The Star's longtime columnist talks baseball and football families, Abdi Abdirahman's last NYC marathon and Gonzaga's fit in the reconfigured Pac-12:
Jason Jacome's family tradition leads him to PCSHOF
When Jason Jacome is inducted into the Pima County Sports Hall of Fame next Sunday, it will be a day not just to honor his baseball career, but also to celebrate his family and its remarkable baseball lineage.
Tucson has produced many gifted baseball families over the last century — the Tolsons, the Kellners, the Hasseys, the Duncans — but the Jacome baseball family tree stands alone.
Jason, for example, was an all-city pitcher at Rincon High School in 1989. Two years later, after going 17-2, he became an NJCAA All-American at Pima College, drafted by the New York Mets. Jason Jacome pitched five MLB seasons and followed that by winning 21 games for the Yakult Swallows of the Japanese baseball league, and becoming a starter for the Triple-A Tucson Sidewinders and in the Mexican Pro League.
Jason is now the associate head coach at Pima College, working for his brother, head baseball coach Ken Jacome, whose career has been on a winning arc since he was an all-city pitcher at Rincon in 1985.
Ken Jacome’s baseball career has been one success upon another. After pitching at New Mexico State and Oklahoma City University, Ken became the head coach at Pueblo High School, then started the baseball program at El Paso Community College, served a stint on Jerry Stitt’s coaching staff at Arizona, and spent 14 years on the coaching staff of the New Mexico Lobos.
The Jacome baseball family got its start in the 1940s at Tucson High School. That’s when Jason and Ken’s grandfather, Eddie Jacome, became the ace pitcher during Tucson High’s state record 52-0 winning streak, which led to three state championships.
Eddie then signed with the Boston Braves and spent seven years in the minor leagues, which included a season of 28-3 at Class C Midland in 1951. He was 106-47 in the minor leagues. That was just the beginning of the Jacome baseball story.
Eddie’s two sons, Ken and David, followed in their father’s baseball footsteps. Both Ken and David made the 1965 All-City team at Rincon High, Ken as a pitcher and David as a shortstop. After playing four years at Arizona, David played two years of minor-league baseball.
The sons of Jason and Ken have also followed the family baseball footprint.
Jason’s son Atley is a pitcher at Park University in Phoenix. Ken’s son Jacob pitched at Pima College and New Mexico Highlands.
The PCSHOF’s annual induction ceremony will be held at 12:30 p.m. at the DoubleTree Reid Park next Sunday. The Class of 2022 includes Arizona and Pima College assistant basketball coach Jim Rosborough; the director of officials for NCAA men’s basketball, Chris Rastatter; Arizona and Canyon del Oro High School All-American softball pitcher Kenzie Fowler; and nine-time state championship tennis coach Robb Salant, among others. Tickets are available at pcshf.org.
Four generations of Felix family members — from left: Andy Pogue, Tony Felix, Jason Pogue, Phil Felix, Joey Felix and Tony Felix Jr. — all have football in common.
Four-generation football family excels
Speaking of a remarkable Tucson family sports lineage, long-time Tucson barber Phil Felix, who played on Salpointe Catholic High School's first varsity football team in the early 1950s and is a member of the school's sports Hall of Fame — is the patriarch of a four-generation high school football family in Tucson.
Are there other four-generation prep football families in Tucson? I haven’t been able to find any after significant research.
Phil, 87, has been blessed this season to watch Jason Pogue, his great-grandson, play for Mountain View High School’s football team. Here’s how the Felix football tree grew:
- Phil Felix played at Salpointe in the early 1950s.
- Tony Felix, Phil’s son, played on Vern Friedli’s first Amphitheater High School teams in the 1970s and coached at Mountain View under state championship coach Wayne Jones from 2000-08. Tony also played at NAU.
- Phil Felix, Tony’s brother, played on Amphi’s 1975 state championship team.
- Tony Felix Jr. played at Mountain View from 2000-03.
- Joey Felix, Tony’s son, played at Mountain View from 2003-06.
- Jason Pogue, Tony’s grandson, is a freshman linebacker on state championship coach Matt Johnson’s current Mountain View team.
If you know of another four-generation high school football family in Tucson, please let me know.
Dave Heeke's busy week of basketball
Arizona athletic director Dave Heeke had a typically busy schedule last week, flying to Houston as part of his new role on the NCAA men’s basketball committee, which, among other things, selects the 68-team field for March Madness.
Heeke replaced UCLA athletic director Martin Jarmond, who was rightly removed from the committee by the Pac-12 after the Bruins announced they were jumping to the Big Ten Conference.
Not only that, but Heeke continues the unmatched tradition of Arizona ADs being part of the NCAA selection committee. Dick Clausen was the first UA athletic director so honored in the 1960s. He was followed by Cedric Dempsey, who became chairman of the committee in 1988. Then came UA athletic director Jim Livengood, who was chairman of the committee in the early 2000s. Former Arizona AD Greg Byrne, now the AD at Alabama, in serving his second of five years on the committee.
Last week in Houston, the Division I men’s basketball committee conducted its annual fall meeting, where representatives from prospective men's Final Four cities made their pitches to host the event. The committee has not reached a final decision on awarding future men's Final Four sites but is expected to do so later this month.
The committee also spent time discussing future championship considerations, including the recent topic of expansion. Let’s hope Heeke and his associates shoot down any ideas of expanding the 68-team field to recent conversations about a 96-team field.
Abdi Abdirahman was a key part of UA's No. 4 finish in 1998. That season was the Wildcats' best hope for a national title in men's track and field in program history.
Abdi Abdirahman to run final NYC Marathon
Tucson’s five-time Olympic distance runner Abdi Abdirahman will run the last of his big-name competitions at Sunday’s New York Marathon. After becoming an All-American at Pima College and Arizona in the 1990s, the 45-year-old Abdirahman says he will now move away from elite-level competition and, among other things, will mentor other runners and maybe even volunteer as a pace-runner at America’s top distance events. This will be Abdi’s eighth New York Marathon; he has six top-10 finishes. Abdirahman and Nike ended their 25-year sponsorship relationship earlier this year, but he quickly signed a two-year contract to represent Asics last month. ….
Kevin Long continues UA baseball trend
When Arizona won the 1989 Pac-10 baseball championship, it placed a school-record six players on the all-conference first team. Incredibly, all six made big-league baseball their life’s work. Outfielder Kevin Long, is currently the Philadelphia Phillies’ hitting coach. Long’s other five 1989 all-conference Wildcat teammates had remarkable success in MLB. Trevor Hoffman became a Hall of Fame relief pitcher; first baseman JT Snow played 16 big-league seasons and won five Gold Glove Awards; All-American catcher Alan Zinter spent this season as the Cincinnati Reds hitting coach; pitcher Scott Erickson played 15 years in the big leagues and won 20 games for the 1991 world champion Minnesota Twins; and outfielder Damon Mashore spent the 2022 season as the Los Angeles Angels' outfield and baserunning coordinator. …..
'Eye on the Ball' host Steve Rivera pens Lute book
Tucson sports-radio host Steve Rivera of Fox Sports 1450-AM, has written a book “Lessons From Lute,’’ which will be released Tuesday by Triumph Books and will be available at Amazon.com. Rivera, who was the Tucson Citizen’s basketball beat writer for 17 years, interviewed all of the famous names from the Olson years, including Sean Elliott, Steve Kerr, Damon Stoudamire, Mike Bibby and Jason Gardner, as well as Olson’s most imposing coaching rival, Stanford’s Mike Montgomery. Luke Walton wrote the forward for Rivera’s book. …
Ex-radio, TV personality Larry Schnebly dies at 94
Sad to hear of the death last week of longtime Tucson radio and TV personality Larry Schnebly. He was 94. Schnebly was a radio analyst of Arizona football games in the 1960s and also a play-by-play voice of the Tucson Open golf tournaments of the 1960s on KGUN-9 before the Tucson Open was televised by national networks. Schnebly was a kind man whose positive energy touched those he met. …..
Mike Lude's family connects to new Bowling Green AD
Small world department: During last week’s homecoming football game at Arizona Stadium, former Washington and Auburn athletic director Mike Lude, a Tucson resident the last 25 years, was a guest of the UA athletic department in Dave Heeke’s press box suite. Lude, who turned 100 last June, was accompanied by his daughters, Janann and Jill, who grew up in Ohio during Lude’s days as athletic director at Kent State. Both Janann and Jill graduated from nearby Bowling Green University. When Heeke’s chief operating officer, Derek van der Merwe, entered the suite, he was introduced to Lude’s daughters, who were informed that van der Merwe had been named the AD at Bowling Green. Without prompt, Janann and Jill then began singing Bowling Green’s fight song. Pretty cool, huh?
Pac-12 Networks to air 12 games Monday
To celebrate the opening of the Pac-12 men’s basketball season, the Pac-12 Networks will broadcast the games of all 12 teams on Monday, a series of nonconference games that begin at noon and runs to almost midnight.
The Arizona-Nicholls game, which begins at 7:30 p.m. at McKale Center, is one of four games that will be aired on the main Pac-12 Networks feed. The others are Pacific at Stanford, noon; Texas State at WSU, 5:30; and Sacramento State at UCLA, 9:30 p.m.
ASU’s opener against Tarleton State will be shown on Pac-12-Arizona at 5:30 p.m.
Unfortunately, none of the 12 games figures to be much more than a blowout. About the only competitive Monday openers will be Tulsa at Oregon State, which went 3-28 last year.
The Pac-12 erred by choosing not to broadcast any of the 12 women’s games scheduled this week. As it stands today, none of Arizona’s first seven women’s basketball games are scheduled to be televised. Not until Adia Barnes’ team plays Kansas on Dec. 8 is a UA women’s game scheduled to be on the Pac-12 Network, or any TV channel.
That’s a problem that commissioner George Kliavkoff should work to change by 2023-24.
My two cents: Gonzaga would give Pac some extra pop in hoops
Several media precincts last week reported that Gonzaga has talked to the Pac-12 and Big 12 about joining either conference as a basketball-only member.
That would be a home run for the Pac-12.
In the 21st century, Gonzaga has become a more reputable basketball brand than UCLA. The oft-uninspiring Pac-12 men’s basketball season would immediately get a boost from Gonzaga’s established rivalries with Washington. WSU and Oregon. Zags coach Mark Few grew up near the Oregon campus.
The Gonzaga-Arizona series would immediately become the league’s No. 1 matchup.
I can’t imagine Gonzaga pursuing a berth in the Big 12. The travel requirements to Big 12 foes like West Virginia, Central Florida, Houston and Cincinnati should be a deal-killer.
But Gonzaga jumping to the Pac-12 would instantly revive a league that has been all but put to sleep by low-level basketball programs at Cal, Utah, Washington, WSU and the likely departure of UCLA.
Why wait? Get this deal done ASAP.
