Author: fartheroffthewall

This post is part of a media project called SoCal Sports History 101: The Prime Numbers from 00 to 99 that Uniformly, Uniquely and Unapologetically Reveal The Narrative of Our Region’s Athletic Heritage. Pick a number, and consider the list of athletes attached to it. Who wore it best? Or, what’s the most compelling story linked to it? Any person, place or thing is in play with Southern California connections. Star power, transformational achievement, longevity, notoriety and quirkiness all factor in. Whatever leads to a lively discussion and interpretation.

The most obvious choices for No. 4:

Duke Snider: Los Angeles Dodgers
Byron Scott: Los Angeles Lakers
Rob Blake: Los Angeles Kings
Bobby Grich: California Angels
Russell White: Crespi High football

The not-so-obvious choices for No. 4:

Rodney Anderson: Cal State Fullerton
Joe McKnight: USC football

The most interesting story for No. 4:
Zenyatta: Thoroughbred racehorse (2007 to 2010)
Southern California map pinpoints:
Arcadia (Santa Anita); Inglewood (Hollywood Park)

Reference books on the subject:
“Horse Racing Divas: From Azeri to Zenyatta, Twelve Fillies and Mares Who Achieved Racing’s Highest Honor,” by Bloodhorse Publications, 2011
“Zenyatta: Queen Z -the Legend,” by Patricia Probert Gott, 2017

Moments of Zenyatta clearly blindside me.

Occasionally, I’m driven to tears.

Not a super-keen follower of horse racing — baffled more by the mindset of parimutuel wagering and watching those consistently lose their disposable cash based on a hunch or banking too much on past performance data — I took it as a fun assignment to go out to the 2009 Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita Park and capture the atmosphere. My focus was far more on who showed up for it, measure the interactions, watch money and drinks spill around the grounds.

It led to a time just sitting with actor Dennis Hopper to watch him handicap. That could have been the most memorable take away.

The sun was already in the right spot by the late Saturday afternoon, creating its usual magnificent mystique by using the San Gabriel Mountains as its palate, when a thoroughbred in pink and turquoise silks named Zenyatta, with master Mike Smith up top, created, for me, the most exhilarating, most Southern-California sports moment I ever witnessed.

In 2008, Zenyatta ran away with the Breeders’ Cup Ladies’ Classic at Santa Anita. The four-year-old came in undefeated but was facing the best field of her career, with four Grade I winning fillies shipping in from New York alone. Zenyatta broke last and trailed early before making up ground on the far turn and winning by a length and a half. She got a standing ovation.

In 2009, Moss dared to enter Zenyatta in the Classic, a field of the world’s most worthy males, of any age, size and nationality. A true world championship.

She would wear No. 4. A forgone conclusion perhaps in her mind. Maybe. We’ll never be able to ask her.

Such a Garbo move.

This post is part of a media project called SoCal Sports History 101: The Prime Numbers from 00 to 99 that Uniformly, Uniquely and Unapologetically Reveal The Narrative of Our Region’s Athletic Heritage. Pick a number, and consider the list of athletes attached to it. Who wore it best? Or, what’s the most compelling story linked to it? Any person, place or thing is in play with Southern California connections. Star power, transformational achievement, longevity, notoriety and quirkiness all factor in. Whatever leads to a lively discussion and interpretation.

The most obvious choices for No. 31:

Mike Piazza: Los Angeles Dodgers
Cheryl Miller: Riverside Poly High basketball, USC women’s basketball
Ed O’Bannon: UCLA basketball
Reggie Miller: UCLA basketball
Kurt Rambis: Los Angeles Lakers
Dean Chance: Los Angeles/California Angels

The not-so-obvious choices for No. 31:

Carnell Lake, UCLA football
Karch Kiraly: UCLA volleyball
Chuck Finley: California/Anaheim Angels

The most interesting story for No. 31:
Cheryl Miller: USC women’s basketball (1981-82 to 1985-86) via Riverside Poly High
Reggie Miller: UCLA basketball (1983-84 to 1986-87) via Riverside Poly High
Southern California map pinpoints:
Riverside; Westwood (UCLA); downtown L.A. (USC)

Reference books on the subject:
“I Love Being the Enemy: A Season on the Court with the NBA’s Best Shooter and Sharpest Tongue,” by Reggie Miller with Gene Wojciechowski, 1995

During the 2005 season, rumors percolated that Reggie Miller was ready to retire from the NBA after a hot-shot, 18-year run, all of them with the Indiana Pacers. He was coming up on 40 years old. It made sense.

TNT reporter Cheryl Miller denied the story was true.

She was even a bit adamant about it as she told her broadcasting partner on air to cease and desist with reporting such inaccurate information. Besides, if anyone should know, would be her.

Two weeks later, during a Lakers-Pistons telecast, Cheryl Miller reported on TNT that Reggie Miller would, in fact, be retiring. Reggie had told his coach, Rick Carlisle, first. Then he gave the scoop to Cheryl.

Proving again: Older sisters protect younger brothers, no matter what their age or their eventual Basketball Hall of Fame status.

For both of them.

Reggie Miller – aka Uncle Reg, The Knick Killer, Killa, Funk and Mighty Mouth, as they are listed on his BaseballReference.org biography – was born 19 months after his sister Cheryl. They were the last two of the five kids from Saul and Carrie Miller at their Riverside home. Included in that was oldest son, Darrel, a catcher for the California Angels (who wore No. 32, 1984 to 1988).

As basketball players, Cheryl was the bigger deal even if, at 6-foot-2, she was at least five inches shorter than pencil-thin Reggie in their adult lives.

It was Cheryl who once scored 105 points in a 32-minute game in 1982 for Riverside Poly High – the same night Reggie scored 40 in a game for the boy’s varsity team. Guess who got the bigger headlines?

In leading Poly to a 132-4 record, averaging 37.5 points a game, Cheryl was also said to be the first female player to dunk in a game. She was the national High School Player of the Year. As a junior and senior.

She picked USC to continue her play, a place making a name for itself with the McGee twins on the front line. USC won a national title her freshman year — the Trojans were 31-2. And in her sophomore year — the Trojans were 29-4. She took a detour to win a gold medal for US basketball in the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, and won the Naismith Player of the Year Award three times.

There’s little argument, even today, she is among the most dominant players in women’s basketball history. In October of 2025, in honor of the 50th anniversary of the women’s basketball poll, The Associated Press assembled a list of the greatest players since the first poll in 1976. Without ranking them, Miller was included on the AP first team with Caitlin Clark, Diana Taurasi, Brenna Stewart and Candace Parker.

“I grew up watching Cheryl Miller play,” said Chicago native Parker, who ended up a star with the WNBA’s Los Angeles Sparks. “She’d be No. 1. My dad was like ‘This is who we wanted you to be.’ I’m honored to be on this list with her.”

In March of 2020, HBO Sports created a documentary celebrating Miller, and it included NBA analyst Doris Burke exclaiming: “She was a bad … mother … fucker.” (Even if our story in the L.A. Times misconstrued that quote).

That nickname is not on any of Cheryl Miller’s internet biography stats pages. It should be.

This post is part of a media project called SoCal Sports History 101: The Prime Numbers from 00 to 99 that Uniformly, Uniquely and Unapologetically Reveal The Narrative of Our Region’s Athletic Heritage. Pick a number, and consider the list of athletes attached to it. Who wore it best? Or, what’s the most compelling story linked to it? Any person, place or thing is in play with Southern California connections. Star power, transformational achievement, longevity, notoriety and quirkiness all factor in. Whatever leads to a lively discussion and interpretation.

The most obvious choices for No. 26:

Jon Arnett: USC football; Los Angeles Rams
DeShaun Foster: UCLA football
Chase Utley: Los Angeles Dodgers
Slava Voynov: Los Angeles Kings

The not-so-obvious choices for No. 26:

Kirk Altenberg: UCLA football
Willie Brown: USC football; Los Angeles Rams
Wendell Tyler: Los Angeles Rams

The most interesting story for No. 26:
Gene Autry: Los Angeles Angels inaugural owner (1961 to 1998)
Southern California map pinpoints:
Hollywood, Anaheim, Palm Springs

Reference books on the subject:
“Back in the Saddle Again,” by Gene Autry with Mickey Herskowitz, 1978
“Public Cowboy No. 1: The Life and Times of Gene Autry” by Holly George-Warren, 2007
“New Deal Cowboy: Gene Autry and Public Diplomacy,” by Michael Duchemin, 2016
“The Gene Autry Series,” by Bob Hamilton, W.H. Hutchinson, Snowden Miller, Cole Fannin and Lewis W. Patten, 1944 to 1957

Somehow, in the chain of command involving the Los Angeles/California/Anaheim Angels franchise, there’s a No. 26 jersey handing in Gene Autry’s wardrobe closet that belongs to him.

More prominent, it’s framed on the wall in what is still preserved at Angel Stadium as the Autry Suite. In 2026, it was still there, spotlighted, more than 26 years after his passing?

On the last day of the 1982 season, Oct. 3, after the Angels clinched the AL West title with a 93-69 mark, Autry was called out at the end of a pre-game ceremony.

The Angels’ roster at the time was dotted with highly-paid free agent acquisitions: Reggie Jackson, Rod Carew, Bobby Grich, Fred Lynn, Don Baylor, Doug DeCinces and Bob Boone. It also had Ken Forsch, Bruce Kison, and, for some reason, 41-year-old Luis Tiant available to pitch. All prime benefactors of Gene-Gene the ATM Machine.

A few had been around to be part of the 1979 team that won the AL West but lost out in their first real opportunity to go to the World Series, losing to eventual champion Baltimore in the playoffs. The Angel teams in between — 65-95, last place in ’80; 51-59, fifth place in the strike-interrupted season of ’81 — were miserable underachievers.

After a presentation where DeCinces was given the Owner’s Trophy as team MVP and Brian Downing was voted Most Inspirational, Autry was about to leave the field when the entire team then came out of the dugout. Baylor carried with a No. 26 Autry jersey.

That was the first uniform number retired by the franchise. It was taken off the back of injured pitcher Bill Travers, another free-agent bust, who wasn’t around to protest.

It seems sweet in a way the then-75 year old Autry pulled on the pull-over jersey and hitched up the sansabelt slacks to fill his latest role. Maybe it would have been more appropriate to give No. 61 — the year the team was created.

By that point, Autry was already a Hollywood success story, all dressed up as a cowboy, with real stirrups. Not the nylon baseball type.

That’s the visual we’d rather keep.

This post is part of a media project called SoCal Sports History 101: The Prime Numbers from 00 to 99 that Uniformly, Uniquely and Unapologetically Reveal The Narrative of Our Region’s Athletic Heritage. Pick a number, and consider the list of athletes attached to it. Who wore it best? Or, what’s the most compelling story linked to it? Any person, place or thing is in play with Southern California connections. Star power, transformational achievement, longevity, notoriety and quirkiness all factor in. Whatever leads to a lively discussion and interpretation.

The most obvious choices for No. 10:

Ron Cey: Los Angeles Dodgers
Landon Donovan: Los Angeles Galaxy
Carlos Vela: LAFC
Norm Nixon: Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Clippers
Justin Herbert: Los Angeles Chargers
Pat Haden: USC football, Southern California Sun
Rick Neuheisel: UCLA football

The not-so-obvious choices for No. 10:

Willie O’Ree: Los Angeles Blades hockey
Mauricio Cienfuegos: Los Angeles Galaxy
Giovani dos Santos: Los Angeles Galaxy
Marta: Los Angeles Sol
Cooper Kupp: Los Angeles Rams
Gus Williams: USC basketball
Lyman Bostock: California Angels
Justin Turner: Los Angeles Dodgers
Don Klosterman: Loyola University and Los Angeles Rams
Tom Dempsey: Los Angeles Rams

The most interesting story for No. 10:
Landon Donovan: Los Angeles Galaxy midfielder (2005 to 2014, 2016) via Redlands High School and Redlands East Valley High School
Southern California map pinpoints:
Ontario; Redlands; Rancho Cucamonga; Carson (Galaxy Home Depot Stadium)

Reference books on the subject:
“Landon: A Memoir,” by Landon Donovan, 2026

In early 2024, Landon Donovan lamented about the state of the Los Angeles Galaxy.

Once the brightest star in the Major League Soccer universe, the franchise had logged more losses than wins over previous last eight seasons and had been lapped, by almost measurements, by the expansion LAFC team across the city.

“It feels to me,” Donovan told the Los Angeles Times, “like the Galaxy has lost its soul.”

Such a soulful response from a home-grown talent that once kickstarted the Galaxy to the MLS Cup five times. To eight playoff eight runs. Who retired as the league’s all-time leading scorer. Whose league MVP Award is now named after him. Then there’s that oddly painted statue of him outside the Galaxy’s home field.

If Donovan’s words carry weight, it’s because he once carried the weight of the franchise, as well as the league, on a long sprint at a time when it needed someone to do the heavy lifting.

When he took ownership of the number 10 from 2005 to 2014 in Galaxy lore, at the core point of the 15 MLS seasons he has a player, it can be argued that he saved a league in danger of going bankrupt.

Donovan had a lot invested, having grown up on the AYSO fields of the Inland Empire. He was the face of U.S. soccer and its growth was marked by a chart of him.

Playing in the most World Cup games and scoring the most World Cup goals of any American. Diverting to the San Diego Sockers of the Major Arena Soccer League in 2019. Coaching the San Diego Loyal to the second-tier USL Championship, and the San Diego Wave of the National Women’s Soccer League, while adding his voice for Fox’s global coverage.

All that he’s carried on his shoulders is even more evident as he assesses his own life and what he might do to help others reach their ultimate goal of personal happiness.