December 16, 1974: “The Towering Inferno” Premieres

December 16, 1974: The Towering Inferno premieres, directed by John Guillerman and produced by Irwin Allen, "The Master of Disaster." Within the past 2 years, the 1,368-foot, 110-story World Trade Center had opened in New York; the 1,454-foot, 110-story Sears Tower had opened in Chicago; and the 1,815-foot CN Tower in Toronto, with a 1,122-foot-high observation deck, had begun construction.

It's a film with "a cast of thousands." Steve McQueen and Paul Newman were two of the biggest stars in the movies at the time, and each wanted top billing. So a compromise was reached: Their names were staggered on the posters, so that McQueen was listed on the left, but Newman's name was higher, allowing each man to claim top billing. Each man was paid $1 million -- about $5.75 million in 2022 money.

The film was based on the novels The Tower by Richard Martin Stern, and The Glass Inferno by Thomas N. Scortia and Frank M. Robinson. In the film, the skyscraper is known as the Glass Tower, designed by architect Doug Roberts (Newman). It's 1,688 feet high (a height that wouldn't be reached in real life until 2007) and 138 stories above the streets of San Francisco.

The Tower's electrical system gets overloaded, and a fire starts on the 81st floor. McQueen plays Battalion Chief Michael O'Hallorhan, leading the firefighters. Maureen McGovern, previously in Allen's disaster film The Poseidon Adventure, plays a singer, and, as she did in the previous film with "The Morning After" (which hit Number 1 for her in 1973), sings the theme song.

Older stars: Fred Astaire, William Holden, Jennifer Jones, Olan Soule. Younger stars: Richard Chamberlain, Dabney Coleman, Faye Dunaway, Susan Flannery, Mike Lookinland, Felton Perry, Gregory Sierra, Robert Vaughn, Robert Wagner... and football star O.J. Simpson.

*

December 16, 1974 was a Monday. Despite this, ABC did not air a Monday Night Football game, having aired a Saturday night game 2 nights earlier. Baseball was out of season. No games were played in the NBA, the ABA, the NHL or the WHA. So there were no scores on this historic day.

December 16, 1973: The O.J. 2,000 Game

December 16, 1973: O.J. Simpson sets the NFL's single-season rushing yards record, becoming the 1st player to rush for 2,000 yards in a season.

In 1934, Beattie Feathers of the Chicago Bears became the 1st NFL player to rush for 1,000 yards in a season. His 1,004 yards stood as the record until 1947, when Steve Van Buren of the Philadelphia Eagles raised it to 1,008. In 1949, Van Buren broke his own record, with 1,146.

Jim Brown played 9 seasons in the NFL, 1957 to 1965, all with the Cleveland Browns, and led the League in rushing yards in 8 of them. Jim Taylor of the Green Bay Packers led in 1962. In 1958, Brown broke Van Buren's record by plenty, with 1,527. In 1963, with the schedule having been increased from 12 to 14 games, he raised the record to 1,863. In 2 years, he had increased the record by 33 percent; within 8 years, by 62 percent.

Simpson arrived in professional football in 1969, with the Buffalo Bills, having won the Heisman Trophy the year before and led USC to the National Championship the year before that. But his 1st 3 seasons were a bit of a struggle. In 1972, he rushed for 1,251 yards, leading the NFL, and the most by any player in 7 years, since Brown in his last season.

The Bills began the 1973 season in a new stadium, in the Buffalo suburb of Orchard Park, New York. It was then named Rich Stadium, and is now named Highmark Stadium. Simpson started off as well as anyone could have hoped for, rushing for 250 yards.

This broke the single-game record of 247, then held by Willie Ellison of the Los Angeles Rams in a 1971 game. In 1976, Simpson would raise that record to 273, but it was broken a year later when Walter Payton rushed for 275. Today, the record is 296, set by Adrian Peterson of the Minnesota Vikings in 2007.

Simpson ran for 103 yards in Week 2, 123 in Week 3, 171 in Week 4, and 166 in Week 5. But in Week 6, he was held to 55 yards by the defending Champion Miami Dolphins and their "No-Name Defense." In Week 7, against a Kansas City Chiefs defense that had once been great but was now aging, Simpson ran for 157. That gave him 1,025 for the season, at the halfway mark. Brown's record of 1,863 and even 2,000 now seemed within reach.

Then Simpson went into a slump. He only got 79 yards in Week 8 and 99 in Week 9. He bounced back in Week 10, getting 120. In Week 11, he got 124. In Week 12, he got 137. That got him 1,584. And in Week 15, he got 219. That gave him 1,803. So, in the season's final game, he needed 61 for a new record, and 197 for 2,000.

Fortunately for Simpson and the Bills, they were playing the New York Jets. Unfortunately, it would be at Shea Stadium, in cold air, with snow falling, on a frozen field. But the Bills were used to that kind of weather back home, so it didn't bother them much -- even if Simpson himself was a San Francisco native who'd made his name at USC, in the steady warm weather of Los Angeles, on the pristine grass field at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

The result was not really in doubt. The game was 7-7 at the end of the 1st quarter, by which point Simpson had already surpassed Brown's single-season record, needing just 8 carries to do it. The Bills pulled ahead to 21-7 by the half, including a touchdown run by Simpson.

The Bills led 28-7 after 3 quarters, and the final was 34-14. In case you're a Jet fan who is wondering: For the Jets, who finished 4-10, Joe Namath completed 13 out of 30 passes, for 206 yards, 2 touchdowns and no interceptions. But he also got sacked 3 times.

With 5 minutes left, Bills quarterback Joe Ferguson handed off to Simpson, and he ran up the middle, gaining 7 yards. It gave him 200 yards even for the day, and 2,003 yards for the season. The Bills carried him off the field, and a crowd of 47,740, mostly Jet fans, gave him a standing ovation.

This turned out to be the last game as an NFL head coach for the Jets' Wilbur "Weeb" Ewbank. He had led the Baltimore Colts to the NFL Championship in 1958 and '59. It had been only 5 seasons since he and Namath had led the Jets to win the Super Bowl, but it now seemed very far away.

The Bills also became the 1st NFL team to rush for over 3,000 yards in a season. At a postgame press conference, Simpson -- because of his initials, sometimes called "Orange Juice" or just "Juice" -- introduced each member of the offensive line, who called themselves "The Electric Company," because, "We make the Juice flow."

Let the record show that they were: Left tackle Dave Foley, left guard Reggie McKenzie, center Mike Montler, right guard Joe DeLamielleure, and right tackle Donnie Green. DeLamielleure would eventually join Simpson in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. (Montler died in 2018, Green in 2019. As of the 2022 NFL season, Foley, McKenzie and DeLamielleure are still alive.)

The following season, their 1st season with the "charging" buffalo on their helmets instead of the standing one they'd had since their 1960 inception, the Bills made the Playoffs. Although he caught a touchdown pass in the AFC Divisional Playoff, the Bills lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers, in what turned out to be the only Playoff game Simpson ever appeared in.

In a way, Simpson was unlucky: For all his personal success, as a player, an actor, and a commercial pitchman, he arrived in Buffalo just as the Dolphins were becoming the team that would dominate the AFC Eastern Division, which they remained until the mid-1980s, by which point Simpson was in the Hall of Fame, a sideline analyst for NFL games on NBC, and still doing commercials, especially for Hertz Rent-a-Car, sometimes with golf legend Arnold Palmer.

And he was popular. Still good-looking. Charming. For a lot of people, including myself, O.J. Simpson had been a hero for all or most of their lives.

And if he, rather than his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman, had died on June 12, 1994, it would have been a shock, but not the greater shock that we all got. Though it's likely that the awful things he had already done by that point would have come out eventually.

The film The Dark Knight featured Aaron Eckhardt as fictional District Attorney Harvey Dent, who said, "You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." And he went on to prove it.

The film The Sandlot featured Art LaFleur as the ghost of Babe Ruth, saying, "Heroes get remembered, but legends never die."

O.J. Simpson was a hero. He is a legend. But it's worth remembering that not all legends are heroic ones, or have happy endings.

The O.J. 2000 Game remains considerably more memorable than the one in which the record O.J. set was broken, by Eric Dickerson of the Los Angeles Rams. How much more memorable? This much: I had to look up not only the date, but the year that it happened. And I was just short of my 15th birthday at the time, so I remember it having happened, though I wasn't watching as it happened.

It was December 9, 1984: The Rams beat the Houston Oilers, 27-16 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium), and, with 215 yards, Dickerson surpassed Simpson, finishing the game with 2,007. There was 1 more week to play, and in the season finale, he ran for 98, finishing the year with 2,105.

This remains the NFL record. In 1985, Herschel Walker ran for 2,411 yards for the New Jersey Generals of the United States Football League. But, just as Dickerson needed a 15th game to surpass Simpson (O.J. still holds the record for most rushing yards in the 1st 14 games of a season), Walker played an 18-game season. What's more, the USFL was not highly regarded. Dickerson himself said, "The difference is, I did it in the majors, and he did it in the minors." The next year, Walker came to the NFL, with the Dallas Cowboys. His peak total in the NFL was 1,514 yards, in 1988.

There have now been 8 2,000-yard rushing seasons in NFL history. Since Simpson and Dickerson: Barry Sanders had 2,053 for the 1997 Detroit Lions, Terrell Davis had 2,008 for the 1998 Denver Broncos, Jamal Lewis had 2,006 for the 2003 Baltimore Ravens, Chris Johnson had 2,006 for the 2009 Tennessee Titans, Adrian Peterson had 2,097 for the 2012 Vikings, and Derrick Henry had 2,027 for the 2020 Titans.

(UPDATE: Saquon Barkley had 2,005, in a 17-game season in which he was held out for the 17th game to protect him from injury, for the 2024 Philadelphia Eagles. Counting the Playoffs and the Super Bowl, he had 2,504, an all-time record, breaking the 1998 mark of Davis, 2,468.)

Oddly, while Lewis and Peterson would both eventually break (and Peterson still holds) the record for most rushing yards in a game, neither did it in the season in which they rushed for over 2,000 yards. Simpson did (in 1973) -- and didn't (in 1976, when he raised the single-game record).

For comparison's sake: Jim Brown's highest single-game total was 237; Walter Payton, the 1st man to rush for more yards in a game than Simpson (275), and eventually the NFL's all-time rushing leader, topped out at 1,852 yards in a season; and Emmitt Smith, who surpassed Payton and remains the all-time rushing leader, topped out at 237 for a game and 1,773 for a season.

*

December 16, 1973 was a Sunday. These other games were played in the NFL:

* The New York Giants lost to the Minnesota Vikings, 31-7 at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut. (This was after the old Yankee Stadium was renovated, but before Giants Stadium was completed.)

* The Baltimore Colts beat the New England Patriots, 18-13 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore.

* The Washington Redskins beat the Philadelphia Eagles, 38-20 at Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in Washington.

* The Atlanta Falcons beat the New Orleans Saints, 14-10 at Atlanta Stadium. (It was renamed Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium in 1975.)

* The Miami Dolphins beat the Detroit Lions, 34-7 at the Orange Bowl in Miami.

* The Green Bay Packers beat the Chicago Bears, 21-0 at the old Soldier Field in Chicago.

* The Dallas Cowboys beat the football version of the St. Louis Cardinals, 30-3 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.

* The Kansas City Chiefs beat the San Diego Chargers, 33-6 at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.

* The Cincinnati Bengals beat the Houston Oilers, 27-24 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* The Los Angeles Rams beat the Cleveland Browns, 30-17 at the Los Angeles Coliseum.

* The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the San Francisco 49ers, 37-14 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco.

* The Oakland Raiders beat the Denver Broncos, 21-17 at the Oakland Coliseum.

* And there was no Monday Night Football game that week.

There were 4 games played in the NBA:

* The Kansas City-Omaha Kings beat the Detroit Pistons, 105-104 at the Kansas City Municipal Auditorium.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 115-110 at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California.

* The Milwaukee Bucks beat the Portland Trail Blazers, 121-98 at the Portland Memorial Coliseum.

* And the Phoenix Suns beat the Seattle SuperSonics, 113-109 at the Seattle Center Coliseum.

There were 3 games played in the American Basketball Association:

* The New York Nets beat the Utah Stars, 129-109 at the Nassau Coliseum.

* The San Antonio Spurs beat the Memphis Tams, 85-80 at the Mid-South Coliseum in Memphis.

* And the Kentucky Colonels beat the San Diego Conquistadors, 106-101 at the San Diego Sports Arena. (It's now named the Pechanga Arena.)

There were 7 games in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers lost to the Chicago Black Hawks, 6-1 at Madison Square Garden.

* The New York Islanders lost to the Philadelphia Flyers, 4-0 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.

* The Boston Bruins beat the California Golden Seals, 5-3 at the Boston Garden.

* The St. Louis Blues beat the Buffalo Sabres, 5-2 at the Buffalo Memorial Auditorium.

* The Pittsburgh Penguins beat the Atlanta Flames, 2-1 at The Omni.

* The Detroit Red Wings beat the Vancouver Canucks, 7-5 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* The Montreal Canadiens, the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Los Angeles Kings and the Minnesota North Stars were not scheduled.

And there were 6 games in the World Hockey Association:

* The Edmonton Oilers beat the Jersey Knighs, 7-6 at the Cherry Hill Arena in the Philadelphia suburb of Cherry Hill, Camden County, New Jersey.

* The Chicago Cougars beat the New England Whalers, 3-2 at the Boston Garden.

* The Quebec Nordiques beat the Toronto Toros, 4-3 in overtime at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* The Cleveland Crusaders and the Houston Aeros played to a tie, 2-2 at the Sam Houston Coliseum in Houston.

* The Minnesota Fighting Saints beat the Winnipeg Jets, 3-2 at the Winnipeg Arena.

* The Los Angeles Sharks beat the Vancouver Blazers, 5-3 at the Los Angeles Sports Arena.

November 25, 1976: O.J.'s Romp In Defeat

November 25, 1976: As usual, the Detroit Lions play at home on Thanksgiving Day. However, for the 2nd year in a row, it's being held at the decidedly untraditional venue of an indoor stadium, the Silverdome in suburban Pontiac, 30 miles northwest of downtown Detroit.

The Lions certainly had a high-profile opponent for their game, televised nationally on NBC. Not so much the team, the Buffalo Bills, as their leading offensive threat, running back O.J. Simpson. The top running back in the NFL in the decade, he was already the holder of the single-season record for rushing yards, with 2,003 in 1973.

At this point, the NFL record for rushing yards in a game was 247, by Willie Ellison of the Los Angeles Rams in a 1971 game. In this game, however, the Lions couldn't stop O.J. He set a new record with 273 yards, and scored 2 touchdowns.

But, much like the Boston Celtics treated Wilt Chamberlain in the 1960s, the Lions approached the situation as if O.J. couldn't be stopped, but the rest of his team could. Quarterback Greg Landry led 4 scoring drives before the Bills got on the board, leading to a touchdown pass he threw to David Hill, 2 field goals from Benny Ricardo, and another pass from Landry to Hill. Midway through the 3rd quarter, the Lions led, 20-0. Simpson's 2 touchdowns bookended a touchdown run by the Lions' Dexter Bussey. Detroit won, 27-14.

The game was fairly typical of Simpson's career. In 11 seasons, he played in 1 Playoff game, a defeat to the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1974. In this season, with his best single-game performance, not only did the Bills lose that game, but went 2-12.

A year later, Walter Payton of the Chicago Bears broke the record, rushing for 275 yards. That was still the NFL record in 1994, when O.J. Simpson was arrested for killing 2 people, including his ex-wife. He was acquitted, but was later found liable for their deaths in a civil trial, and later spent time in prison, not for those murders, but for a separate armed robbery.

The NFL record for rushing yards in a game was raised to 278 by Corey Dillon of the Cincinnati Bengals in 2000, to 295 by Jamal Lewis of the Baltimore Ravens in 2003, and to 296 by Adrian Peterson of the Minnesota Vikings in 2007. That record still stands.

*

November 25, 1976, like all Thanksgiving Days, was a Thursday. One other game was played in the NFL: The Dallas Cowboys beat the football version of the St. Louis Cardinals, 19-14 at Texas Stadium in suburban Irving, 10 miles northwest of downtown Dallas. The leading rusher in that game only had 54 yards, and it was the Cowboys' quarterback, Roger "the Dodger" Staubach.

There were 3 college games:

* Number 11 Texas A&M beat arch-rival Texas, 27-3 at Memorial Stadium in Austin.

* Number 17 Rutgers beat Colgate, 17-9 at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway, New Jersey. This completed an 11-0, undefeated season for Rutgers. I have a separate entry for that event.

* And Kent State beat Northern Illinois, 42-0 at Dix Stadium in the Cleveland suburb of Kent, Ohio.

One more note from football on this day: Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb was born.

Baseball was out of season. In recent times, the NBA and the NHL have avoided playing on Thanksgiving, so as not to compete for TV ratings with the NFL. But, this time, there were 3 NBA games:

* The Cleveland Cavaliers, beat the Detroit Pistons, 111-105 at The Coliseum in the Cleveland suburb of Richfield, Ohio.

* The Houston Rockets beat the New Orleans Jazz, 105-99 at the Superdome in New Orleans. In defeat, "Pistol" Pete Maravich scored 35 points.

* And the Phoenix Suns beat the Washington Bullets, 104-98 at the Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

And there were 2 NHL games. The New York Islanders lost to the Detroit Red Wings, 3-1 at the Nassau Coliseum. And the Boston Bruins beat the Vancouver Canucks, 4-2 at the Boston Garden.

And there were 2 games in the World Hockey Association. The New England Whalers beat the Birmingham Bulls, 5-3 at the Jefferson County Civic Center in Birmingham. And the Quebec Nordiques beat the Indianapolis Racers, 5-0 at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis.

This was also the day of the last concert by The Band, filmed for the documentary The Last Waltz. I have a separate entry for that event.

November 18, 1967: USC vs. UCLA: "The Game of the Century"

O.J. Simpson's 4th quarter touchdown

November 18, 1967: One of college football's occasional "Games of the Century" is played. And the schools involved were based just 10 miles apart, and even shared a stadium at the time.

The University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) was founded in 1919 as the southern branch of the University of California, with its main branch in Berkeley, outside San Francisco. It became a separate school in 1927.

Located 12 miles west of downtown Los Angeles, in a neighborhood called Westwood, it is a State-sponsored school, and by 1967, it had already produced such legendary athletes as Jackie Robinson, Bob Waterfield and Rafer Johnson. At the time, it had a quarterback who was a favorite for the Heisman Trophy, Gary Beban; and the best player in college basketball, Lew Alcindor, who would later change his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Since 1967, it's produced football quarterback Troy Aikman; basketball legends Bill Walton, Ann Meyers, Reggie Miller and Russell Westbrook; baseball players Chase Utley and Gerrit Cole; tennis legends Arthur Ashe and Jimmy Connors; track icons Jackie Joyner-Kersee and her sister-in-law Florence Griffith Joyner; and soccer stars Cobi Jones and Brad Friedel.

The University of Southern California (USC) was founded in 1880, and is a private school. Its campus, 4 miles south of City Hall, effectively marks the border between downtown L.A. and the South Central ghetto.

Its football program then had the other favorite for the 1967 Heisman Trophy, running back Orenthal James "O.J. Simpson." It had already produced the 1965 Heisman winner, Mike Garrett; and also Red Badgro, Frank Gifford and Willie Wood. In the late 1920s, they had a player named Marion Morrison, but his misbehavior got him kicked off the team. He stayed in L.A., became an actor, and changed his name to John Wayne.

Since 1967, USC has produced Heisman winners Charles White, Marcus Allen, Carson Palmer, Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush, and other football stars like Ron Mix, Sam Cunningham, Lynn Swann, Anthony Munoz, Ronnie Lott, Willie McGinest, Junior Seau, Troy Polamalu, Bruce Matthews, Bruce's brother Clay Matthews Jr., and Clay's son Clay Matthews III.

Their highly successful baseball program had already produced Tom Seaver, and has since gone on to produce Bobby Valentine, Dave Kingman, Fred Lynn, Mark McGwire, Randy Johnson, Mark Prior, Barry Zito, and Bret and Aaron Boone.

In basketball, they had already produced Bill Sharman, and went on to produce Paul Westphal, Cheryl Miller, Lisa Leslie and Cynthia Cooper. They produced Olympic swimming Gold Medalist and actor Buster Crabbe, diving Gold Medalist Dr. Sammy Lee, swimming Gold Medalist Murray Rose, shot put Gold Medalist Parry O'Brien; and have since produced pole vault Gold Medalist Bob Seagren and swimming Gold Medalist John Naber.

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum opened in 1923, and USC had played football there ever since. UCLA began playing there in 1933. The Coliseum had hosted the Olympic Games in 1932, the NFL's Los Angeles Rams since 1946, and, 10 months earlier, the 1st Super Bowl. But, to Los Angelenos, it never hosted a bigger game than this one.

UCLA started the season by beating then-Number 9 Tennessee at home. They won away to Pittsburgh, Washington State and Penn State. They beat Cal at home, and Stanford away. Then came a blemish on their record: A 16-16 draw against Oregon State. 

USC started with home wins over Washington State and then-Number 5 Texas, beating Michigan State away, rising to Number 1. They continued, beating Stanford at home, beating then-Number 5 Notre Dame away, Washington away, Oregon at home, and Cal away.

But, 7 days after forging the tie with UCLA, Oregon State struck again, beating USC in Corvallis. That same day, UCLA rebounded with a 48-0 home win over Washington.

They rebounded with a 48-0 home win over Washington, and went into the the battle with USC ranked Number 1. USC was Number 4. A crowd of 90,772 filed into the Coliseum to watch UCLA in powder blue and USC in cardinal red face off in front of a national audience on ABC. The winner had the inside track to the Championship of the Athletic Association of Western Universities (the league now known as the Pacific-Twelve), the AAWU's berth in the Rose Bowl, and a shot at the National Championship.

It was billed as "The Game of the Century," despite that label having been used just a year earlier for Notre Dame vs. Michigan State. USC was favored by 3 points. Admission: $6.00 -- about $50 in today's money.

Each team scored a touchdown in the 1st quarter: First UCLA on a 12-yard run by Greg Jones, then USC when Pat Cashman intercepted a pass that Beban had intended for Jones, returning it 55 yards for a touchdown.

In the 2nd quarter, Zenon Andrusyshyn of UCLA missed a field goal attempt, and Simpson had a 12-yard touchdown run, dragging 2 UCLA tacklers into the end zone. At halftime, the Trojans led, 14-7.

Beban was not about to let down his effort in the game, and in the Heisman debate with O.J. In the 3rd quarter, he threw a 53-yard touchdown pass to George Farmer, tying the game. USC coach John McKay noticed that Andrusyshyn tended to make low kicks, so he sent 6-foot-8 linebacker Bill Hayhoe into the middle of the line, and he blocked 2 field goal attempts. The game remained 14-14 at the end of 3 quarters.

Early in the 4th quarter, Beban, battling a rib injury, threw a touchdown pass to Dave Nuttall. But, just as he had blocked those field goal attempts, now, Hayhoe blocked Andrusyshyn's extra point attempt. It was 20-14 UCLA, but that block would matter.

Gary Beban

With 10:38 left to play, and 3rd and 7 from the USC 36, USC quarterback Toby Page called an audible known as "23 blast." Simpson remembered thinking it was a terrible call. It wasn't: A key block from Dan Scott enabled O.J. to cut back to the middle, and run 64 yards for a touchdown. Rikki Aldridge kicked the extra point, and it was 21-20 USC.

Beban's injuries became too much for him, and he was unable to get the Bruins back across midfield. The 21-20 score held to the end, and USC had won. Any 1 of the 3 kicks that Hayhoe blocked would have made a difference, either giving UCLA a 23-21 win, or forging a 21-21 tie -- or forcing USC to decide, trailing 21-20 at the end, to decide whether to go for a 21-21 tie or a two-point conversion and a 22-21 win.

Chris Schenkel and former Oklahoma coach Bud Wilkinson called the game for ABC. Keith Jackson, then in only his 2nd season with ABC, narrated the taped highlights, and called it the greatest game he ever saw. So did Giles Pellerin, a USC graduate who saw every game the school played from 1925 until 1998, when he died while watching the USC-UCLA game, 797 games in a row.

Beban was unable to play the next week, and UCLA lost at home to Syracuse. They were not invited to a bowl game. Nevertheless, in one of the closest votes in the award's history, Beban was awarded the Heisman Trophy. UCLA ended the season 7-2-1, ranked Number 10.

USC had no more regular-season games. They went to the Rose Bowl, to face Indiana, then ranked Number 4, and won, 14-3, clinching the National Championship.

Simpson was a junior, so he returned for 1968, and seemed headed for another National Championship. They beat ranked opponents in Minnesota (away), Miami, Stanford (away), Cal and Oregon State. And, again, they beat UCLA, 28-16. And O.J. easily won the Heisman.

However, traditionally, when USC plays Notre Dame, it's in the middle of the season when it's the Fighting Irish's turn to host, to avoid the November cold of northern Indiana; and at the end of the season when it's the Trojans' turn, so it's in L.A. and warm. Notre Dame was ranked Number 9 at the time, and escaped with a 21-21 tie. It dropped them to Number 2, and sent them to the Rose Bowl to face Number 1 Ohio State. The Buckeyes' ended the Trojans' 12-game winning streak, 27-16, and won the National Championship.

O.J. went on to have a sensational pro career, at least on an individual basis, rushing for 11,236 yards, 2nd all-time at the time of his retirement. He set records, since broken, for rushing yards in a season (2,003 in 1973) and in a game (273 in a 1976 contest). He became one of the most popular athletes of his generation, and also gained praise as an actor. Team-wise, he was less successful: His Buffalo Bills played in only 1 Playoff game, smacking into the Pittsburgh Steel Curtain, although O.J. did score a touchdown in the game.

Beban -- like Simpson, a native of San Francisco -- had considerably worse luck than that. He was drafted by the Los Angeles Rams, so he didn't have to move, even playing in the Coliseum. But they already had All-Pro Roman Gabriel as their quarterback. And the Rams had already messed this situation up recently: They drafted the 1962 Heisman winner, Terry Baker, and he couldn't win the starting job from Gabriel, either.

So, before Beban signed a contract, the Rams traded his rights to the Washington Redskins, who already had future Hall-of-Famer Sonny Jurgensen. Sonny was 34, so trading for his replacement was a good idea. And the 'Skins had one of the greatest quarterbacks ever as their head coach, Otto Graham. But Sonny remained the starter, and Beban was released on the eve of the 1970 season. He was cut by the Denver Broncos before the 1971 season, and never played again.

Like Simpson, he was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame. But rather than being elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, his pro career consisted of 5 appearances, 1 incomplete pass, 5 rushes for 18 yards, and 1 trick play where he caught a pass for 12 yards.

Beban became a broadcaster for UCLA football, and a successful real estate executive. Chances are, even he would have been unable to sell the house where Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman were murdered on June 12, 1994; or the house where O.J. Simpson was arrested for those crimes 5 days later. Perhaps, even before that, Gary Beban would not have been willing to trade lives with O.J. Simpson; certainly, he would not have wanted to do so afterward.

*

November 18, 1967 was a Saturday. These other notable college football games were played:

* Number 2 Tennessee faced Mississippi, a.k.a. "Ole Miss," on somewhat neutral ground at the Liberty Bowl in Memphis. Tennessee won, 20-7, wrapping up the Southeastern Conference title.

* Number 3 Purdue beat Michigan State, 21-7 at Ross-Ade Stadium in West Lafayette, Indiana. The week before, they had beaten Minnesota. But the following week, they lost to arch-rival Indiana in Bloomington, forcing a 3-way tie for the Big Ten title.

Purdue couldn't go to the Rose Bowl, anyway: The Big Ten then had a rule that none of its teams could go to the Rose Bowl in back-to-back years, and despite the fact that Minnesota had beaten Indiana, seemingly breaking that tie, Minnesota had gone more recently, and so the league presidents voted to send Indiana instead, where they were beaten by USC.

* Number 6 Wyoming beat Texas-El Paso, 21-19 at the Sun Bowl in El Paso, Texas. Wyoming thus clinched the Western Athletic Conference Championship, but lost to Louisiana State in the Sugar Bowl.

* Number 7 Oklahoma beat Kansas, 14-10 at Memorial Stadium in Norman, Oklahoma. Oklahoma won the Big Eight title, and then beat Tennessee in the Orange Bowl. But the winner of that game would only have won the National Championship if USC had lost the Rose Bowl, which they didn't.

* Number 9 Notre Dame beat Georgia Tech, 36-3 at Grant Field in Atlanta. Notre Dame went on to beat the University of Miami in the Orange Bowl.

* Texas A&M, not ranked at the time, beat Rice, 18-3 at Rice Stadium in Houston. A&M beat arch-rival Texas on Thanksgiving to clinch the Southwest Conference title, and beat Alabama in the Cotton Bowl.

* Penn State, not ranked at the time, beat Ohio University (definitely not Ohio State), 35-14 at Beaver Stadium in State College, Pennsylvania. They went to the Gator Bowl, finishing in a 17-17 tie with Florida State.

* Yale beat Princeton, 29-7 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton, New Jersey, to wrap up the Ivy League title. They still had to play Harvard, and don't ever tell anybody from either school that "The Game" is meaningless. Yale won it, 24-20 at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut.

* New York City's only real remaining college football team, Columbia, lost to Penn, 26-6 at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

* And New Jersey's biggest team, Rutgers, lost to Holy Cross, 21-10 at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway.

* My high school, East Brunswick in Middlesex County, New Jersey, beat Sayreville, 41-0 away.

The brand-new American Basketball Association had no games scheduled for the day. Probably for the best, giving that this was, along with the following Saturday and New Year's Day, 1 of the 3 biggest dates on the college football calendar, thus interfering with attendance and TV ratings. But 5 NBA games were scheduled:

* The New York Knicks lost to the Baltimore Bullets, 101-93 at the old Madison Square Garden. They would move into the new Garden 3 months later.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 116-111 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia. For the Sixers, Billy Cunningham scored 31 points, Hal Greer 22, and Wilt Chamberlain only 8, but he also had 33 rebounds and 6 assists. For the Celtics, Sam Jones and Bailey Howell both scored 33.

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Detroit Pistons, 132-130 at the Chicago Stadium.

* The Los Angeles Lakers beat the St. Louis Hawks, 127-107 at the Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis.

* And the San Francisco Warriors beat the San Diego Rockets, 142-124 at the San Diego Sports Arena. (The building is now named the Pechanga Arena. The Rockets, an expansion team that year, moved to Houston in 1971.)

There were 5 games in the newly-expanded NHL:

* The New York Rangers lost to the Boston Bruins, 3-1 at the Boston Garden.

* The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Chicago Black Hawks played to a tie, 2-2 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* The Philadelphia Flyers and the Minnesota North Stars played to a tie, 2-2 at the Metropolitan Sports Center in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.

* The Pittsburgh Penguins beat the St. Louis Blues, 5-3 at the St. Louis Arena.

* The Oakland Seals beat the Montreal Canadiens, 2-1 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena.

* And the Detroit Red Wings and the Los Angeles Kings were not scheduled.

Also, Arsenal drew with Leicester City, 2-2 at Filbert Street in Leicester. 

October 26, 1984: “The Terminator” Premieres

October 26, 1984: The Terminator premieres. Originally, director James Cameron wanted football player-turned-actor O.J. Simpson to star as the eponymous villain. This was rejected, because a focus group suggested that O.J. wouldn’t be believable as, literally, a heartless killing machine. So they got Arnold Schwarzenegger. And the rest is… uh, history?

In 2029, what then seemed like a fairly distant future, Earth has been devastated by a nuclear war, and is ruled by machines. But the tide has turned, as humanity's rebellion, led by a man named John Connor, is beginning to win. So the machines send a cybernetic assassin back to 1984, before John's birth, to kill his mother, Sarah (Linda Hamilton, who later married Cameron). Knowing that this is the plan, John (never actually shown in the film) sends one of his soldiers, Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn) back to protect Sarah. He does so, at the cost of his own life -- but not before fathering Sarah's child, his boss.

This movie began Schwarzenegger's use of the phrase, "I'll be back" in every movie. As a result, people started using it, instead of what they used before: General Douglas MacArthur's line, "I shall return."

The movie also began a franchise that has, through 2022, extended to 5 films and a TV series, which have often contradicted each other, producing an incredibly convoluted timeline, including Schwarzenegger playing both good and evil Terminators.

When Schwarzenegger was elected Governor of California in 2003, he became known as "The Governator."

In a 2015 episode of the YouTube series Epic Rap Battles of History, "Epic" Lloyd Ahlquist played the Terminator. His opponent, as played by "Nice" Peter Shukoff, was RoboCop.

*

October 26, 1984 was a Friday. Baseball season was over. Football was in midweek. The NBA season opened, with 6 games:

* The New Jersey Nets lost to the Atlanta Hawks, 119-104 at the Brendan Byrne Arena at the Meadowlands. Dominique Wilkins, the dunk artist known as "The Human Highlight Film," scored 34 points for the Hawks.

* The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, 111-101 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Detroit Pistons, 130-123 at the Silverdome in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan. Isiah Thomas scored 35 points in defeat.

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Washington Bullets, 109-93 at the Chicago Stadium.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Golden State Warriors, 122-114 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena.

* And the Seattle SuperSonics beat the Utah Jazz, 102-94 at the Seattle Center Coliseum.

And there were 3 games in the NHL:

* The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Quebec Nordiques played to a tie, 2-2 at the Colisée de Québec.

* The Detroit Red Wings beat the Buffalo Sabres, 8-3 at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit. John Ogrodnick and former Sabre Danny Gare each had 2 goals.

* And the Edmonton Oilers beat the Los Angeles Kings, 8-2 at the Northlands Coliseum in Edmonton. Jari Kurri scored 2 goals. Wayne Gretzky didn't score any, but he and Kurri each had 3 assists.

October 3, 1995: O.J. Simpson Is Acquitted of Murder

Left to right: Defense attorney F. Lee Bailey,

O.J. Simpson, defense attorney Johnnie Cochran

October 3, 1995: Former football star, sportscaster and actor O.J. Simpson is found not guilty of the murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman, at the Los Angeles County Courthouse in downtown L.A.

In hindsight, the evidence is overwhelming. But the verdict was correct: "Not Guilty." Why? Because a conviction can only be achieved if all 12 jurors are convinced that the prosecution has proven the defendant's guilt, as the saying goes, beyond a reasonable doubt.

As soon as prosecutor Christopher Darden put Detective Mark Fuhrman, who'd been part of the LAPD's investigative team at the murder scene, on the stand, the case against O.J. was blown. Fuhrman had tampered with evidence, and evidence of his racism was presented.

He was taken apart on the stand by F. Lee Bailey, a member of O.J.'s legal "Dream Team," who had previously become famous for defending Dr. Sam Sheppard, the basis for the TV show The Fugitive; Albert DeSalvo, accused of being the Boston Strangler; Army Captain Ernest Medina, for his role in the 1968 My Lai Massacre in Vietnam; Santo Trafficante Jr., allegedly the kingpin of organized crime in Florida, often linked by conspiracy theorists to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy; and Patty Hearst, for her role in a 1974 bank robbery.

Moreover, if Fuhrman had not been put on the stand, the bloody gloves would never have been put into evidence, and we never would have found out that, for whatever reason, they didn't fit. That's reasonable doubt, right there. The leader of the Dream Team, Johnnie Cochran, was right: "If it doesn't fit, you must acquit." While morally wrong, the verdict was legally correct.

The Dream Team also included Robert Shapiro, who had previously defended other Los Angeles-based athletes, including former New York Mets star Darryl Strawberry on drug and tax charges; Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard Law School professor who had previously defended Heavyweight Champion Mike Tyson on rape charges, real estate tycoons Harry and Leona Helmsley on tax charges, televangelist Jim Bakker on both, and socialite Claus von Bulow for murdering his wife; Barry Scheck, director of The Innocence Project; and Robert Kardashian, who had left the legal profession in disillusionment, founded a music company, and only returned to it because O.J. was a close friend.

Both Shapiro and Kardashian later publicly doubted O.J.'s innocence, and the relationship between the Dream Teamers reached a point where Shapiro admitted in an interview that he would never speak to either Bailey or Dershowitz again.

O.J. regained his freedom. But a civil suit was brought by the Brown and Goldman families. With a different standard -- only a preponderance of the evidence is necessary to decide, although the jury must still be unanimous on that -- he was found liable for the victims' deaths, and forced into a whopping fine.

He lost the estate at 360 North Rockingham Avenue, about 2 miles northwest of the murder scene. He lost his trophies, including the Heisman. He lost his TV and film residuals. Even any income he would get from books (he did write one, cheekily and cruelly titled If I Did It) and any memorabilia shows he was hired for (and he was hired for some) would go to the Brown and Goldman families. Pretty much the only income that legally couldn't be touched was his NFL pension.

O.J. moved away from his beloved L.A., to Miami, where the stigma against him wasn't as strong. In Miami, pretty much the only thing that will make people hate you is support for the Communist regime in Cuba.

But O.J. did not act like an innocent man who wanted to rebuild his life after his exoneration. He continued to act like a guilty man who wanted to rub in your face the fact that he got away with it. He found income and ways to keep it that the Browns and the Goldmans couldn't do anything about. He appeared in rap videos, in character as a gangsta or a pimp. And, just as Donald Trump did instead of his job, he played lots and lots of golf in Florida, instead of doing what he promised he would do: "Look for the real killer."

On September 13, 2007, O.J. led a group of men into a room at the Palace Station Hotel in Las Vegas, where sports memorabilia dealer Bruce Fromong was staying. They pulled guns on Fromong, and stole O.J.-related items. O.J. later said the items had been stolen from him, and denied that he and the others broke in, and that they had weapons.

On October 3, 2008, exactly 13 years after his acquittal in Los Angeles, O.J. was convicted in Las Vegas. He was sentenced to 33 years in prison. On July 20, 2017, the Nevada Parole Board decided to grant him parole. He was released on October 1, having served nearly 9 years for armed robbery. That's more than many killers serve for murder.

Robert Kardashian died of cancer in 2003, only 59 years old. He did not live to see his daughters Kim, Kourtney and Khloé, or their half-sisters Kendall and Kyle Jenner, become famous. He did, however, put the older sisters to work in his music company, so they learned a work ethic: They became hard-partiers, but they were never "heirheads."

Johnnie Cochran died in 2005, F. Lee Bailey in 2021. As of October 3, 2022, Robert Shapiro, Alan Dershowitz, Barry Scheck, Marcia Clark, Christopher Darden, Judge Lance Ito, Mark Furhman and O.J. Simpson are still alive.

UPDATE: O.J. died in Las Vegas on April 10, 2024. He was 76 years old. Fuhrman died in 2026. Dershowitz came under fire as part of the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.

*

October 3, 1995 was a Tuesday. On the same day, for the 1st time ever, a postseason MLB game is played in the Mountain Time Zone. The Colorado Rockies had won the NL Wild Card in only their 3rd season, and host the Atlanta Braves in Game 1 of the NL Division Series at Coors Field in Denver. But a Chipper Jones home run in the 9th inning gives the Braves a 5-4 win.

Also, for the 1st time in 41 years, a postseason game is played in Cleveland. Tony Peña homers to left field in the 13th inning, to give the Cleveland Indians a 5-4 win over the Boston Red Sox in Game 1 of the AL Division Series at Jacobs Field (now Progressive Field). It is Cleveland's 1st postseason game victory since the clinching Game 6 of the 1948 World Series -- 47 years.

Of more interest to Yankee Fans: After 14 seasons, Don Mattingly finally plays in a postseason game. It is also the 1st postseason game in the history of the Seattle Mariners, not counting last night's 1-game Playoff for the AL Western Division title.

The Yankees win, 9-6, in front of a rapturous crowd of 57,178, the largest paid attendance in the 33-season history of the post-renovation original Yankee Stadium. David Cone gives up 2 home runs to Ken Griffey Jr., but is backed up by home runs by Wade Boggs and Rubén Sierra. Mattingly goes 2-for-4 with an RBI.

Peña would later manage the Royals from 2002 to 2005, and coach with the Yankees from 2006 to 2017. On a few occasions, when Joe Torre or Joe Girardi was thrown out of a game, or was unable to manage on a given day, Peña stood in. This remains the closest any minority has ever come to being the manager of the New York Yankees.

And the Cincinnati Reds beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 7-2 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

June 17, 1994: Split Screen

June 17, 1994: NBC has a problem. Through its sports department, it is contractually obligated to show one thing. But its news department has a big story to cover, and it might be more dramatic than the sporting event in question.

This is no "Heidi Bowl" for the Peacock Network. And it certainly isn't for kids.

*

In 1983, James Cameron was casting The Terminator. He wanted O.J. Simpson, an actor and one of the greatest running backs in football history, to play the seemingly unstoppable cyborg from the future. But focus groups told him that there was no way that O.J. would be taken seriously as a killing machine.

In 1994, Simpson had finished filming Frogmen, an action film about U.S. Navy divers, and had been interviewed on the set for Entertainment Tonight. He seemed enthusiastic about this film.

He was 46 years old, going on 47. He was dating budding actress Paula Barbieri. He was a member of the College and Pro Football Halls of Fame. He had a fabulous house in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles. He walked with kings, presidents and his fellow stars. He was rich, famous and popular beyond most people's wildest dreams.

Like Michael Jackson and Bill Cosby, he had transcended his status as a black man in a white-dominated society, to become one of the biggest celebrities in America, and he remained one even though he hadn't played a down of football in nearly 15 years.

But, as happened to Jackson the year before, and has happened to Cosby since -- and as had recently happened to white celebrities Pete Rose (also an ex-athlete) and Woody Allen (also involved in movies), his image was about to change in ways that we could not have possibly imagined.

Oh yeah: Frogmen has never been released. It remains in someone's vault, never seen by the general public. And O.J. has never been cast in another feature film.

*

When we went to bed on the night of June 12, 1994, we thought of O.J. Simpson as one of the greatest football players ever, a good sideline reporter on NBC's NFL telecasts, and a decent actor. If he had been the one who died that night, by whatever means, it would have been sad -- as far as the public knew at the time.

And, as it turned out, a lot of people would have been better off. Himself included.

We knew he had been married and divorced twice. What most of us did not know was that he had beaten both of his wives. The 2nd wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, had repeatedly called the police about it. One of the times, one of the responding lawmen was a young Detective named Mark Furhman.
Nicole told lots of people that she believed O.J. would kill her one day. On the night of June 12, 1994, Nicole Brown Simpson had dinner with her mother, Juditha Brown, at Mezzaluna Trattoria, an Italian restaurant in the Brentwood section of the Westside (it's always spelled as 1 word) of Los Angeles, where a friend of hers, Ronald Goldman, was a waiter.
Nicole drove her mother home. When she got home to 875 South Bundy Drive, about half a mile southwest of the restaurant, her mother called, saying that she left her sunglasses at the restaurant. Nicole called the restaurant. The glasses were found, and Ron agreed to deliver them.
Both Nicole and Ron were murdered at Nicole's house that night, brutally stabbed to death. She was 35, he was 25.
The middle of June 1994 was a weird time in America. Republicans were pushing hard against the agenda, and indeed the legitimacy as President, of Democrat Bill Clinton. We were beginning to hear about something called the Internet. Nirvana bandleader Kurt Cobain committed suicide at age 27. The threat of a baseball strike loomed, a threat that was, unfortunately, realized in August.
And both the teams playing their home games at Madison Square Garden, the NBA's New York Knicks and the NHL's New York Rangers, reached their sport's Finals. On June 14, the Rangers won the Stanley Cup for the 1st time in 54 years, defeating the Vancouver Canucks in Game 7. By that point, O.J. was already a suspect in the murders.
On June 17, Game 5 of the NBA Finals was played at The Garden. While the Knicks were on their way to beating the Houston Rockets that night (though the Rockets would win the series in Game 7 in Houston on June 22), NBC went to a split screen.
Because Al Cowlings was driving a white 1993 Ford Bronco, California license plate 3DHY503, on Interstate 405, the San Diego Freeway, with O.J. Simpson in the back seat, with a gun to his head, and the police were following it. It was one of the most surreal events in television history.

It was surreal in part because it didn't seem to be all that fast a chase. The Bronco averaged about 45 miles per hour. It was also surreal because there were people on overpasses, cheering O.J. on, as if they believed he was innocent, and being unfairly persecuted by the cops.

Some time later, on the talk show The View, panelist Star Jones, a former Brooklyn prosecutor, defined friendship this way: "Who do you want driving the Bronco?" In other words, if you're in as much trouble as O.J. was in, who do you want to help you attempt to get out of it? Frankly, I think a better definition is, "For whom would you drive the Bronco?" As in, for whom would you risk your own criminal prosecution?

But since, by that point, everybody knew "A.C." not as a former football player, but as O.J.'s yes-man, Star did not have to explain her point. We all knew what she meant.
 

A.C. drove O.J. back to the house, where he was arrested. The ensuing legal process, including the "Trial of the Century," has been blamed for everything from the ruining of the American criminal justice system to the worsening of American race relations, from the dumbing down of American culture through "reality TV" to the rise of the Kardashian family. (One of O.J.'s "Dream Team" lawyers, and one of his best friends, was Robert Kardashian Sr., ex-husband of Kris Jenner, and father of Rob, Kourtney, Kim and Khloe.)

The infamous '93 Ford Bronco is on loan on display at the Alcatraz East Crime Museum, in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, 25 miles southeast of Knoxville, and 4 miles west of Dolly Parton's Dollywood theme park. It sits next to serial killer Ted Bundy’s 1968 Volkswagen Beetle and bank robber John Dillinger’s 1933 Ford V-8 getaway car.

*

June 17, 1994 was a Friday. The Knicks won that Game 5, 91-84. They were up 3 games to 2. But the next 2 games were at The Summit in Houston. (That arena has since been converted into the Central Campus of the Lakewood Church, Dr. Joel Osteen's "megachurch.") The Rockets won Game 6, 86-84; and Game 7, 90-84. Hakeem Olajuwon had lost to Patrick Ewing in the 1984 NCAA Tournament Final, when Ewing's Georgetown beat Hakeem's University of Houston.

Now, Hakeem had revenge, and the Rockets had their 1st NBA Championship. Still, with the Rangers having won the Stanley Cup, this gave the 1968 version of Madison Square Garden a status it still holds: The closest any arena has ever come to having the NBA and NHL Champions at the same time.

Football was out of season. These Major League Baseball games were played that night:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Milwaukee Brewers, 8-1 at Yankee Stadium. Mike Stanley hit a solo home run, but Cal Eldred allowed only 2 other hits, a double by Danny Tartabull and a single by Pat Kelly. Scott Kamieniecki didn't make it out of the 5th inning for the Pinstripes.

* The New York Mets lost to the Florida Marlins, 6-5 at Joe Robbie (now Hard Rock) Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Montreal Expos, 10-8 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Minnesota Twins, 9-2 at Oriole Park at Camden Yards in Baltimore. Cal Ripken went 1-for-5 with an RBI.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the Cincinnati Reds, 6-5 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.

* The Oakland Athletics beat the Texas Rangers, 4-2 at The Ballpark (now Choctaw Stadium) in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas. Rickey Henderson went 0-for-4, but did draw a walk.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Boston Red Sox, 8-1 at Jacobs (now Progressive) Field in Cleveland.

* The Toronto Blue Jays beat the Detroit Tigers, 7-4 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit.

* The California Angels beat the Chicago White Sox, 5-3 at the new Comiskey Park (now Rate Field) in Chicago.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 7-4 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.

* The Seattle Mariners beat the Kansas City Royals, 5-1 at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City. Ken Griffey Jr. went 1-for-5 with a solo home run.

* The San Diego Padres beat the Houston Astros, 3-2 at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego.

* The Colorado Rockies beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 13-5 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

* And the San Francisco Giants beat the Chicago Cubs, 6-1 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Barry Bonds went 0-for-3, although he did draw a walk.

This was also the opening day of soccer's World Cup, the 1st to be held on American soil. Luckily for NBC, and for American soccer, it was ABC and its sister company ESPN that had the rights to that. There were 2 games played on the day. Germany beat Bolivia, 1-0 at Soldier Field in Chicago. And Spain and South Korea played to a 2-2 draw at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

June 12, 1994: The Brentwood Murders

June 12, 1994: When this day began, Nicole Brown and Ronald Goldman were alive. Goldman was almost unknown outside his family. Brown, if she was publicly known at all, was known as the 2nd ex-wife of O.J. Simpson.

Just a few months before, New York real estate mogul Donald Trump had married Marla Maples. Both President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton attended as invited guests. No one thought it odd that Trump had invited them.

The idea that Trump, bodybuilder-turned-actor Arnold Schwarzenegger or "professional wrestler"-turned-actor Jesse Ventura would get elected to any political office was ridiculous.

Hardly anyone outside of the Los Angeles metropolitan area had heard of anyone named Kardashian, but Robert Kardashian, a lawyer who had given up his practice to become a record company executive, and O.J.'s best friend (or so we've been told), was about to become part of O.J.'s "Dream Team."

As it turned out, Al Cowlings -- teammate of O.J.'s in high school and junior college, and with the University of Southern California and the Buffalo Bills -- was the ring bearer at Robert Kardashian's 1978 wedding to Kris Houghton.

And those of us who knew O.J. as a football legend, when we heard the word "Bronco," the colors that came to mind were the orange and blue of the Denver team, not the white of the Ford SUV that Cowlings would drive O.J. in on that weird night (still daylight in California) of June 17, 1994, when NBC went to a split-screen: Game 5 of the NBA Finals, and the police chasing the Bronco.

When I was a kid in the 1970s, the Weekly Reader would poll kids of various ages, boys and girls alike, and ask them who their heroes were. O.J. Simpson, a running back who never appeared in a winning NFL Playoff game, always finished 1st. Finishing 2nd was Neil Armstrong.

The 1st man to walk on the Moon was Number 2.

O.J. won a National Championship at USC in 1968, but played 9 seasons with the Bills, and 2 more with his hometown San Francisco 49ers, and played in just 1 Playoff game. But, as with certain other sports legends -- Don Mattingly, Ken Griffey Jr., Anna Kournikova, Michael Jordan until 1991, and O.J.'s contemporary Pete Maravich come to mind -- not winning didn't matter. O.J.'s talent, good looks, and winning personality made him a bigger star than more successful running backs such as the Miami Dolphins' Larry Csonka, the Pittsburgh Steelers' Franco Harris, and the Dallas Cowboys' Tony Dorsett.

He starred in commercials for Hertz Rent-a-Car, and had already acted on episodes of TV shows, including Ironside, a police drama set in his native San Francisco). He was cast in The Towering Inferno (as the tower's chief security officer, he was one of the few big names whose character survived the movie), The Cassandra Crossing, Capricorn One, and, most notably, Roots, as Kadi Touray. He became a sideline reporter for NBC's NFL telecasts, and was very good at it.

He starred on the HBO series 1st & Ten as a star player forced by injury to turn to coaching (with fellow USC Heisman winner Marcus Allen as the player who takes his place), and showed a talent for slapstick as Detective Nordberg in the Naked Gun films. Ironically, the 1st one, in 1988, showed an L.A.-based athlete attempting a murder: Reggie Jackson, wearing his old California Angels uniform, played a player brainwashed to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II of Britain, stopped by Leslie Nielsen's usually-inept Lieutenant Frank Drebin.

In 1983, James Cameron was casting The Terminator. He wanted O.J. to play the seemingly unstoppable cyborg from the future. But focus groups told him that there was no way that O.J. would be taken seriously as a killing machine.

In 1994, O.J. had finished filming Frogmen, an action film about U.S. Navy divers, and had been interviewed on the set for Entertainment Tonight. He seemed enthusiastic about this film.

He was 46 years old, going on 47. He was dating budding actress Paula Barbieri. He was a member of the College and Pro Football Halls of Fame. He had a fabulous house in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles. He walked with kings, presidents and his fellow stars. He was rich, famous and popular beyond most people's wildest dreams.

Like Michael Jackson and Bill Cosby, he had transcended his status as a black man in a white-dominated society, to become one of the biggest celebrities in America, and he remained one even though he hadn't played a down of football in nearly 15 years.

But, as happened to Jackson the year before, and has happened to Cosby since -- and as had recently happened to white celebrities Pete Rose (also an ex-athlete) and Woody Allen (also involved in movies), his image was about to change in ways that we could not have possibly imagined.

Oh yeah: Frogmen has never been released. It remains in someone's vault, never seen by the general public. And O.J. has never been cast in another feature film.

*

When we went to bed on the night of June 12, 1994, we thought of O.J. Simpson as one of the greatest football players ever, a good sideline reporter on NBC's NFL telecasts, and a decent actor. If he had been the one who died that night, by whatever means, it would have been sad -- as far as the public knew at the time.

And, as it turned out, a lot of people would have been better off. Himself included.

We knew he had been married and divorced twice. What most of us did not know was that he had beaten both of his wives. The 2nd wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, had repeatedly called the police about it. One of the times, one of the responding lawmen was a young Detective named Mark Furhman.
Nicole told lots of people that she believed O.J. would kill her one day. On the night of June 12, 1994, Nicole Brown Simpson had dinner with her mother, Juditha Brown, at Mezzaluna Trattoria, an Italian restaurant in the Brentwood section of the Westside (it's always spelled as 1 word) of Los Angeles, where a friend of hers, Ronald Goldman, was a waiter.
Nicole drove her mother home. When she got home to 875 South Bundy Drive, about half a mile southwest of the restaurant, her mother called, saying that she left her sunglasses at the restaurant. Nicole called the restaurant. The glasses were found, and Ron agreed to deliver them.
Both Nicole and Ron were murdered at Nicole's house that night, brutally stabbed to death. She was 35, he was 25.

The middle of June 1994 was a weird time in America. Republicans were pushing hard against the agenda, and indeed the legitimacy as President, of Democrat Bill Clinton. We were beginning to hear about something called the Internet. Two months earlier, Nirvana bandleader Kurt Cobain committed suicide at age 27. The threat of a baseball strike loomed, a threat that was, unfortunately, realized in August.
And both the teams that played home games at Madison Square Garden, the New York Knicks and the New York Rangers, reached their sport's Finals. (This had previously happened in 1972.) On June 14, the Rangers won the Stanley Cup for the 1st time in 54 years, defeating the Vancouver Canucks in Game 7. By that point, O.J. was already a suspect in the murders.
On June 17, Game 5 of the NBA Finals was played at The Garden. While the Knicks were on their way to beating the Houston Rockets that night (though the Rockets would win the series in Game 7 in Houston on June 22), NBC went to a split screen.
Because Al Cowlings was driving a white 1993 Ford Bronco, California license plate 3DHY503, on Interstate 405, the San Diego Freeway, with O.J. Simpson in the back seat, with a gun to his head, and the police were following it. It was one of the most surreal events in television history.

A.C. drove O.J. back to the house, where he was arrested. The ensuing legal process, including the "Trial of the Century," has been blamed for everything from the ruining of the American criminal justice system to the worsening of American race relations, from the dumbing down of American culture through "reality TV" to the rise of the Kardashian family.

Calling Simpson's trial a "circus" would be offensive to circus performers, whose intent is to bring entertainment and joy to "ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages."

I was one of millions of 1970s kids who admired O.J. I didn't want to believe he could have done it. Who among us knew what he was really like?

When O.J. was found not guilty on October 3, 1995, the verdict was legally right, because the prosecution's case was fatally flawed; but morally wrong, because later evidence came forward that made it all but impossible that the killer of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman could have been anyone but O.J. Simpson.

In many ways, we will never be the same. And few of those ways are for the better.

*

June 12, 1994 was a Sunday. Football was out of season. The Stanley Cup Finals were between Games 6 and 7. Game 3 of the NBA Finals was played: The Houston Rockets beat the New York Knicks, 93-89 at Madison Square Garden.

And these Major League Baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Toronto Blue Jays, 3-1 at the SkyDome (now the Rogers Centre) in Toronto. Pat Hentgen outpitched Scott Kamieniecki. Devon White went 3-for-4 with a home run and 2 RBIs. Don Mattingly went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The New York Mets beat the Montreal Expos, 5-4 at Shea Stadium.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Boston Red Sox, 8-4 at Fenway Park in Boston. The O's got home runs from Cal Ripken, Rafael Palmeiro and Leo Gomez.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 7-2 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Florida Marlins, 5-1 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh.

* The Colorado Rockies beat the Cincinnati Reds, 3-2 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Chicago Cubs, 2-1 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 12-6 at Milwaukee County Stadium.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Chicago White Sox, 6-2 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Texas Rangers, 7-2 at The Ballpark (now Choctaw Stadium) in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the Houston Astros, 3-1 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* The California Angels beat the Detroit Tigers, 8-6 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim).

* The San Diego Padres beat the San Francisco Giants, 5-2 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Tony Gwynn went 1-for-4 with an RBI. Barry Bonds went 2-for-4.

* And the Oakland Athletics beat the Seattle Mariners, 11-2 at the Kingdome in Seattle. Rickey Henderson went 2-for-3 with 2 walks. Ken Griffey Jr. went 1-for-4.