![]() There wasn't a day I wasn't up at Nottoway Park."īrower was not a prolific scorer, but he fought for rebounds and used his grit to outmuscle opponents. He would turn saw horses on their sides and pretend that they were defenders. He spent up to six hours a day practicing. The 14-year-old spent his first year on the freshman team. I said 'hey, if I work hard enough I can be on varsity by the time I'm a senior." "It was so much bigger than life back then. "I used to go to those games and sit on the rafters by myself," remembered Brower. Vilani's father would bring Brower to the games. He remembers watching his neighbor Vince Vilani, a 6-foot-4 post player for Madison's 1975 dominating 20-2 squad, do what he wanted to do - dominate the court and put on a show. I didn't practice the other sports." Brower fell in love with basketball from an early age. "That's what I spent all my time practicing on. "It was the only sport that I couldn't, and I don't want to say master, it was the only thing I couldn't consistently be good at it," said Brower, who eventually signed an undrafted free agent deal with the Texas Rangers, where he played the first three years of his major league career before being traded to the New York Yankees in 1989. "It's time I try to master one of these sports." Brower chose baseball because it was the only sport that the natural athlete could not master. "I was a jack of all trades and master of none," remembered Brower. He had walked away from the Duke University football team in order to focus on baseball. The 5-foot-11, 185-pound center fielder went undrafted in 1982 and felt at odds with himself after having given up both football and basketball. He still holds the single-season record for triples (11) and ranks second for single-season stolen bases (30). He led the team in runs (53), triples (11), home runs (9), RBI (35), and stolen bases (30) helping Duke to a 29-10 record in 1981. He could take pitches a long way to that direction." Brower was an outfielder for Madison before continuing his career at Duke, where he led the nation in triples, was an All-ACC selection and broke four ACC records while hitting. "What stuck in my mind was his power to right centerfield as a hitter. "He was a talented athlete and it doesn't matter what sport you are talking about," said Roth, who is now a substitute teacher and lives near Fredericksburg. That's what former Madison baseball coach Don Roth remembers about Brower, his power to the opposite field. Vernon in the spring of 1978 when he watched Brower's towering home run sail nearly 420 feet. ![]() It went over the fence and into the parking lot," remembered former NFL and Clemson football player Billy Davis, who was a sophomore at Mt. ![]() It's also true that Brower was an all-region selection in all four of his sports: baseball, basketball, football and track. The story about him arm-wrestling 350-pound football players for a little extra cash in the bars near the Duke University campus - where he starred on both the baseball and football teams during college - well, those stories are also true. The one about him going out for the football team in his senior year and compiling over 1,200 yards and 20 touchdowns and being named the Player of the Year in his first year of organized football - that story is true. Some stories have been exaggerated over the years, but some haven't and the line between truth and legend has been blurred, but it's only because Brower was such a standout athlete that it's difficult to find the line between fact and fiction. 10 jersey was retired, reads: "One of the greatest athletes ever at JM."Įveryone has a Bobby Brower story. The plaque on Madison's wall of fame just outside the gymnasium in which Brower's No. The type of figure whose name has grown in local sports lore. Bob Brower, a 1978 graduate and the only athlete ever to letter in four sports in one year at James Madison High School, is one of those legendary figures.
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