“We are extremely excited to have Reggie join the staff of the Monogram Club,” said Fraleigh. “Reggie brings with him a very unique background and skill set that will benefit the club in many ways. His experiences as a successful football player, both at Notre Dame and on the professional level, combined with his time as an employee of the University will serve him well in his new role.”
“Reggie has the personality and drive to make a significant impact within our organization,” said current Monogram Club president Marc Kelly. “This hire is not only a tremendous addition to our entire membership, but specifically within the membership of former football players. He is a perfect choice to bridge and develop the relationship between the different generations of Notre Dame football.”
And here is a clip of our new Manager for Monogram/Football Alumni Relations making our current defensive coordinator miss him in the open field on th way to a spectacular touchdown run.
Brady Quinn entered to a standing ovation from the home crowd and made his debut for the Cleveland Browns Sunday, playing one series while Derek Anderson was sidelined with a hand injury. Quinn played for only one series, the Browns final possession of the first half. He was 3-8, for 45 yards.
Quinn’s first pass was tipped at the line and fell short of his intended receiver. His second pass was also short, but could have been caught if the running back was able to make a good play. Quinn then completed his next three passes for 15, 12 and 18 - all for first downs. With first and goal from the 49ers six yard line, Quinn passed three times. His first was thrown away to the right corner after good coverage negated a fade route. He threw a strike to Braylon Edwards in the back of the endzone. The pass went through Edwards hands as the combination of excellent coverage with a possible drop negated Quinn’s first opportunity at a touchdown. On third and goal, Quinn found Kellen Winslow Jr. wide open in the short center of the endzone, but his pass bounced off Winslow’s chest as Brady’s final chance at his first career touchdown pass, instead lead to a field goal by Phil Dawson.
In a postgame interview that can be viewed on the Browns multimedia site, Quinn was asked if he was disappointed only being in for one series. Quinn again showed the maturity of a team player that has been raved about by Cleveland teammates and columnists alike.
I’ve said this all year long. Every quarterback wants to be in there as much as possible until the end of a game. Of course going in there for one series was a little bit of a tease, but it was great just to get in there and have the experience. It keeps you hungry.
The Browns defeated the 49ers 20-7 to finish a 10-6 season. They missed the playoffs when the Titans beat the Colts late Sunday.
After the game, CBS cameras caught a midfield embrace between former Irish players Quinn (Browns QB), Arnaz Battle (49ers WR) and Bryant Young (49ers DT). Young had played the final game of his 14 year career.
Notre Dame lost a legend on Wednesday when Harry Oliver died at age 46 after battling cancer for the past two years.
“The man who made the most famous kick in Irish football history is dead at the age of 46. Harry Oliver had battled cancer for the past two years. He died Wednesday in his hometown of Cincinnati.”
Oliver made the most famous field goal in Notre Dame history when he booted a 51 yard field goal to beat Michigan in 1980. Youtube has the Michigan and Notre Dame calls f the kick. Make sure to listen to the Michigan call and notice how distraught Bob Ufer was that he messed up the final score twice before finally getting it right with “Notre Dame wins 29 to 27.”
For a little more on just how special Oliver’s field goal was, he’s an excerpt from Irish Legends.
There were four seconds to play when coach Devine sent in his left-footed field goal kicker, Harry Oliver. Oliver’s longest field goal had been 38 yards in a JV game. Now he was asked to kick a fifty-one yarder against a stiff fifteen mile per hour wind.
Then a remarkable thing happened. Just as Oliver lined up to kick the ball, the wind died down. Oliver calmly stepped into the ball and kicked his way into Notre Dame’s Hall of Fame with a fifty one-yard kick over the crossbar–just as the final gun sounded for the end of the game and a Notre Dame victory, 29-27.
“Behind me was the library with its huge mosaic of `Touchdown Jesus.’ The ball went up and cleared the crossbar by 3 inches. I know that wind stopped at that second, and I’m convinced `Touchdown Jesus’ gave the ball a little nudge to get it over.”
“Everyone was jumping on top of me. Unfortunately my leg got caught up in a weird position, and I started to scream. Joe Gramke, a teammate who also had played at Moeller, started pulling off the people. Then I got out. That field goal was the greatest thrill of my life.”
Ron Powlus may have had an up and down career that never really lived up to the unreasonable expectations that were placed upon him, but now that he is back in football as Notre Dame’s quarterbacks coach, its hard not to root for him after reading articles like the one in today’s South Bend Tribune:
“I don’t take into account, in my college experience, I don’t take into account football. I can tell you that my college experience at Notre Dame as a student was phenomenal — friends, classes, all that. You throw in football and it makes that experience 100 times better. And some people say, ‘Oh really? You got hurt and you know …’
“I don’t care. That’s life. That’s playing the game. So yeah, I missed my freshman year because of injury. What am I going to do? I missed it. I was hurt. I played four years after that. I broke my arm and I missed 2 1/2 games. Yes, I missed 2 1/2 games.”
Powlus would add:
“I had a terrific experience. I had the opportunity to represent Notre Dame and its alumni and its professors and its students and the kids that lived next door to me in Flanner Hall and the opportunity to wear the gold helmet on the field every week. I mean, that enhances my experience a hundred-fold. Just because there was a statement that was made that I was supposed to win Heisman trophies and didn’t, and got a lot of criticism for it, that doesn’t ruin my college experience.”
Quotes like that make it hard to not root for anything but success for Powlus who may have received more unfair criticism than any quarterback in Notre Dame history during his time with the Irish. Quotes like that also make me very pleased that Powlus will be at Notre Dame to coach and mentor Jimmy Clausen who will have all the pressure Powlus had and then some. Luckily for Powlus the internet was not nearly as big when he was under center for the Irish. With Clausen, however, the pressure will be even greater in this age of message boards and blogs as Jimmy is already finding out.
Here’s hoping Powlus flourishes in his new role and works his way up the coaching ladder while at Notre Dame.
“It’s better for me to be there than watch it at home,” he said. “When I’m at home, I have this Notre Dame room, and it’s just me and my son (Autry). And when the game’s on, no one can call me. No one can talk to me. No one is allowed to come into the room.
“I was talking to (former teammate) Ron Powlus a couple of weeks ago. I told him I’ve turned into the guy we used to make fun of. I’m a Notre Dame fanatic. I can’t help myself. I’m hopeless.”
It’s great to see former players who still have this much passion for the University. As die hard fans we sometimes forget that some of the players who play for the Irish aren’t anywhere near as obsessed enthusiastic as we are towards Notre Dame football.
The rest of the article paints a very positive picture of Denson and how he gave up his dream of playing professional football for the betterment of his family.
“It was easy, really,” said Notre Dame’s all-time leading rusher, whose final days as a pro were spent as a Montreal Alouette in 2004. “I have always been family-oriented. I had a daughter my senior year in high school, so I always understood responsibilities. I had a son my senior year at Notre Dame.
“Family life was fine when I was playing in Miami, but when you start to go a few months in Cleveland, a year in Chicago, two years in Detroit, my kids didn’t need to be moving around like that. This is their time.”
With his playing days over, Denson makes his living as a financial adviser primarily for professional athletes.
“The reason I got into this is there’s such a need for it,” Denson said. “You get a guy who’s 19, 20, 21 years old. You throw a ton of money at them, and there’s no training. Athletes have the worst spending habits, and they get a bad rap for it.
On top of being a Notre Dame football nut, Denson is putting his Notre Dame degree to good use. Stories like this about former players never get old.
Jeff Samardzija took the hill for the Daytona Cubs Friday for the first time of the season and pitched pretty well in his initial outing of the year. The former Notre Dame wide receiver tossed five innings allowing five hits (all singles), 1 earned run, and giving up 1 walk while striking out 1 as well.
Here’s some accounts of Samardzija’s start from around the web.
“I knew my pitch count was about 75,” said Samardzija, who threw exactly 75 pitches — 51 for strikes. “I felt good out there. It was the first game, and I was a little excited.”
Samardzija said he didn’t notice the home team was playing fight songs from former Fighting Irish rivals.
“You’ve got to expect that a little,” Samardzija said. “I didn’t really notice. If they did, they did. It wasn’t the first time, and it probably won’t be the last.”
“The majority of the time, he was pitching with his fastball,” Reed said of Samardzija. “He threw a couple of good sliders, but mainly he just attacked the hitters with fastballs. He came out pretty sharp and threw the ball well.”
On Friday, Samardzija’s fastball was consistently shown at 93 mph on the scoreboard at Space Coast Stadium throughout the night, Daytona broadcaster and media relations director Derek Ingram said.
“He never really got hit hard,” Ingram said of Samardzija’s outing after the game. “There were a lot of little bloop singles. I’d say everybody here is pretty happy with what they saw out of Jeff Samardzija tonight.
“His fastball was really establishing itself tonight. We saw 93 consistently on the board and occasionally 94, but you never know with these readings.”
“The sinker was moving,” Samardzija said. “”I got it up in the 90s, and turned it into a couple of double plays.”
Chicago Cubs farm director Oneri Fleita observed the game and liked what he saw.
“His sinkers looked like they dropped a foot,” Fleita said. “When he commands it like he did tonight, fills up the strike zone with strikes, he’s tough to hit. There’s a lot of positives that will come out from tonight and that’s why he’s here. All in all it was a great outing for him. He was focused, poised and made good pitches. He looks like he’s been doing this a long time.”
In addition to the fight songs that blared on the public address system, the game program also poked a little fun at Samardzija. Below an Irish football action shot of Samardzija were a USC logo and picture of former Trojans quarterback Matt Leinart.
The site has a blog, message board, mail bag, and a bunch of interesting info on Jeff. Take a look around, there’s some good information on there and from the sound of it, Jeff plans on being pretty involved with the site and interacting with the fans…
“Every day I’ll stop in and create a new blog during the week, and every couple weeks take on some of your questions from the mailbag page. In all honesty feel free to use the site to its ability. Fire away on the message board and get in those questions on the mailbag page, but try to keep the questions to one per person.”
We’ll do our best here at UHND to keep up on Jeff’s career with the Cubs, but for daily updates, check out the blog on the site.
Jeff Samardzija made his last appearance of Spring Training for the Cubs on Monday after they cut 14 players from their spring roster. Before being sent down to the miniors, Samardzija did get to face Barry Bonds with the much maligned slugger getting a single off of the Cubs Rookie. Here are some quotes from mlb.com.
“It was cool,” Samardzija said about facing Bonds. “I tried to keep cool and just make some pitches. I kept the sinker up a little bit, and he put the bat on it.”
It was cool to face Bonds? Not many big-league pitchers feel that way.
“I got to face a lot of guys since I’ve been up here, a lot of guys I’ve watched for a long time,” Samardzija said. “It’s all thrilling. My job as a pitcher is to keep my emotions together on the mound. I’m a pretty emotional guy. I just took some deep breaths, made my pitches and what happens, happens.”
Despite being sent down to the minors, Cubs General Manager Jim Hendry and manager Lou Pinella had nothing but high praise for their rookie hurler.
“It was very entertaining,” Cubs general manager Jim Hendry said, “but I’ve been excited about this kid since the day we got him. He handled himself like a pro with a lot of poise. He’s a big-time guy.”
“He’s pitched like a veteran really,” Piniella said. “You could see that he’s had big-time exposure playing football at Notre Dame. This hasn’t fazed him too much. I think he’s looked at some of our veteran pitchers and how they go about their business, what it takes to be a big leaguer, and he’ll take that with him. I wouldn’t be surprised that he’ll have good, steady progress in the Minor League system.”
Samardzija will move down to Single A Dayton where he will gain experience and work on becoming a full time baseball player.
Jeff Samardzija made his spring training debut this past weekend and despite only pitching one inning, his debut got him some good reviews from manager Lou Pinella as well as the Cubs fans in attendance.
Here’s a few excerpts from some articles on his performance Saturday:
The game featured the spring training debut of Chicago rookie Jeff Samardzija, the former Notre Dame standout wide receiver who spurned a possible future in the NFL to join the Cubs. The 22-year-old right-hander retired the A’s in order in the sixth, setting down Eric Chavez, Mark Ellis and Travis Buck, then left to a standing ovation from hundreds of Cubs fans who attended the game.
“That was impressive,” Piniella said. “You can tell he’s played before 80,000 fans before.”
This crowd didn’t bother him at all. He faced the middle of this Oakland lineup, he went right after [Eric] Chavez and a couple other left-handed hitters, and I think he was having fun out there, which is really important. It’s going to be exciting for him.”
Samardzija looked like a natural in Cubs blue.
“This is the first of anything,” Samardzija said. “You want to get out there, get your shot, and work through it. It was nice to get out there. It was real good to throw some early strikes, which used to do me in.”
Fast start: Rookie pitcher Jeff Samardzija made quick work of the A’s in Saturday’s sixth inning. He retired the side in order on 8 pitches (5 strikes). He also broke the bats of Mark Ellis and Travis Buck.
According to the Cubs, Samardzija’s fastball clocked between 94-98 mph and averaged 97. The former football star at Notre Dame received a standing ovation from the 10,074 in attendance.
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Ron Powlus may have had an up and down career that never really lived up to the unreasonable expectations that were placed upon him, but now that he is back in football as Notre Dame’s quarterbacks coach, its hard not to root for him after reading 
Jeff Samardzija took the hill for the Daytona Cubs Friday for the first time of the season and pitched pretty well in his initial outing of the year. The former Notre Dame wide receiver tossed five innings allowing five hits (all singles), 1 earned run, and giving up 1 walk while striking out 1 as well.
After reading my 
