October 24, 1960: John Wayne's "Alamo" Lie

October 24, 1960: The film The Alamo premieres. John Wayne had wanted to make a film about the March 6, 1836 siege of the former Spanish mission in San Antonio for 15 years. He plays Davy Crockett, and, since Crockett died at the Alamo, this is one of the few films in which a character played by John Wayne dies. His son Patrick Wayne plays an officer who survives, because he's sent out to get reinforcements. His daughter Aissa Wayne also appears.

Richard Widmark plays Jim Bowie. Laurence Harvey plays William Travis. Doo-wop singer Frankie Avalon plays Smitty, a young soldier who is an aide to Crockett. Denver Pyle, later known as Uncle Jesse on The Dukes of Hazzard, plays Thimblerig the Gambler. Richard Boone, then playing Paladin on Have Gun -- Will Travel, plays Sam Houston, who gets revenge at San Jacinto on April 21, 1836.

Ruben Padilla plays Generalissimo Antonio Miguel Lopez de Santa Anna, defending Mexico from the Texans.

"Remember the Alamo!" the Texans said in 1836. Modern Texans still say it today. But they don't remember what really happened. What are the 2 things present-day Texans hate the most? Illegal immigrants and other criminals. The Texans at the Alamo were both of those things: What is now the City of San Antonio was then part of Mexico, and they were there without permission; and they were slaveholders, and slavery had been abolished in Mexico in 1829 -- officially. Clearly, in practice, the country had not been able to fully do so.

In other words, at the Alamo, the good guys won. But the Texans yelled, "Remember the Alamo!" at San Jacinto 46 days later, won that, and declared independence. Then, in 1844, when it looked like Mexico was going to take them back, they called their Uncle Sam for help. Cowards.

And then, to thank America for saving their asses, they seceded in 1861, because they decided that having slaves was more important than accepting that all men are created equal.

And then, nearly a century later, John Wayne made a movie about the Alamo, and, of course, any side that The Duke is on must be the heroic one, right? Wrong: The men "defending the Alamo" were no heroes. And John Wayne was no hero.

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October 24, 1960 was a Monday. Actor BD Wong and golfer Ian Baker-Finch were born.

Baseball season was over. Football was in midweek: There would be no Monday Night Football for another 10 years. And there were no games scheduled in the NHL. There was 1 game in the NBA: The New York Knicks beat the Los Angeles Lakers, newly moved from Minneapolis, 111-101 at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena.

June 25, 1999: San Antonio's 1st Title

June 25, 1999: The San Antonio Spurs win their 1st league championship, after 3 years in the ABA and 23 years in the NBA. They defeat the New York Knicks, 78-77 at Madison Square Garden, to win Game 5 and the NBA Championship.

For the only major sports team in a city now with over 1.14 million people, this is a huge moment. It begins a stretch where, in 16 seasons, coach Gregg Popovich and forward Tim Duncan will lead them into 6 NBA Finals, winning 5 of them, the 1st 2 with center David Robinson.

For the Knicks, it is their 8th trip to the NBA Finals, and it remains their last. They managed to get there despite an injury to their star player, center Patrick Ewing. Forward Larry Johnson put the team on his back, and was 3 wins away from becoming a New York sports legend.

Coach Jeff Van Gundy -- short, bald, scrawny, looking nothing like a basketball player -- had built a team that played scrappy ball. Bill Gallo, sports cartoonist for the New York Daily News, drew him as a boxer, calling him "Rocky Van Gutsy."

But "Coach Pop" had as much guts, more brains, and more talent, and there was little the Knicks could do. In 1997, the Knicks had been bought by Cablevision, and James Dolan has run them ever since. And competitiveness has been a rarity.

Founded in 1967, in the American Basketball Association, as the Dallas Chaparrals, the team moved in 1973, becoming the San Antonio Spurs. They were 1 of the 4 ABA teams invited to join the NBA in 1976. By 1978, they had won a Division title, followed by trips to the Western Conference Finals in 1979, '82 and '83.

After a few down years, the arrival of coach Larry Brown in 1988 and Robinson in 1989 made them a Playoff team again. They got back to the Conference Finals in 1995, Popovich's 1st year as general manager. In 1996, after a bad start, he named himself head coach, and the arrival of Duncan the following season made them a title team in just 2 more seasons.

The Spurs would win the title again in 2003, Robinson's last year. Sports Illustrated named Robinson and Duncan their Sportsmen of the Year. The Spurs won again in 2005, 2007 and 2014, losing in the Finals in 2013, as Duncan straddled the NBA's Shaquille O'Neal era and the first half of the LeBron James era, as it was LeBron's Heat that beat the Spurs in the 2013 Finals, before the Spurs turned the tables in 2014.

By 2022, the population of San Antonio was believed to be 1.47 million people, and its metropolitan area 2.6 million. Yet the Spurs remain its only major league team: They lost the WNBA's Silver Stars after the 2017 season; the Missions are in baseball's Class AA Texas League; despite several minor professional football teams, including the Gunslingers of the 1980s USFL and the Brahmas of the current UFL, they've only hosted 3 NFL regular-season games, all as an emergency home for the 2005 New Orleans Saints after Hurricane Katrina; San Antonio F.C. are in the USL Championship, the 2nd tier of American soccer; and they have no pro hockey team at all.

UPDATE: The Spurs do not yet have a team Hall of Fame, but they have retired uniform numbers. From the 1970s: 13, for guard James Silas; and 44, for guard George Gervin. From the 1980s: 00, for guard Johnny Moore.

From their 1999 NBA Championship: 6, for guard Avery Johnson; 21, for forward Tim Duncan; 32, for forward Sean Elliott; 50, for center David Robinson; and a banner with his total coaching wins, 1,390, for head coach Gregg Popovich. From their 2003 Championship: Duncan, Robinson, Popovich; 9, for guard Tony Parker; 12, for forward Bruce Bowen; and 20, for guard Manu Ginóbili.

From their 2005 and 2007 Championships: Duncan, Popovich, Parker, Bowen and Ginóbili. From their 2014 Championships: Duncan, Popovich, Parker and Ginóbili. The Spurs reached the NBA Finals again in 2026, but lost to the Knicks.

Gervin, Robinson and Parker have been inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame.

*

June 25, 1999 was a Friday. These Major League Baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees beat the Baltimore Orioles, 9-8 at Camden Yards in Baltimore. The Yankees scored a tying run in the 8th and the winning run in the 9th, a home run by Shane Spencer, making a winning pitcher of Dan Naulty in relief of Hideki Irabu. Tino Martinez went 4-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Derek Jeter went 1-for-4. So did Cal Ripken.

* The New York Mets beat the Atlanta Braves, 10-2 at Turner Field (now Center Parc Stadium) in Atlanta. Rick Reed was the winning pitcher. John Olerud went 4-for-6 with 2 RBIs. Benny Agbayani went 2-for-3 with a walk. Both hit home runs. Rickey Henderson went 1-for-5 with a walk.

* The Montreal Expos beat the Florida Marlins, 4-3 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Chicago White Sox, 6-1 at Fenway Park in Boston.

* The Tampa Bay Devil Rays beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 11-4 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Minnesota Twins, 2-0 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Brian Moehler pitched a 6-hit shutout.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Chicago Cubs, 3-2 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Sammy Sosa went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 5-3 at Milwaukee County Stadium.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Cleveland Indians, 8-2 at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Houston Astros, 10-7 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Arizona Diamondbacks, 1-0 at Bank One Ballpark (now Chase Field) in Phoenix. José Jiménez (not the Bill Dana character of the same name) pitched a no-hitter, and still needed Thomas Howell to single Darren Bragg home in the top of the 9th to beat Randy Johnson. Mark McGwire went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The San Diego Padres beat the Colorado Rockies, 10-1 at Qualcomm Stadium (formerly San Diego Stadium and Jack Murphy Stadium). Tony Gwynn did not play.

* The Anaheim Angels beat the Oakland Athletics, 4-3 at Edison International Field of Anaheim (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim).

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat their arch-rivals, the San Francisco Giants, 4-2 at Candlestick Park (then named 3Com Park at Candlestick Point) in San Francisco. Barry Bonds went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* And the Texas Rangers beat the Seattle Mariners, 11-4 at the Kingdome in Seattle. This was the last series the Mariners played there, before moving into Safeco Field (now T-Mobile Park). Alex Rodriguez went 0-for-4. Ken Griffey Jr. did not play.

May 15, 1993: San Antonio's Texas-Sized White Elephant

May 15, 1993: The Alamodome opens in San Antonio. The 64,000-seat facility was intended to be a larger home for the NBA's San Antonio Spurs, and to attract an NFL franchise.

It had been built because San Antonio, from the 1980s onward, has been one of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in America. And the existing Alamo Stadium, built in 1940 and seating 18,000 (with an additional 14,000 temporary seats), proved unsuitable for use by the San Antonio Wings of the World Football League in 1974 and 1975, and the San Antonio Gunslingers of the United States Football League in 1984 and 1985. So the Alamodome was an improvement, and predictions that the NFL was coming seemed pretty good.

Well, in 1993, the NFL gave its 1995 expansion teams to Charlotte and Jacksonville. In 1994, the 2 Los Angeles teams moved, the Rams to St. Louis and the Raiders back to Oakland. In 1995, the Cleveland Browns moved to Baltimore. In 1996, the Houston Oilers began the process of moving to Nashville. In 2002, Houston got a new team. And, that same year, the Spurs moved into a modern arena, after winning their 2nd NBA Championship at the Alamodome.

The Houston Oilers played 2 preseason exhibition games there in 1993 and 1994. The Dallas Cowboys were the opponent for 1 of those 1993 games. They played each other in the 1995 preseason. The New Orleans Saints, having played a preseason game there against the Minnesota Vikings in 2001, played 3 "home games" there in 2005, after Hurricane Katrina left the Superdome unusable for that season.

The NCAA has hosted the Final Four there in 1998, 2004, 2008 and 2018, and will again in 2025; and the Women's Final Four in 2002, 2010 and 2021. The Canadian Football League's brief U.S. experiment put the San Antonio Texans there for the 1995 season.

The stadium has hosted the annual Alamo Bowl ever since. It's hosted the Big 12 Conference Championship Game in 1997, 1999 and 2007; and the Conference USA Championship Game in 2021, and it is scheduled to do so again in 2022. And, on the TV show Coach, fictional Minnesota State won the 1993 National Championship there.

The University of Texas at San Antonio, a school in the NCAA's Football Championship Subdivision (FCS, what used to be known as "Division I-AA"), began playing there in 2011. It's been home to the Arena Football League's San Antonio Talons from 2012 to 2014, and the Alliance of American Football's San Antonio Commanders in 2019.

Setup for UTSA football

Mexico's national soccer team played 2 games there in 2004, another in 2014, and was beaten by the U.S. team in 2015, to date the only game the U.S. men's team has played there. The U.S. women's team also played a game there in 2015. Mexico played there again in 2017. Several Mexican club teams have played there.

The International Hockey League's San Antonio Dragons played a few home games there in the 1996-97 and 1997-98 season. Baseball has even been played there, Spring Training games by the Texas Rangers from 2013 to 2017, although the artificial turf field is bad, and the right field fence is only 272 feet from home plate. So, if San Antonio ever gets a Major League Baseball team, they will not be playing in the Alamodome.

The building remains a "white elephant." It’s beginning to look like the NFL will never put a team there, either moved or expansion. As I said, MLB isn't going to play there. And the current plan for a proposed Major League Soccer expansion team is for them to use a smaller, soccer-specific stadium.

(UPDATE: The United Football League's San Antonio Brahmas began play there in 2023.)

*

May 15, 1993 was a Saturday. These Major League Baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 4-3 at Yankee Stadium. Mélido Pérez outpitched Al Leiter. Mike Stanley went 3-for-4 with 2 RBIs. Don Mattingly was injured, and did not play. Paul Molitor went 0-for-4.

* The New York Mets lost to the Montreal Expos, 2-1 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal. Chris Nabholz outpitched Bret Saberhagen.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 5-3 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. Greg Maddux outpitched David West. Mark Lemke hit a home run for the Braves, and Darren Daulton hit one of the Phils. This result would be reversed in the National League Championship Series.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Colorado Rockies, 5-3 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Baltimore Orioles, 5-3 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Cal Ripken went 1-for-4.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 14-5 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 9-5 at Milwaukee County Stadium. Greg Vaughn hit 2 home runs. Robin Yount, in his last season, went 0-for-2 with a walk.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Boston Red Sox, 7-4 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis.

* The Florida Marlins beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 8-0 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis. Ryan Bowen pitched a 6-hit shutout.

* The Texas Rangers beat the Chicago White Sox, 6-4 at Arlington Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas. Rafael Palmeiro hit a home run in the bottom of the 11th to win it, driving Iván Rodríguez in ahead of him. The former was eventually proven to be a steroid cheat, and the latter has long been suspected of it.

* The Houston Astros beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 7-1 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* The San Francisco Giants beat the San Diego Padres, 3-0 at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego. Trevor Wilson (4 hits over 7 1/3rd innings), Dave Righetti (2/3rds) and Rod Beck (1) combined for a 4-hit shutout.

* The California Angels beat the Kansas City Royals, 5-3 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). George Brett, in his last season, went 1-for-4.

* And the Oakland Athletics beat the Seattle Mariners, 2-1 at the Oakland Coliseum. Rickey Henderson went 1-for-3 with 2 walks. Ken Griffey Jr. went 1-for-3 with a walk.

There were 3 games in the NBA Playoffs:

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, 96-90 at The Coliseum outside Cleveland in Richfield, Ohio. Michael Jordan scored 32 points.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Seattle SuperSonics, 97-79 at The Summit in Houston. (It's now the Central Campus of televangelist Joel Osteen's Lakewood Church.)

* And the San Antonio Spurs beat the Phoenix Suns, 111-96 at the HemisFair Arena in San Antonio.

There was 1 game in the Stanley Cup Playoffs: The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the St. Louis Blues, 6-0 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

And the FA Cup Final was played at the old Wembley Stadium in London. North London team Arsenal and Yorkshire team Sheffield Wednesday played to a 1-1 draw. A replay was scheduled for the following Thursday, and Arsenal won it, 2-1. The rules were changed, so that, if the game ends in a draw, there would be extra time; if still level, penalty kicks.

March 30, 1998: A Black Coach Wins the Title at Kentucky

March 30, 1998: The University of Kentucky basketball team, coached by Orlando "Tubby" Smith and led by Nazr Mohammed and Jamaal Magloire, beats the University of Utah 78-69 at the Alamodome in San Antonio, which is also where the Final Four will be held this weekend.

Smith played at High Point College in North Carolina (it became "High Point University" in 1991), but was never an NBA prospect. He went into coaching, first as a high school head coach in his native Southern Maryland, then in the suburbs of Charlotte, North Carolina.

He became an assistant coach in college, including under Rick Pitino at Kentucky, alongside Billy Donovan, who went on to win National Championships at the University of Florida. In 1991, Smith was named head coach at the University of Tulsa, and in 1995 at the University of Georgia. Twice and Tulsa and once at Georgia, he got his team to the NCAA Tournament's Sweet 16.

Pitino led Kentucky to the National Championship in 1996, and reached the Final but lost in 1997. He then left to accept the head job of the Boston Celtics, and Smith was hired, the 1st black head coach at the school that long seemed to stand for white supremacy in college basketball.

Smith got the Wildcats into the NCAA Final with a 34-4 record. They lost to Number 1 Arizona, who had beaten them in the previous year's Final, in a Thanksgiving weekend tournament in Hawaii. Their other losses were all at home at Rupp Arena in Lexington: By 3 points to arch-rival Louisville; to Florida; and to the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss).

They won the Southeastern Conference regular-season title, blazed through the SEC Tournament; and, in the NCAA Tournament, beat South Carolina State, easily beat St. Louis University, crushed Number 19 UCLA, edged Number 3 Duke, and beat Number 10 Stanford in overtime to get to the Final.

Coached by Rick Majerus (who was considerably tubbier than Tubby Smith), Utah made the Final Four for the 4th time, but the 1st since 1966. They had won the National Championship in 1944, but not since, while Kentucky had won it 7 times.

Utah jumped out ahead, and led 41-31 at the half. But, as they had in their last 2 games in the Tournament, the "Comeback Cats" came back, and won the game, 78-69. Jeff Sheppard was named the Tournament's Most Outstanding Player.

For Kentucky, whose old-time coach Adolph Rupp had been seen since the 1960s as a protector of white supremacy in college basketball, to be coached by a black man to a National Championship, was considered a very big deal.

This was the 4th time that Kentucky won the title in a year ending in an 8, having also done so in 1948, 1958 and 1978. It would turn out to be the 6th time the Yankees won the World Series in a year that Kentucky won basketball's National Championship (1949, 1951, 1958, 1978, 1996 and 1998).

Smith led Kentucky back to the Elite Eight in 1999, 2003 and 2005; and to the SEC Championship in 2000, 2001, 2003 and 2005. But he couldn't get them back to the Final Four, and UK's "blue blood" fans got frustrated. Some UK fans went as far as to place "for sale" signs on his front lawn. I'd like to think they would have done the same thing to a similarly struggling white coach.

In 2007, Smith was offered a lifeline, the head coaching job at the University of Minnesota, and took it, leaving Kentucky. Things settled down, and he was elected to UK's Athletic Hall of Fame in 2013. He coached at Minnesota until 2013, then at Texas Tech for 3 years, then at the University of Memphis for 2 years.

In 2018, he was named head coach at his Alma Mater, High Point University, lasting 4 years, long enough to raise enough money to build them a new arena, the 4,500-seat Qubein Center, with its playing surface named for Tubby and his wife: The Tubby and Donna Smith Court. In 2022, he retired, turning the job over to his son, G.G. Smith, who had previously coached at Loyola University Maryland in Baltimore.

*

March 30, 1998 was, like most NCAA basketball Finals in the modern era, a Monday. The NBA had no games scheduled. Major League Baseball opened its regular season the next day. Football was out of season. There were 5 games in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers lost to the Tampa Bay Lightning, 3-1 at Madison Square Garden.

* The Boston Bruins lost to the Colorado Avalanche, 4-1 at the FleetCenter (now the TD Garden) in Boston.

* The Los Angeles Kings beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-2 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* The St. Louis Blues beat the San Jose Sharks, 6-2 at the Kiel Center (now the Enterprise Center) in St. Louis.

* And the Edmonton Oilers beat their Provincial arch-rivals, the Calgary Flames, 3-1 at the Edmonton Coliseum (as the Northlands Coliseum was then known).