Presidents Day on Monday, the national holiday for White House occupants through history, got us thinking about the leaders of distinction across the decades in Miami and South Florida major team sports.
Franchise owners, team executives and coaches — we’re talking everyone but players themselves. Who have been the most important, influential figures we’ve had, not counting athletes, all sports and all time?
There was a passing-of-the-baton quality to the timelines of the two men highest on our list, as Pat Riley was introduced in Miami by the Heat in September 1995, just a couple of months before Don Shula retired from the Dolphins.
I fancy myself something of a Miami sports historian, so I think I have a strong top 15 here. Then again, Presidents Day can’t seem to decide if there’s an apostrophe in there, so nothing is certain. (I would fight you on my first two, though).
Our top 15 non-athletes in Miami team sports history:
1. Pat Riley (Heat president, 1995-present; Heat coach, 1995-03, 2005-08): Riley was introduced aboard a cruise ship called Imagination, said he envisioned championship parades down Biscayne Boulevard — and delivered. It’s three NBA crowns under his guidance so far, and counting. Along the way the big-swinging Riley has traded for Alonzo Mourning and Shaquille O’Neal, drafted Dwyane Wade and signed LeBron James.
2. Don Shula (Dolphins coach, 1970-95): Back-to-back Super Bowl wins including the 1972 Perfect Season — still a never-duplicated, one-of-its-kind accomplishment. Most NFL coaching wins ever with 347 (274 with Fins).
3. Wayne Huizenga (Marlins owner, 1993-98; Panthers owner, 1993-2001; Dolphins owner, 1994-08): — The only man to be a major player in three SoFla franchises, Huizenga was the founding father and first owner of Marlins baseball and Panthers hockey. As Dolphins owner his teams made the playoffs eight times in 15 seasons (and have made the playoffs once in 13 years since).
4. Joe Robbie (Dolphins owner, 1966-89): A South Dakota lawyer, Robbie jumps at the chance to bring an AFL expansion team to Miami, and the rest is history. Ingenuity and his own money built the stadium that is Hard Rock today. Underappreciated, Robbie (and wife Elizabeth) also owned the NASL Miami Toros-turned-Fort Lauderdale Strikers, the seed for pro soccer in South Florida.
5. Erik Spoelstra (Heat coach, 2008-present): Miami’s all-time winningest coach and a two-time champion. A Riley protege who began as team’s video coordinator and rose through the ranks to recently be named among 15 greatest coaches in NBA history.
6. Joe Thomas (Dolphins director player personnel , 1966-71; VP 1979-82): Simply put, Thomas’ drafting in club’s expansion era left a windfall of talent for Shula to inherit. Bob Griese, Larry Csonka, Dick Anderson, Mercury Morris, Bill Stanfill, Jake Scott and Vern Den Herder all were Thomas finds. He also had one of steal deals of all time in trading for Larry Little.
7. Jimmy Johnson (Hurricanes football coach, 1984-88; Dolphins coach, 1996-99): At UM “J.J.” took over for Howard Schnellenberger and accelerated the Canes’ rise as a power, winning the national championship in 1987 and leaving talent to help win two more during the next four years. With the Dolphins, Johnson draft picks included Jason Taylor, Zach Thomas, Sam Madison, Patrick Surtain and Daryl Gardener.
8. Howard Schnellenberger (Dolphins offensive coordinator, 1975-78; Hurricanes coach, 1979-83; FAU football founder/coach 1998-2011): Schnellenberger will forever be the father of the Canes football dynasty as winner of UM’s first national championship in 1983. At FAU he started the program from scratch and left the school with an on-campuis stadium borne of his own initiative and tireless fundraising.
9. Micky Arison (Heat owner, 1995-present): Arison is the top dog always content to be in the background, itself a revelation. His first hire as owner was Pat Riley. Credit his quiet leadership for building the most consistently competitive sports franchise in this market.
10. Dave Dombrowski (Marlins general manager, 1993-2001): Dombrowski orchestrated the cub’s best years, hiring Jim Leyland and forming the team that won the ‘97 World Series. After a mandated fire sale and rebuild, the team’s 2003 championship after he left featured mostly Dombrowski’s players.
11. David Beckham (Inter Miami president/part owner, 2020-present): Miami begins its third season In Major League Soccer this Saturday, but Beckham’s perseverance had been ongoing since 2014, through stadium delays and layers of Miami politics. Team hasn’t won enough its first two seasons, but Beckham’s commitment and brand foment optimism.
12. Ron Fraser (Hurricanes baseball coach, 1963-92): Fraser took over a fledgling, dying program with no money, no uniforms and no scholarships and transformed it into a power. The “Wizard of College Baseball” won two national titles and as a master promoter realized the construction of the program’s on-campus stadium.
13. Sam Jankovich (Hurricanes director of athletics, 1983-90): The most important AD in UM history, Jankovich oversaw three national championships in football and returned men’s basketball to campus after a 15-year absence.
14. Honorable mentions: We haven’t forgotten you, Andy Elisburg, Derek Jeter, Jim Larranaga, Jim Leyland, Katie Meier, Jack McKeon, Kim Ng and Bill Torrey, among others. Jeter’s got to start winning to rise. Ng could be higher for the trailblazing alone, as MLB’s first Asian and female general manager. We might tip a nod to incoming Canes football coach Mario Cristobal, too, based on the instant, massive spike of enthusiasm around the program since his hiring.
15. Brian Flores (Dolphins coach, 2019-21): To close us out we save a symbolic spot for Flores, the Dolphins’ first Black fulltime (non-interim) head coach, fired recently despite engineering the club’s first consecutive winning seasons since 2003. What you see on this ranking is mostly white faces — Jeter the only one of color. It underlines the point of Flores suing the NFL alleging racist hiring practices. Sports has a long, long way to go in encouraging and realizing diversity at the owner, executive and coaching levels.
So. With preemptive apologies to all the deserving names we may have left out ... how did we do on our ranking?
