Blackhawks. While with the Blackhawks, he served three games as an interim player-coach.

Alan_Sawyer

Alan Leigh Sawyer (January 1, 1928 – June 30, 2012) was an American professional basketball player for the Washington Capitols of the National Basketball Association (NBA). He played college basketball for the UCLA Bruins from 1945 to 1950. He missed the end of the 1948–49 season after an appendectomy. Sawyer helped lead the 1949–50 team to their first Pacific Coast Conference (PCC) championship. He was named to the first team of the All-Southern Division PCC team in 1949, and voted to the second team in 1950. He was selected in the third round of the 1950 NBA draft by the Capitols.After the Capitols were disbanded mid-season in 1951, its players were allocated to other teams, and Sawyer was drafted by the Tri-Cities Blackhawks. However, he decided to return to the University of California, Los Angeles, to complete his degree.Sawyer later became a math teacher and coached basketball at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa, California.

Hadley_Hicks

Hadley Fergus Hicks (April 1, 1933 – June 21, 2016) was an American football and baseball coach and author. He served as the head football coach at Sterling College in Sterling, Kansas for two seasons, from 1988 to 1989, compiling a record of 3–16.Before coaching in college, Hicks was prominent in Arizona athletics and served on the board of the Arizona Athletic Hall of Fame. He also later wrote stories about his work in high school and college athletics. Hicks also played baseball at Arizona State University and later for one year in the minor leagues with the Pulaski Cubs.