HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS

      BY High was a small school but we did participate in all of the major sports being played at that time: football, basketball, baseball, tennis, track, and even wrestling.  Dad had discouraged me from trying out for football noting how his knee injury while playing High School football had ended his participation in most sports. He said it wasn’t worth the risk!

      Our school had an abundance of great basketball players. We had won several state championships. I was good, but evidently not good enough. I got cut from the team during tryouts. Wrestling was definitely not for me. The idea of hugging up against a sweat-covered male body and squirming around contorted on a wrestling mat held no attraction.

BASEBALL

      Baseball was a natural fit. I had done well in Little League and Pony League, and would do well in High School. I started as a freshman. Our coach was Frank Arnold. As well as coaching baseball and basketball, Coach Arnold was the coach for most of the boys' PE classes. He would later coach BYU's basketball team during the Danny Ainge years. 
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Coach Frank Arnold

     Coach Arnold put me on third base. I was a great infielder and had a strong enough arm to make the throw to first. My friends, Dick Thomas, Kent Peterson, and others I had previously played baseball with were all doing great, and we were having fun once again.

     At practice my hitting and fielding were better than ever. Then it happened. One afternoon during a preseason game, I was stealing third base, running hard, it was going to be close. The catcher caught the ball and fired it to third for the tag. I slid in low feet first in a cloud of red dust. I heard a loud crack. The ump called, Safe! The third base coach yelled, Time Out! Pain shot up my arm. 

     Quickly assessing what had happened I discovered a new joint between my elbow and wrist. It was a compound fracture bent at a ninety degree angle. Up to this point in my young life I had considered myself unbreakable. I had felt pain before but nothing like this! With every beat of my heart a jolt of screaming pain ignited in my arm as I sat on the curb waiting for Mom to pick me up and run me to the Emergency Room at the hospital.

      It seemed like forever before Roscoe Nelson, our family doctor and a close friend of Dad’s, made it to the hospital to put me out before setting the bones. Coming out of the anesthesia I was happy to see my forearm straight and looking somewhat normal. Before going under I had wondered if my arm would ever be the same. Dr. Nelson said it was a bad break and I would be in a cast for at least six months. Six months?!! There goes the baseball season along with some fun summer water sports.

LETTERMEN’S CLUB

    Since the break was in my left arm, I would now focus on Tennis. My arm finally healed, and for the next three years I made the tennis team and baseball team, and was good enough to letter in both.

Francis on the BY High Baseball team

 

     I was invited to join the Lettermen’s Club, a group of talented and well-toned athletes. I bought Phil Swenson’s Lettermen’s jacket and proudly displayed my baseball and tennis pins.

Unfortunately the jacket and pins were stolen from our team bus during a baseball game at Pleasant Grove High School. The jacket was probably burned in effigy during a Pleasant Grove High School Pep rally. They were tired of being beaten at every sport by a small, insignificant school like BY High. 

TENNIS

      During our senior year, Dave Beck and I were teamed up as doubles partners on our outstanding tennis team. We were not only good, but we were cool. You see, if you were really cool, you would carry around one or two Stan Smith, Jack Kramer, or Pancho Gonzales wooden rackets strung with cat gut strings, and locked down tight in a wooden brace.

     Our tennis team had qualified for the State Tournament in Salt Lake City. We had a great team anchored by our number one singles champs, Tom Schaerrer and Roger Porter. Another outstanding player, Dave Beck, was my doubles partner and our team captain.

Francis missed this photo because he was with the BY High baseball team playing in an important game.

      It turned out to be a scorching hot day, and felt even hotter on the University of Utah’s cement courts. Dave and I played two hard fought matches and came out on top. We were physically spent after five hours on the court. We were told that we had done our part well and were finished for the day. We wouldn’t know how our team had fared until all the singles and doubles matches were finished. Great, but what we needed at that moment was liquid and lots of it!

      We drove to a nearby A&W root beer stand and each ordered up a sweet gallon, and chugged down the ice cold liquid. With round bellies and rubber legs we returned to the courts. Evidently the State Tennis championship had ended in a tie, and of all things Dave and I would need to play a one-set tie breaker to determine the winner. It would have been nice to know about this before we had challenged each other to a root beer drinking contest!

      The final set began. Whop. Slosh, slosh, slosh. Whop. Slosh, slosh. Whop. Slosh. It didn’t take long watching us slosh around the court before everyone knew BY High would be taking home the second place trophy. Ah, but the root beer was so satisfying!

      Dave Beck was not only a great tennis player but also a good friend. Unfortunately he passed away suddenly a few years ago while playing tennis, the game he loved.

Friends in 2006 attending Dave Beck's funeral in American Fork, Utah. Left to right: David Clark, Paul Evans, Kent Peterson, Stewart Grow, Francis Rogers. Since this photo was taken, sadly Dave Clark has also passed away.

BOXING

      Frank Arnold couldn’t wait for his end of the year boxing tournament in PE. All boys would be paired up with equally weighted partners. He took special delight in pairing up two of the “Three Nephites,” George Taylor and I, in the lightweight division. The matches were made up of three 1-minute rounds with only pride on the line. They were held in the windowless, airless fourth floor attic of the Elementary building. The attic was located above BYU’s original third floor gym on the Lower Campus.

Boxing gloves and headgear

       After watching several matches where our friends were beating each other senseless, it was finally our turn. We suited up with head gear and gloves, and entered the fighting mat. I figured that since George and I were such good friends we would just dance around, throw a few jabs, and fake a good show. But evidently George had other plans. His first punch hit me so hard I thought I was going down for the count! It turned out to be a hard fought fight. We exchanged blow for blow, and somehow made it through the three rounds with our heads intact but our brains scrambled. At least mine was. The last time I had fought George was on the playground at Wasatch School in fifth grade, and he had definitely improved since then!