He was one of the nation’s top two-sport athletes in the mid-1970s. At 5-8, he had to prove he could play running back in the rugged Pacific-10 Conference and that he possessed the power to play the outfield in baseball. Furthermore, he had the fortitude to leave his home in Corvallis and become a star at Oregon.

In football, he paced Oregon in rushing three straight seasons, averaged 8.1 yards per carry as a sophomore and gained more than 1,000 yards as a junior, only the second in the school’s history to surpass that figure at the time. As a three-year starter and all-conference performer in baseball, he finished with seven career records, including hits, runs batted in and stolen bases. He batted .315 for his career and was drafted by the San Diego Padres after his Oregon career.