Re: RIP... Sam DeLuca

[Papa Carl]

"buRford" <buR...@buR.ford.com> wrote in message
news:msn577hcr67e1ap91...@4ax.com...
> Always sad to see a good guy go... lots of memories from when he was doing
> *color,* on
> Jets broadcasts. RIP!
>
>
> September 15, 2011
> Sam DeLuca, a Former Jet and Broadcaster, Is Dead at 75
> By DANIEL E. SLOTNIK
>
> Sam DeLuca, a scrappy guard for the Jets in the 1960s who became a
> broadcaster after a
> career-ending injury, died Tuesday at his home in Pelham, N.Y. He was 75.
>
> The cause was pancreatic cancer, T. J. Reynolds, a family friend, said.
>
> DeLuca was drafted by the Giants in 1957 to replace the All-Pro guard Bill
> Austin, who
> planned to retire that year. Austin decided to play another season, and
> the Giants sent
> DeLuca to the Canadian Football League, where he played for three years.
>
> He joined the Los Angeles Chargers when the American Football League was
> founded in 1960
> and started on the Chargers' A.F.L. championship team during the 1963-64
> season before
> returning to New York, this time as a Jet.
>
> DeLuca, 6 feet 2 inches and 245 pounds, played his first full season with
> the team in
> 1964-65. He became a team captain, and during the 1965 and 1966 seasons he
> led the
> offensive line that protected a flashy young quarterback named Joe Namath.
>
> But in the final preseason game of 1967-68, one season before Namath
> guaranteed and
> delivered a Jets victory over the Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III,
> DeLuca sustained a
> knee injury that permanently removed him from the line.
>
> DeLuca's injury coincided with a strike by the American Federation of
> Television and Radio
> Artists that kept the two usual Jets commentators, the veteran broadcaster
> Merle Harmon
> and the Daily News sports columnist Dick Young, off the air for two games.
>
> DeLuca covered both games alongside Wally Schwartz, WABC's general
> manager, and proved so
> adept that by spring he was hosting pregame and postgame radio shows for
> the Mets. In time
> he became Harmon's regular color commentator on Jets broadcasts and worked
> with him until
> 1972, when he moved to NBC. He retired as a sportscaster in 1988.
>
> DeLuca said he missed the excitement and glamour of professional football,
> but appreciated
> the consolations of his new job.
>
> "There was less pressure," he said in an interview with a WABC Radio fan
> site. "I found
> that I liked it, because I could go out to dinner the night before a road
> game and not
> worry about having to play the next day."
>
> Saverio DeLuca was born in Brooklyn on May 2, 1936. He attended Lafayette
> High School with
> the future Dodgers pitching star Sandy Koufax and the future Mets owner
> Fred Wilpon, and
> played for the school's championship football team in 1952.
>
> DeLuca was a third-team all-American guard at the University of South
> Carolina before he
> was drafted by the Giants.
>
> He married Diane Johnson in 1976 and is survived by her, their son, Sam,
> and a son and two
> daughters from a previous marriage.


Very sad. It is hard for me to believe he was that old...then I look at my
driver's license and get a little shock...damn, we are all getting very old.

[Johnny Morongo]

Speak for yourself, Pops. I'm never gonna get old, die or see the Jets
win a Lombardi. Oh woe is me. <G>

[John C TX]

On Sep 16, 4:54 am, Johnny Morongo <Moro...@Burf.com> wrote:
> On 9/15/2011 10:44 PM, Papa Carl wrote:
>
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> > "buRford"<buRf...@buR.ford.com>  wrote in message

You must be Irish.

[Johnny Morongo]

Well I WAS drunk, so I guess that qualifies.

[Papa Carl]

"Johnny Morongo" <Mor...@Burf.com> wrote in message
news:j4v6dp$hnt$1...@dont-email.me...

It's called purgatory

[JKConey]

"buRford" wrote in message

news:msn577hcr67e1ap91...@4ax.com...

Always sad to see a good guy go... lots of memories from when he was doing
*color,* on
Jets broadcasts. RIP!

Wow after all this time, if you put a gun to my head I don't think I
could've come up with his name. He was great. Glad you posted it here.


-- JK Sinrod
www.MyConeyIslandMemories.com

[Johnny Morongo]

Then I've served my time. Come to think of it, God owes me several
years for all my suffering.

[Papa Carl]

"Johnny Morongo" <Mor...@Burf.com> wrote in message

news:j50u1e$tcj$1...@dont-email.me...

When we get to Heaven...it will be Super Sunday every day...and The Jets
win.