It should surprise no one that Tony Gonzalez did his pre-NFL draft workouts at Huntington Beach High School. After all, that's where the future Pro Bowl selection was a first-team All American at tight end and linebacker as well as an Orange County and Sunset League MVP in basketball.
Gonzalez lettered in football, baseball and basketball, reminding me of a couple NFL Hall of Famers who did the same in my high school's league: Anthony Munoz (of Chaffey High School in Ontario) and Ronnie Lott (of Eisenhower in Rialto). If memory serves, Lott also wrestled. But Gonzalez can hold this over those guys: he shared Orange County High School Athlete of the Year honors with a fellow named Tiger Woods.
Which brings us to the twilight of Gonzalez's fine NFL career and a surprise about who worked him out before the 1997 draft.
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Troy Aikman, the CBS football commentator who starred at quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys and UCLA, tweeted the following Wednesday:
Why the trip down memory lane? Aikman's colleague at CBS Sports, Jason La Canfora, had reported earlier in the day on interest from playoff contenders in Gonzalez's services. The tight end currently plays with the 1-4 Atlanta Falcons, who he has said he wants to finish his career with, but a trade might help his team as well as his rumored destinations: the Baltimore Ravens, New England Patriots or his old team, the surprising, 5-0 Kansas City Chiefs.
“It's all going to be in Tony's court,” La Canfora observes.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.