Our best ever?

Byline: Bob Clark The Register-Guard

Jordan Kent is in his first weekend of training camp with the Seattle Seahawks, in what could be termed the latest experiment by a National Football League team to find out if an athlete can be turned into a professional football player.

Here's another idea: If Kent turns out to be what the Seahawks envision, does he then merit consideration as the best male athlete to ever come out of a high school in this area?

It's difficult to top the accomplishments of Danny Ainge, the 1977 North Eugene graduate who went on to play at the top levels of two sports, in major-league baseball with the Toronto Blue Jays and in basketball with four teams in the NBA, after he was the national college player of the year in 1981 at Brigham Young.

In an attempt by The Register-Guard to bestow a mythical honor on an athlete who graduated from a high school in the newspaper's circulation area, there appear to be two contenders to Ainge, based on their accomplishments beyond high school:

Football and baseball player Chris Miller, a professional in both who walked off the diamond before some thought he should, and Kent, who only began playing football in the fall of 2005 for Oregon after making notable contributions in basketball and track and field on the collegiate level.

Disagree? That input - or agreement - is being encouraged in a poll at www.registerguard.com. The accompanying chart (see right) of our area's best athletes in specific sports - those in which the Oregon School Activities Association conducts championships - is also open to discussion.

Remember these two qualifications used in compiling these selections: The athletes needed to attend a high school in the circulation area of The Register-Guard, and the primary factor in weighing their accomplishments is what they did beyond high school.

There's certainly room for debate in picking the best in particular sports and the best all-around athlete. It encompasses vastly different eras, and all were considered. Going back in time, Bill Dellinger's times may not measure up to those of current runners, but there's no disputing his pair of NCAA titles of the '50s, nor his Olympic medal in 1964.

Pure numbers can't always be used for comparison, unless they're compared to contemporaries. No matter the number, Todd Christensen twice led the NFL in receptions.

In evaluating the multi-sporters, what Kent doesn't have that Ainge and Miller do is a record of success as a professional. That's where what he does with the Seahawks might prompt an update of this selection process in some future year.

With but two seasons of organized football in his background, can Kent make it in pro football?

`I still need to catch up, I know that,' Kent said of what he learned from the mini-camps and individual workouts he went through between being drafted in April and this weekend's opening of the Seattle training camp, with rookies having reported Thursday, and practice officially beginning today.

`They said I'm definitely a developmental guy and that they want to see where I'm going to be in a year or two,' Kent added. `But I understand that they can't give me a free pass to be on the roster. I need to show I can play this game.'

If it seems an unlikely turn to expect the most success in a sport that wasn't an athlete's primary activity, consider that Kent seems to be following the pattern of Ainge and Miller in that regard.

To play professional basketball, where he had a 14-year playing career, coached and remains an executive with the Boston Celtics, Ainge had to first get himself out of his baseball contract. Miller, now the director of Kidsports in Eugene, said `basketball was always my first love, and after that baseball,' and yet it was in football where he became an all-league quarterback for Oregon, was the 13th player selected in the NFL draft and played a decade as a professional.

It wasn't until his final year at Oregon that Kent concentrated on playing football. The previous school year he made his debut in football in the fall before rejoining the basketball team in the winter and then going to the track, and thus became the first UO male athlete since World War II to letter in three sports in the same academic year.

`I knew eventually I would have to make a decision, but I definitely missed basketball and track,' Kent said. `The experiences I had at Mac Court, at Hayward Field and at Autzen Stadium, those are all such special places that you can't trade that for anything.

`If you have the ability to do all three (sports), why not maximize your experience? Sure, there are always going to be those regrets, `what if I'd just stuck with one sport?' '

Except, what if Ainge or Miller had done that?

Ainge, also a good enough football player in high school that he had college teams interested in him as a wide receiver, did accept a basketball scholarship to BYU. But he then took advantage of a newly revised NCAA rule that allowed an athlete to be a professional in one sport and play for a college in another, and signed with the Blue Jays after being drafted as a high school senior.

While college basketball prevented Ainge from participating in spring training with the Blue Jays, he nonetheless was moved up through the minor leagues and to the majors by 1979, perhaps because Toronto was then a recent expansion team, or wanted to seduce Ainge into giving up basketball.

Instead, Ainge was the Wooden Award winner in 1981 as the top basketball player in college and, despite being bound by that baseball contract, was a second-round selection of the Boston Celtics. When the baseball strike shut down the sport that summer, Ainge was prompted to switch sports immediately rather than delay it any further.

`His dad and I still laugh about how it all went down,' said Bob Quinney, a Eugene attorney who represented Ainge in his dual negotiations with the Jays and Celtics.

With the strike halting baseball, the Ainges and Quinney snuck into Boston and enticed the Jays to send representatives for secret discussions. With the legendary Red Auerbach and other Boston officials on the second floor and the Blue Jays on the eighth, the Ainge contingent set up camp in between.

`We were up and down that elevator all day,' Quinney said.

The Blue Jays wanted about $1 million to let Ainge out of his deal, and Quinney argued for first-round money from the Celtics because his client would have gone that early, except for being tied to the baseball deal.

`Red Auerbach got so mad he threw down his cigar and started yelling at us,' Quinney said.

Eventually, Boston relented, Toronto and Ainge compromised on their demands, and it was off to the basketball court for Ainge, who would help the Celtics win two NBA titles.

For Miller, it was more a matter of determining football was his sport.

At Sheldon High School, he didn't turn out for football until his junior season, and then was the punter and backup quarterback. He had notable success as a senior but still said, `I would have gone and played basketball and baseball in college except I tweaked a knee in basketball.' The recruiting waned from suitors in that sport, while the Ducks and Oregon State, among others, offered a football scholarship.

`I took the bird in hand,' Miller said, and started for Oregon before the end of his true freshman season.

He later signed a baseball contract with the Seattle Mariners and spent two summers playing for minor-league teams, though a broken hand severely limited one of those seasons. Could he have reached the top level of pro baseball?

Yes, said Mel Krause, the former Oregon coach.

`He was a heck of a baseball player,' Krause said. `He could have been a major-league shortstop.'

Ainge was, though he was used primarily at second and third base by the Blue Jays. A comparison of Ainge and Miller as baseball players?

`I'd say they're pretty equal,' Krause said.

Miller said that because he had the broken hand his second season of pro baseball, `I wasn't able to evaluate the two (sports) fairly. ... I think I had the ability if I'd stuck with it ... but football was going pretty well.'

And what about basketball? Miller thinks of that sport often, and fondly.

`That's the one regret I have, that I didn't play college basketball, that I didn't get to play for Oregon in a game at Mac Court,' Miller said.

The offer was there once, from former UO coach Don Monson. Miller had to decline.

`I needed to stay (academically) eligible,' Miller said, laughing. `I'll be real.'

There are added hurdles for the multi-sport athlete, many of them related to the time commitment, whether for academics or to keep up with fellow competitors who concentrate on one activity.

`I know a lot of people are so determined to make it as a professional that they figure they can only do one sport, so they pick one sport and stick with it. Even then, it's hard to' make the top level of a sport, Kent said.

If he'd chosen one, could he have improved his shooting enough to interest the NBA? He had the athletic ability, and showed it as a rebounder and defender.

Would track as a full-time activity have allowed him to improve to world class in the long jump, where he went over 25 feet in high school? Or cut his times on the track to put him on the road to the Olympics?

There's no looking back for Kent.

`If you've got the ability to do it all, do it,' he said. `It's definitely worth it. What I'll take away from it is the memories of each sport, the people who were my teammates and the experiences we had together.

`That's so much more important to me than wondering if I hadn't played basketball, would I have been able to run (the 200 meters) in 20.1 instead of 20.5? If I had a chance to do it all over again the same way, I'd still do it all.'

DANNY AINGE

North Eugene, 1977

Basketball: Top college player in nation as senior at BYU in 1981; went on to play 14 seasons in the NBA after being second-round pick of Celtics, who won two titles with Ainge ...

Is currently the executive director of basketball for the Celtics

Baseball: Hit .220 in 211 games for Toronto Blue Jays from 1979 through '81, playing outfield and second base, third base and shortstop

CHRIS MILLER

Sheldon, 1983

Football: All-league quarterback for Ducks and set several school records; was first pick of Atlanta Falcons (13th overall) in 1986 who started 62 games in 10 seasons with Falcons, Rams and Broncos ... Is currently director of Kidsports

Baseball: Drafted by Seattle Mariners and played two seasons of minor-league baseball, the second cut short by a broken bone

JORDAN KENT

Churchill, 2002

Basketball: Started 24 games at UO and in each of three years won or shared award as top defender

Football: Second-leading receiver for Ducks in only second season of playing football, with 44 receptions; drafted in sixth round by Seahawks

Track and field: Won a West regional title in 200, anchored relay teams that won Pac-10 and scored at NCAA meets; top 10 all-time at UO in 100 and 200

VOTE ONLINE

Based on their accomplishments after high school, wouldn't one of this trio be the best all-around male athlete to ever come out of this area? Vote at www.registerguard.com/bestever