Caldwell County native Madison Bumgarner wins SI Sportsman of the Year
The Story
Caldwell County native Madison Bumgarner, who had two victories and a five-inning save in leading the San Francisco Giants past the Kansas City Royals to a World Series title, was named the 2014 Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year on Monday.
He’s gonna need a bigger trophy case…Madison Bumgarner, 2014 @SINow Sportsman of the year! #SFGiants pic.twitter.com/BbrqzGOHlo
— World Champs (@SFGiants) December 8, 2014
If you don’t know Caldwell County, it’s here:
The Facts
– Bumgarner, 25, the seventh MLB player, the fourth left-handed pitcher, the first Giants player and the first South Caldwell High Spartan to be honored.
– He has three World Series titles, a 4-0 Series record and holds Series marks for lowest ERA (0.25), fewest hits per nine innings (3.5) and fewest walks plus hits per inning (0.528).
– He is great in the regular season, too.
– Previous Sportsman winners include Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Muhammad Ali, LeBron James, Mike Krzyzewski, Joe Montana, Jack Nicklaus and Billie Jean King. None of them had Bumgarner’s breaking ball.
– Sports Illustrated dutifully played up the country boy aspect. The press release noted that Bumgarner’s 116-acre farm in Lenoir is 23 miles from Boone (Named for the pioneer Daniel Boone!) and 66 miles southwest of Mount Airy (inspiration for television’s Mayberry!).
– Sports Illustrated’s release did not mention that the farm is also 74 miles from Charlotte (nation’s second fastest-growing city!)
– A member of the C5 staff tried to see Bumgarner pitch when he came to the big city in high school for a state playoff game at West Mecklenburg. South Caldwell deemed Bumgarner unnecessary to beat West Meck. South Caldwell was right.
Quotes
Congrats to MadBum, @SInow’s Sportsman of the year. The epitome of a gamer for the @SFGiants this season. http://t.co/3tD8LUh3lR
— Ronnie Lott (@RonnieLottHOF) December 8, 2014
“The case can be made that he’s the best postseason pitcher of all-time.” – Paul Fichtenbaum, Time Inc. Sports Group Editor. (C5: And he’s from a small town!)
“It’s easy to mythologize the small-town sports hero. Madison Bumgarner isn’t the Sportsman of the Year because he’s from a tiny town, but that town goes a long way toward defining who he is and it gives his story a different texture from past Sportsmen.” – SI Managing Editor Chris Stone. (C5: And they have indoor plumbing!)
“The legend of Madison Bumgarner fits neatly in the space where we keep our idea of the archetypal outdoorsy, countrified man, where also reside the embellished, fictionalized Boone and Mayberry’s Sheriff Andy Taylor. It’s just that in Bumgarner’s case the stories are true.” – SI Senior Writer Tom Verducci. (C5: Don’t bring that archetypal stuff around here!)
C5’s Take:
Bumgarner was amazing in the World Series, and his might be the best performance by a Charlotte Metroplex-native athlete (wait, did you know he’s from a small town?) playing in a big city by the San Francisco Bay not named Stephen Curry. But can’t we come up with an angle that doesn’t need the word archetypal?
Photo: Matt Campbell / AP
This story was originally published December 9, 2014 at 1:14 AM with the headline "Caldwell County native Madison Bumgarner wins SI Sportsman of the Year."