Sports blog information from USA TODAY.
Who has intercepted the most passes from Saints quarterbacks? Hall of Famers like Ronde Barber, Rod Woodson, and Ronnie Lott have haunted them over the years:
We’re continuing our series on the New Orleans Saints’ all-time greatest opponents by shifting attention to defense, thanks to StatMuse. This time we’re looking at the best ballhawks to suit up against New Orleans — a list that includes Pro Football Hall of Famers like Ronde Barber, Ronnie Lott, and Rod Woodson, along with some other annoyingly effective defensive backs.
Let’s get to it, sorting by total interceptions and then return yards:
“He pushes me. To know that he’s an athlete and he knows what it takes to make it, it’s huge. He’s a great support system.”
SAN DIEGO – Michael Herrera is making his PGA Tour debut Wednesday at the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines. It’s the course where he first attended a tournament and watched Tiger Woods.
“After I saw it, I’m like I want to play,” he said. “I want to do this for a living and it inspired me.”
Herrera’s local-boy-makes-good story is an easy one to love but that barely scratches the surface of his story in golf. It turns out Herrera’s story has way more to it.
Ronnie Lott remembers the tee shot.
He was playing in Cedric the Entertainer’s Celebrity Golf Classic, a charity golf tournament, in August 2021 and Herrera was stationed at a tee box on a par 5 to hit drives for the various teams. Lott, the Hall of Fame defensive back for the San Francisco 49ers, and his group couldn’t believe the sound one of Herrera’s drives made and the distance it traveled. Lott recalls the moments that followed in cinematic detail.
“It was that moment, where I was like, hey, kid, come talk to me, I want to know your story,” Lott recalled during a phone interview.
Herrera, 24, told Lott, about growing up in Moreno Valley, California, not far from where Lott, too, was raised (in Rialto), and how he gave up basketball, where he averaged more than 18 points per game in high school, to pursue making it as a professional golfer, primarily on the Advocates Pro Golf Association, a development tour designed to bring greater diversity to the game by developing African-Americans and other minorities for careers in golf. Lott was impressed and asked, “How are you paying for this? Who’s helping you?”
“Nobody,” said Herrera, who was working part-time at the cart barn of a golf course to pay tournament entry fees. “It’s just me and my Pops. We split everything.”
Lott couldn’t help but think of the shoulders that had helped him climb to such heights – Harry Edwards, the American sociologist and civil rights activist, and Charlie Young, former USC football star and 13-year NFL veteran – and was moved to do something he’d never done before.
“Why wouldn’t I help somebody that really loves something? Why wouldn’t I help somebody with a dream?” Lott said. “You always want people to stand on your shoulders to see success. And, you know, that’s the greatest thing you can do for another human being.”
Lott and Herrera exchanged numbers that day. He didn’t realize that one of the greatest to ever play the game of football was about to take him under his wing.
“I had to look him up and then I was like, ‘Wow, he’s big time,’ ” Herrera said. Less than two weeks later, Lott called and asked a very direct question: “How much do you need for the rest of the year?”
“That’s how it all started,” said Herrera. “I gave him a number and he said, ‘OK,’ and he sent me the Tracy Toyota logo (of the car dealership that Lott owns) to get some shirts and hats made along with a check. It was such a relief. I play so much freer now.”
Lott also connected Herrera with agent Sandy Sandoval, whose clients include Patrick Reed, and helped him add a slew of logos to his shirt.
After every tournament round, Herrera texts Lott a report and Lott always asks, “What do you have to do to get better?” Among Lott’s advice that’s stuck with Herrera is to be in the moment and be grateful for the moment.
“He pushes me,” Herrera said. “To know that he’s an athlete and he knows what it takes to make it, it’s huge. He’s a great support system.”
Herrera’s support system extends beyond Lott to Allison Keller, the PGA Tour’s chief administrative officer, who has hosted him during tournaments in the Jacksonville, Florida, area, and teared up when Herrera and fellow APGA pro Joseph Dent left “a sweet note” and Starbucks card as a thank you.
“He’s got personality plus,” she said. “I think he’ll make it in golf but if he doesn’t I’d love to hire him at the PGA Tour.”
Truth be told, Herrera’s first love is basketball. He says he was a good enough point guard to play Division I in college but didn’t have the grades.
“UC-Irvine wanted me,” he said.
He ended up playing hoops at Riverside City College until basketball coach Phil Mathews got a look at his golf ability. Mathews saw raw promise and he sat Herrera down and told him he could keep playing basketball, but he wasn’t going to be great at it. But he could be great at golf.
Mathews said he was going to cut Herrera for his own good, and introduced him to APGA founder Ken Bentley, his former college roommate at UC-Irvine. After Bentley, a former Nestle executive, played a round with Herrera at Wilshire Country Club, he offered him a spot in an APGA Tour event as an amateur, and Herrera bagged a top-10 finish. With the encouragement of the likes of veteran pro Kevin Hall, who played college golf at Ohio State and told Herrera he had enough game to chase the dream, Herrera turned pro in 2019.
“My game stacked up, and I thought, man, maybe there’s something here,” he said.
He enjoyed his best year yet in 2022, including his maiden APGA victory in April when he made birdie at 18 at TPC Scottsdale to win by a stroke. (He flamed out at the second stage of Korn Ferry Tour Q-School and has only conditional status on PGA Tour Latinoamerica and PGA Tour Canada this season.) It was Mathews who had the privilege of informing his former player that he would be receiving a PGA Tour exemption at Torrey Pines.
“To have an exemption into any event would be amazing just to see where my game is at at that level,” Herrera said before receiving the news of his Farmers start.
I'm excited to share that I've received an exemption to play in the 2023 @FarmersInsOpen! It's a dream come true to not only get my first-ever PGA TOUR start, but to have it happen where I attended my first PGA TOUR tournament as a kid. Thanks to @WeAreFarmers for the opportunity https://t.co/JvdSaxkg4a
— Michael Herrera (@Mik3_love14) December 5, 2022
As a kid, Herrera would drive pass Cottonwood Golf Center, a nine-hole, 1,226-yard, par-28 municipal course in his hometown on the way to the mall and to basketball practice. He remembers seeing all that grass and pleading with his dad, Hugo, who emigrated from Guatemala as a teenager, to take him there.
“Golf is a rich man’s sport,” his father said.
But at age 10, after seemingly the 100th time he asked to go to the golf course, his father finally gave in, and they took up the game together. There were tears of joy when Herrera broke the news to his dad that he would be playing against the likes of Jon Rahm, Justin Thomas and Collin Morikawa in the Farmers Insurance Open.
“It’s just one more step,” Herrera’s dad said. “It’s just the beginning.”
That he’s come this far is all the more remarkable given that Herrera never had a coach until his second year as a pro. His clubs were purchased from a barrel at a Roger Dunn Golf Shop. Thanks to the APGA, he was fitted for clubs by Callaway and started receiving professional instruction. He’s a late bloomer, but Lott believes the best is yet to come.
“I tell him to keep grinding, and I hope he continues to dream,” Lott said. “I have this thing I live by — exhaust every moment. And I love the fact that that’s what I’m seeing with Michael. He’s exhausting every moment. And you know, that’s all you can ask from a human being.”
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The former San Francisco 49ers is the latest athlete to show support for the developmental tour.
When Ronnie Lott was a rookie in the NFL, legendary players like Deacon Jones and Jim Brown helped him grow and develop a career that lasted 14 seasons and earned him 10 Pro Bowl selections, four Super Bowl titles and a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Now Lott is returning the favor to an up-and-coming minority golfer. The former defensive back for the San Francisco 49ers is sponsoring Michael Herrera, a player on the APGA Tour, a developmental tour for minority professional golfers. Lott will cover travel and competition-related expenses for Herrera, who won the APGA Tour season opener in January. In return, Herrera will wear a logo for Lott’s Tracy Toyota during competition.
The two met back in August at the Eighth Annual Cedric “The Entertainer” Celebrity Golf Classic Presented by Lexus on the second tee at Spanish Hills Country Club in Camarillo, California.
“He was real interested in my story and he sees that I have the work ethic needed to give making the PGA Tour my best shot,” said Herrera via a release. “Ronnie Lott cares about diversity and he is interested in the success of the APGA Tour.”
The former defensive back, whose All Stars Helping Kids non-profit has raised $20 million for disadvantaged youth, isn’t the first athlete to support the APGA. Billy Horschel hosted an APGA event at TPC Sawgrass – won by Willie Mack – and Cameron Champ’s foundation is working on fundraising opportunities with the tour.
The APGA Tour continues later this month with the Farmers Insurance Fall Series, which began September 20-22 with APGA Tour Valley Forge. Next up is the APGA Tour Farmers Insurance Atlanta Championship, Oct. 17-19 at White Oak Golf Club at the Clubs of Peachtree City in Atlanta. The series concludes with the APGA Tour Farmers Insurance Fall Series Finale, Nov. 7-9 at Wilshire Country Club in Los Angeles.
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San Francisco 49ers legend Ronnie Lott recently reflected on his matchups with the New York Giants and his dust-up with QB Phil Simms.
Ronnie Lott is a Pro Football and College Hall of Fame defensive back whose career was so legendary it’s difficult to begin listing his accomplishments.
Lott is four-time Super Bowl champion (all with the San Francisco 49ers) and 10-time Pro Bowler. His mark on the game of football is indelible to the point where he has a trophy named after him.
The Lott IMPACT Award is handed out annually to the college football defensive IMPACT player of the year. IMPACT stands for many of the traits Lott brought to the game: Integrity, Maturity, Performance, Academics, Community, and Tenacity.
With the 49ers back in the Super Bowl, Lott sat down with Steve Serby of the New York Post this week and divulged some stories about his classic battles with the New York Giants.
Lott had a famous 1990 confrontation with Giants’ quarterback Phil Simms after the Niners aced out the Giants, 7-3, on Monday Night Football. A misconception about Simms’ opinion of him falsely conveyed by ex-Giant Jim Burt started it all.
“He didn’t understand why I decided to get so ballistic,” Lott said of the postgame face-to-face confrontation with Simms. “I threw a tantrum towards him. I didn’t know that Phil felt that way about me, but as we all learned in life, Phil didn’t say that, it was Jim Burt being Jim Burt getting me fired up.”
“He (Simms) looked at me, ‘What the heck are you doing (laugh)? Why are you acting like this?’ But the great thing that I love is that after the whole incident, he comes into the locker room and said to me, ‘I never would have said anything.’ For him to walk in our locker room, after that game, and then say what he said, showed me how great a human being he is.”
Later that season, the Giants would beat the 49ers, 15-13, in the NFC Championship Game. Simms did not play in that game as he was sidelined by a broken bone in his foot.
Serby also asked Lott about the famous 1986 play in which Giants tight end Mark Bavaro took him and several of his teammates for a ride at Candlestick Park.
“I think of being pulled on a slip and slide,” Lott said of what is was like to try to tackle Bavaro. “I had to redeem myself and had to hit him like George Foreman.”
Lott also spoke about Lawrence Taylor, who he said makes him feel 22 every time they meet. He also described what is was like to prepare for those tough Giants teams of the 1980s.
“The game was gonna be a fourth-quarter game. You want to try to beat ’em before you got into the fourth quarter. Coach [Bill] Parcells and his staff were really good at managing time in the fourth quarter. They were very disciplined about how to win games in the fourth quarter,” he said.
Lott is right. The Giants played the 49ers in the postseason five times during Lott’s tenure in San Fran with the Giants winning three. So much for the ‘Team of the 80s.”
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Playing through pain in the NFL: The most courageous performances
After Philadelphia quarterback Josh McCown played with a torn hamstring last week, Touchdown Wire looks at others who’ve played through pain
Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Josh McCown was visibly limping throughout the second half of his team’s wild-card playoff loss to Seattle. Now, we know why.
According to multiple reports, McCown was playing with a torn hamstring. The injury reportedly happened in the second quarter. McCown is 40 and was coaxed out of retirement by the Eagles at the start of the season to serve as the backup to Carson Wentz.
McCown entered the game in the first quarter after Wentz suffered a concussion. Philadelphia did not have an active third quarterback, so McCown stayed in the game. He played fairly well, completing 18 of 24 passes for 174 yards, but was sacked six times.
McCown isn’t the first player to keep playing through a painful injury and he won’t be the last. Here’s a look at nine other players who continued playing through serious injuries:
In a Sept. 26, 2004 game against the Jaguars, the Tennessee Titans quarterback suffered a bruised sternum. McNair spent two nights in the hospital, but returned to play in five more games before finally agreeing to have surgery.
