Standing Next to Greatness and Not Knowing It | Engel Angle

My new year's resolution is that this will be the year of no.
Just like last year, that didn't really take.
Back Engle, Fort Worth Star Telegram, Engle Engle podcast here on the Sunset Lounge.
Happy New Year, everybody.
I hope everybody had a safe New Year and has a great 2026.
If you're a New Year's resolution person, do yourself a solid set yourself up for some
easy wins.
I see these lists sometimes and people go bananas with these, I'm going to lose a thousand
pounds.
I'm going to hike Everest, you know, blindfolded and backwards and on my hands and all
this other stuff.
Do yourself, like give yourself some momentum here in January.
Set up something that you can do and feel good about the accomplishment.
So if you're lose 50 pounds, lose five, lose five and then get going on the right
direction.
I decided I'm going to do a triathlon, assuming I say healthy enough, knock on
wood.
Like last year, my New Year's resolution last year was don't have any surgeries.
I made it and I'm not kidding.
So here in 2026, I want to do a triathlon and I'm looking around the schedules and
stuff like that and the different options and I see this one and it says like Olympic
distances.
I don't even know what that means.
I have no idea.
So I thought, well, yeah, I could probably do that and I might be able to, I don't know,
maybe I probably finished like 50 if out of 30 come competitors.
But I'm looking at it and I thought, yeah, I think I can do that.
Well, then I see another one that says sprint triathlons, perfect for beginners.
That would be me.
That's the one I need to do.
I do not need to do whatever insane distance that I think I can do.
I need to do the one where I can accomplish it, accomplish it, feel good about myself and
then maybe if I want to do a longer one, I'll do that.
So that's my advice.
It is 2026, which means this is the 50th anniversary of the iconic Hollywood movie, Rocky.
I love Rocky, which differentiates me from almost no white Americans who have fallen in
love with this Sylvester Stallone-created boxer and followed everything that he's ever
done.
Much to our own detriment sometimes, especially if the movie involves Tommy Morrison, God
rest his soul.
So Rocky turns 50 here in 2026.
I would imagine throughout this calendar year, we will see a lot of Rocky 50-year-old
content.
I have an anecdote about this that speaks to sometimes you're in the right place and you
don't even recognize it because maybe you're not familiar with the person standing right
next to you or you're not familiar with an opportunity that you completely waste
because the name escapes you or you don't know it.
I have a few of these and it certainly relates to Rocky here a second.
But the first one that I can think of was, let's go back to May, May of 1991.
Maybe it was 92, yeah it was 92 I think.
And I am wrapping up my freshman year at the University of Kansas and somebody in my
dorm says, hey Mac, are you going to the free concert today on the hill?
Free concert?
Free concert?
I didn't know about a free concert.
Who is it?
And the guy says the band's name.
I don't know who that is.
Nah, I'm not going to go.
Six weeks later.
So I don't go.
Six weeks later, I am back in my hometown of Indianapolis, Indiana staying for the summer
where I have a summer job and I am driving around with a high school friend and on the
car radio is a good song.
Really like the song.
Hard driving really hits me.
Like this is good.
So I turn to my friend from high school named Matt Churchman.
I said, Matt, this guy's your good.
Who are you?
Who are these guys?
This is good.
Even the song kind of, I heard him before someplace else.
Matt looks at me and says, you're, you're kidding.
I said, no, these guys are great.
Who is it?
And he says,
Earl Jam.
Well, that was the band that had just given the free concert at Kansas where I was that
I blew off because I didn't know their name.
It turns out about a year prior,
Pearl Jam had signed a contract to give a concert at Kansas in the spring of 92, I think.
And I blew it off and at the time they signed it, shortly they are after, rather they blew
up and became Pearl Jam, but they honored the contract, which would have been nothing
compared to what they had been making leading up to that date.
And I missed it, I missed Pearl Jam.
I missed Eddie Vetter.
And here's the funny part, however many years later, I've still never seen them live.
And I could have seen them at the beginning when they just come out and blown up.
So there's strike one years later, maybe the next year, I have been given a job.
I knocked on a door at the University of Kansas athletic department sports information
office, which really was my foot into the door to a career that I have now.
Very nice man, they dug vans, hired me, I was very excited about this.
And for those of you who don't know, all athletic departments and universities have what they
call sports information offices, now they usually call them athletic media relations office.
And usually it's, it's a PR office for an athletic department.
So I was a student assistant in my very first game, I think would have been 93 or 94, 93,
Kansas, which wasn't very good at the time in football.
I know imagine that was hosting a very, very good Nebraska team.
It was a cold day, it was late November, season was ending and Kansas is playing a very
good Nebraska team.
And I'm in the press box.
First time in my life, I had been in a major athletic events, press box, I'm very excited
about this.
But at the time, my job was basically just observe, observe instead of everybody's way.
Games very exciting, sure enough, Kansas damn near wins it and they lose it at the end
when they failed to convert a two point conversion.
There's a huge deal because Nebraska was great back then.
I realized for the current generation, they can't conceive when Nebraska was an absolute
beast to the team.
And Kansas nearly pulled off the upset.
So after the game, I go to the men's room and in the men's room and that press box,
there was basically a trough urinal where men line up and do their stuff.
The standing to my right is an older gentleman with a red sweater.
And he says to me, boy, that running back from Kansas was something else.
He had a great game.
They nearly got us.
I don't think he didn't say they nearly got us.
He was talking about the Kansas running back and we exchanged pleasantries and as we walk
out the door, I say to this older gentleman, I'm assuming you were pulling from Nebraska
and he looks at me and he says, yes, sir, very much.
That was it.
I have no idea who he was.
No, it's just an older gentleman.
It's nice.
And that's that.
So I go to my boss, Doug Vance a few minutes later.
And I said, hey, Doug, who is that gentleman right there and he looks at him and says, that
I said, yes, sir.
He said, that's Bob DeVanney.
Good to know.
Bob DeVanney was the legendary Nebraska cornhouse crs football coach who was mostly responsible
for turning Nebraska into a college football powerhouse for decades leading up to the Tom
Osborne era.
And I had the wherewithal to ask Bob DeVanney, so I'm assuming you were pulling from Nebraska.
That's a win.
Now, about a year later, I'm still working in the athletic department and I get asked
to join a basketball game at Allen Fieldhouse.
After hours and people who work in the athletic department, we're going to play on the Allen
Fieldhouse floor.
I love Allen Fieldhouse.
It's a great place to see a basketball game, even if you don't care about basketball,
even if you hate KU.
It's a phenomenal place to see a game.
I have been asked to play a game there.
I'm like, yeah, absolutely.
I can't wait.
So I go out there and sure enough, there's a bunch of people I work with, managers from
the basketball team from everywhere else, we're running five on five.
And I'm very excited to play in this game.
So somewhere along the way, I think I fouled my boss, a man named Dean Bucking.
So Dean, Dean wasn't very happy with me about that fellow.
I promised you I wasn't trying to hurt you, but he and I'm immediately trying to apologize.
I didn't mean it.
And he wasn't, he wasn't having it.
So Dean, for some reason, you're watching, you're seeing this.
I wasn't trying to hurt you.
And there is a woman playing with us, black woman with long hair.
And I remember going out on the floor, seeing this woman, and I had never played with the
female before.
And I, so immediately, my antenna's up on like, who's this girl?
Well, why is she playing with us?
And it hits me about two minutes in, oh, she's pretty good.
She's really smooth, wasn't even trying.
She wasn't even trying.
And everything she did was smooth, very coordinated, passed very well.
And a few times she did shoot, she made it.
Good athlete.
I have no idea who she is.
So after the game, I'm trying to apologize to Dean for this foul that wasn't intentional.
And she comes up and she, it's okay, you're a nice guy, it's all right, you're all right.
Never saw her again.
At least not on that day.
About a month later, two months later, I'm with one of my co-workers, a superior, a nice
woman in Chrissy Causey.
Chrissy was in charge of Kansas women's basketball team media wise.
And I see that woman that I play basketball with, like the tall black woman with long black
hair.
And I see her and I don't know who she is.
So I turned to Chrissy and I said, hey, Chrissy, who is that woman right there?
And she gives me this look.
And she says, the woman right behind me kind of whispers it.
And I said, yeah, who is that?
And she looks at me and she says, Lynette Woodard.
Lynette Woodard was probably one of the top three women's basketball players of the 80s.
And she was the first ever woman to be a member of the Harlem club trotters.
Would have been nice to know.
So I missed that one.
And I almost missed the next one too.
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So clearly my batting average with these famous people standing right in front of me is
not great.
I am in 2002 or three.
I'm covering the Dallas stars for the Fort Worth Star Telegram and they had an away game
in Los Angeles against the L.A. kings.
Now for those of you who don't know, there's always a media staff dining area that people
use before the game.
So I'm in the bowels of what was then the Staples Center in downtown Los Angeles and I go
to a table seeing the assistant PR person for the Dallas stars, nice man named Mark Janko
sitting at a table to his right as an older gentleman with glasses is white here and I
don't know who he is and I sit down.
And he's telling a story about Silvestre Stallone and I don't know who this guy is, I've
no clue.
And he said yeah, I just got my latest check for Rocky 3 Rocky 3 my who are you?
I don't I'm not saying this I'm just letting him talk.
And he goes down a rabbit hole of telling the story about how he was in Rocky.
I don't recognize this guy from Rocky, it wasn't like it was Carl Weathers, it's not Burgess
Meredith, it's not Talia Shire, it's nobody.
But as he keeps talking, it hits me, I'm like, wait a minute, I know who this guy is,
but I don't know who he is, who is he?
So he tells a story that as he's telling the story, I figure out, okay, he's a sports
caster, he's a sports caster and he lives in Southern California and he's been here
a long time.
I've figured that out kind of quickly, but I don't know a name and I can't I can't place
it.
I'm really struggling and I'm being quiet.
Meanwhile, Mark who is sitting to stews left is very excited about this.
Mark is from Southern California originally and I'm sitting here and I'm trying to put
it together without interrupting anybody because I don't want to disrupt the flow of this
story.
So he tells a story that he had done a live shot for his local sports cast from the LA
sports arena, which I think is no more, that's where the LA Clippers used to play.
And he had done a live shot and he had been asked by the anchors back in the studio
what were you doing today?
And he says, Oh, I'm down here at the LA sports arena filming this movie that's going to
be terrible.
It's a bad movie.
It's going to be awful.
I spent all day here doing this boxing movie and it's going to be terrible.
It's an awful movie.
I don't know.
Don't bother going to see it.
He's trashing what the product, the movie that he's producing has a small role in on
here in the Southern California.
Well, it just so happened that Sylvester Stallone and the producer who I believe was Joe
Alvetson happened to be watching the local news and see this guy on television, trashing
the movie that they're making and that's not that long before it's release.
On air live, they happen to be watching it and then it hits me.
This is the play by play announcer from the Rocky movies.
I don't know his name, but that's who it is.
And I'm like, Oh my gosh.
Now for a Rocky fan, I'm like, Oh my God, this is the guy who's the, who's the play by
play voice of the fights in the Rocky movies.
And if you think about Rocky, especially Rocky one, the way they used the play by play
announcer to call the fight, the way they used him as a backdrop added a level of authenticity
and almost suspense to it because it felt so real.
And they didn't use all of it.
They just used little parts of it and it hits me.
This is the guy.
That's the voice.
That's why I know this guy.
So he goes on to tell the story of how he got a part in the original Rocky movie and
he goes down to shoot the movie.
They shoot it in about a day or two at the LA Sports Coliseum.
He does his scene and the reason he was contacted to do it was because he was local.
He was cheap.
He had done play by play and he could call a fight.
Well, he thought the movie was going to snink.
So he tells the local sports, he tells the local newscast on a live shot.
Yeah, I'm down here.
The movie stinks.
Sylvester Stallone sees it.
Joe Alvison sees it.
They call him.
They dog custom and they say, you're not in the credits.
You're not getting anything.
Go to hell.
How dare you do this to which this guy says, find me.
I don't care.
Rocky comes out in November and is a global hit.
It wins best picture and a couple months later and it changes Hollywood history.
And it's I was trashing it.
So he had no idea it was going to be any good.
He thought it was going to be bad.
The movie comes out and he sees it and it's a huge hit.
A huge hit that Sylvester Stallone eventually pens a second Rocky movie.
And during filming, they they're they've held to it.
They're not going to ask this guy to be a part of it because they're so mad at him.
So instead they want they try actors to call to to do to call the fight like like in Rocky
one.
They call all these guys and I think they tried like 50 of them and they were all terrible
because they were actors trying to play the part of sports play by play guys.
And that's a different training.
It's a different background.
It's a different pace.
All of it's just different.
So Sylvester Stallone eventually calls this guy and says, Hey, look, I need a favor.
He said I was really upset about it would happen.
And meanwhile, the announcer whose name is Stu Nahan.
Stu goes on to tell Sylvester Stallone, I'm terribly sorry about it.
I feel terrible about it.
I was being off the cuff and glib.
So I didn't know what you had done, you know, I feel tall and it's, it's okay.
Slice says it's all right.
That's all right.
But we need you to do.
I really need you to do this part again for Rocky too.
He said, I just need you to call the fight the way you did in Rocky one.
Stu says I'm happy to do it.
He comes down and he's a part of the franchise moving forward.
And Stu Nahan in Southern California was a big, big deal for a long, long time because
obviously back then there was no ESPN.
The local sports anchor commanded a lot of attention for sports fans and there were
only a few of them in every big market and Stu was the guy.
In fact, Stu had a really funny part, a cameo part with Sean Penn in the famous movie
Fast Times at Ridgemont High.
Hello, everybody.
I'm Stu Nahan.
I'd like you to meet this young man, his name, Jeff Spakoli and Jeff, congratulations
to you.
Things look kind of rough out there today.
Well, I'll tell you Stu, I did battle some humongous waves.
And I think the line was that Sean Penn character, Jeff Spakoli says to Stu Nahan, Stu
nice jacket and they used to play that clip at LA Kings games once a game, something like
that.
So anyways, Stu Nahan is sitting to my left and he's the guy who's in the Rocky movies
and I didn't know it.
I didn't know it until probably about, oh, I don't know how long in that conversation.
And he tells this great story about being a part of the Rocky franchise and the fact
that he didn't start getting the residual checks because you have to sign a screen actor's
guild card if you have a line in the movie and then you start getting royalties moving
forward.
And I'm pretty sure in the original cut, even though Stu Nahan had lines in the film,
he's not in the closing credits because the director and Stallone were so mad at him.
Well, obviously that changed and Stu Nahan now is a part of Rocky lore.
I love that experience.
Now the funny part is I'm listening to this story and Mark Janko is listening to Stu
Nahan recount his time in filming Rocky and how he was almost evicted from the franchise.
And I'll never forget this.
Mark.
It's very important to denote this.
Mark grew up in Southern California.
He was a big baseball fan.
And he says, hey, Stu, who was the best hitter of all time?
Tony Gwynn?
And I'm looking at him.
I'm like, you've got to be kidding me.
We've got this guy rolling about Rocky stories and Hollywood and Jeff Spakoli.
And you're going to ask about Tony Gwynn, the message in the moral of the story is this.
If you get somebody who is attached to the Harlem Globetrotters, an iconic football
team that you happen to be standing next to you're inating, maybe an opportunity to see
a great all-time band and you don't know their name, do your homework, and don't blow
the opportunity.
Happy New Year.
This is a stolen water media production.