Podcast: Let’s Talk About the 25 Most Philly Athletes

Roundtable: The 25 Most Philly Athletes of All Time / Photo-illustration by Neil Jamieson

Since publishing Philly Mag’s 25 Most Philly Athletes of All Time last month, there has been a ton of chatter about the athletes that did (and did not) make the list. Recently, staff writer Malcolm Burnley invited Philly Mag executive editor Bradford Pearson and Olivia Kram, digital media marketing and community manager for Citizen Media Group (all three of whom contributed to the list), to discuss how they felt about the list now and what feedback they’d received. From universal acceptance of Allen Iverson at the number one spot, to the controversy of including a horse, Malcolm, Brad and Olivia dug into the difficult task of defining what makes a Philadelphia athlete a Philly athlete.

Malcolm Burnley: I’m Malcolm Burnley, a staff writer for the Philadelphia Citizen and joining me for this special roundtable discussion on Philly Mag Today, we have Bradford Pearson, executive editor of Philly Mag. And we also have Olivia Kram, digital media marketing and community manager for the Citizen Media Group. I’m super excited to get into this. We all contributed in various ways.

It’s not easy to define what is quintessentially Philly about an athlete, or the Phillyness of an athlete, you know, if it’s someone born here, played here, embodies the spirit of the city. And so Brad, I thought we should start with you.

Bradford Pearson: I think this is a city that expects a lot of its athletes and because of that we’re going to give you the best home crowds, and if you buy into that, we’re going to support you no matter what. And I think that initial tension when people come to town shows there is a learning curve.

Olivia Kram: Yeah, I don’t know how Philly it is to go on TikTok and talk about drinking raw milk.

Burnley: Oh, man. So Bryce Harper was not on the list. Spoiler. Brad, have you heard any consistent complaints with what you put together?

Pearson: I think the biggest complaint so far is that people don’t think Smarty Jones should be on the list. It’s like, okay, you know, there’s still a jockey on top of that horse. It’s still an athlete that the city fell in love with. Broadly speaking, I have been getting some emails about teams or individuals that should be on the list that didn’t make it, like the Mighty Macs from back in the ’70s, who won a bunch of championships, and then the Villanova championship team from the ’80s. But I’m not going to put Villanova on the list because I went to St Joe’s.

Burnley: All right, Olivia, go defend your man. Defend John Kruk as number four.

Kram: I will get to Kruk in a second, but I want to speak to the Smarty Jones thing because that is where we’ve been seeing the most conversations on social media. And I just want to note that when I was a kid, Smarty Jones was having a Smarty Jones moment and I was seeing people with Smarty Jones hats on. And I don’t think that’s really common for racehorses. I’m not a big race person, but I will say Smarty Jones is cemented in my brain in a way that no other racehorse will ever be.

And I don’t really think I need to defend Kruk. Folks who know me will know I have been a champion of Kruk for quite some time. It has a lot to do with his personality after retiring. He was certainly a huge personality during his playing career. I mean, he was parodied on SNL. You don’t get parodied on SNL if you’re a nobody. I feel like he belongs on this list because he’s still around, and I don’t know how many players are still around in the way that he is. He is as much of a part of the Philadelphia Phillies today as he was when he was playing. And that’s a huge, huge accomplishment, and a huge note to just how Philly he is. He’s just won the hearts of Philadelphians everywhere with his yapping.

Pearson: So Malcolm, I’m gonna flip this and ask you about Dawn Staley. You wrote about her and I feel like there’s some sexism in the response to people saying that she should be lower on the list. So I’m wondering when you were writing about her, what did you want to try to capture with what Dawn means to the city?

Burnley: Yeah, I think she’s very appropriately ranked on our list, or, you know, you could always move her up or down maybe a couple of spots. What I really wanted to capture was how insanely special and how much she was kind of a folk hero, even before going to Virginia and going to the Final Fours.

And now so many people know her as really a face, if not probably the second-most famous face in women’s basketball, behind Caitlin Clark. They know her as this incredible coach, but just as an athlete on her own, she’s deserving in that spot.

And I’m happy Iverson is at number one. Iverson seems to represent a style of athlete that is both quintessentially Philly, but also someone who really isn’t interested in corporate sponsorships necessarily.

Pearson: I feel like that era was the last era that the NBA had rough edges and he was clearly straddling eras in that he came in in the late ’90s, Jordan had already established what it meant to be not just a basketball player, but a brand. And I think that AI was obviously like a brand, but he did it in such a different way. I mean, you know, he changed the NBA, not just from a playing standpoint, but from a fashion standpoint, from a Blackness standpoint that was much different than the players that came before him.

Kram: I will say everyone I’ve talked to about this will give me their opinions, but every single one has been like, You’re right about AI. So to have the number one person we’ve put on this list be the one that everyone seems to be on the same page about speaks volumes to Iverson’s impact on the city.

Burnley: Yeah, so I thought it’d be fun maybe to talk about a favorite memory that you feel tied you to the city.

Kram: I kind of have two, and I’ll try to be quick about it, but the number one for me is the Philly Special. I think mostly because you couldn’t write a better sports movie with the narrative of the Philly Special. And it’s, I think, probably why it’s become the talk of documentaries now. But to have Nick Foles in the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl, he’s a backup. He’s a backup. There’s no way he’s going to be able to go up against Tom Brady, and to do the thing that Tom Brady couldn’t do just a few minutes earlier in the game with the Philly special is just incredible.

It really did feel like the moment of, oh shit, we might actually be able to win this thing.

I think the other one that I wanted to note is the standing ovation that Trea Turner got. Because I do think the general reputation of Philly’s fans, not just baseball, but all of our sports, is that we are nasty and that we are kind of difficult to deal with. And I’m not saying that that’s not true. We wear that kind of as a badge of honor. But I think the standing ovation moment really speaks to the duality amongst our fans and the ability to embrace our players and choose a more positive path.

Pearson: So one of mine didn’t make the list, and nor should it, because it’s a personal memory. So I was on campus at St. Joe’s when Jameer Nelson and Delonte West led the team to the undefeated regular season. And it was just one of the most bizarre couple months to spend on a college campus, because you had this really small school in West Philly that all of a sudden became the epicenter of the college basketball universe. And for me, I remember specifically the last game that St. Joe’s played before the Atlantic 10 tournament. So the last regular season game was a home game, and if they won it, they would have the first undefeated regular season in decades in college basketball.

I remember, I didn’t have tickets and a bunch of us were about to watch the game, and one guy on the team gets a call from somebody at the St. Joe’s pep band, and they say, “Hey, we’re going to prop open the back door of the fieldhouse, and you guys can all come in.” We ran and snuck into the back and were able to watch St. Joe’s have this undefeated regular season for the first time any college team had that in decades.

Burnley: I have chills hearing that! And you know, I wasn’t in Philly at the time, but I remember how special that team was and just how cool that story was. And if I pick one real quick, I was gonna say I did go to a Catholic League championship game at the Palestra, and this was Colin Gillespie, who’s now in the NBA, and then went to, you know, Villanova, and won a championship.

There he was playing, I believe for Archbishop Wood, I believe is the school he went to, and they’re playing Neumann Goretti in the championship. And I can’t remember the guard, but Gillespie won, and just kind of totally outshined him. I felt like I discovered Collin Gillespie, though I had nothing to do with it.

Pearson: These are the kinds of moments that aren’t going to make a list, maybe, but are what connect Philadelphia fans like very few other cities in America.

Kram: We ride so hard for our sports and our players. I can’t tell you how many weddings I’ve been to where it’s on a Sunday and there’s a projection screen with the game on. I’ve been to at least five weddings that have had either a Phillies game or an Eagles game on — including my own!

Burnley: I think we’ll maybe have a few kind of final thoughts, and then wrap up here. I think it’s been a really fun, awesome conversation. Do we have any strong feelings or predictions for current Philly athletes?

Pearson: I mean, for me, I think the answer is in the Sixers back court, right? Like, I think that Edgecombe in just one season has basically gone from being like, “Oh, he might be good” to being just endeared by the city.

Kram: Yeah, that’s a good one. My mom has a habit of finding Philly athletes that she loves so much that she says, I’d like to bake a pie for him. Big Edgecombe energy — my mom would definitely love to make a pie for him.

I think for me, someone that didn’t make the list, that I think 10 years from now will is Brandon Graham. He’s a legend. I mean, with the age he is putting his body through what he’s putting it through — for the love of the game? He retired, saw that the Eagles were having a hard time and came back to be a leader. I look forward every year to the mic’d up clips of his trash talking. I think that his love for the city is so apparent.

And maybe I’m jinxing it by saying it, but my prediction for the next Phillies season is that Kyle Schwarber is going to surpass Ryan Howard for most home runs hit in a year. He came so close last year, 56 versus 58. I think if he does that, he’s confirming that he is an all-time Philly legend.

Pearson: And Schwarber is the kind of guy where in your mind, you’re like, “Oh, that dude is super strong, but he also just kind of looks like a regular guy.” You know he goes to the weight room and stuff, but you see Bryce Harper, and you’re like, “Oh his body’s a temple” — other than the raw milk. Schwarber is a … Wawa spokesman.

Kram: Oh, yeah, I’ve seen dudes that look like Schwarber, in every corner of Philadelphia. In fact, I was at Philly Mag’s Wine and Dine event and Malcolm, I kept saying to you, “Is that Kyle Schwarber?” And it was just some guy.

Burnley: I thought it was! I’m still not sure it wasn’t him. And I’ll cap off the conversation by totally cheating and choosing whoever the star player on the WNBA team is.

Pearson: Forward thinking!

Burnley: All right, I guess we can maybe wrap here. Again, I want to encourage everyone listening to go read The 25 Most Philly Athletes. I mean, it’s such an interesting diversity of athletes. We had Stevie Williams, the skateboarder; Randall “Tex” Cobb, the boxing legend. And even names I might have been skeptical about going in, but the writing really convinced me.

Pearson: Wait, who were you skeptical of?

Kram: If you say John Kruk, we’re going to have some problems.

Burnley: I would say Smarty Jones. But in the end you convinced me!

Pearson: Well, I encourage you, or any listeners out there to continue emailing me with your complaints.

Burnley: Well, great. I’m so glad we got a chance to get together and have this conversation. Super, super fun. And once again, the story is The 25 Most Philly Athletes Of All Time. And I just want to say, Brad, Olivia, thanks so much for coming on.