Bob Mendoza

Bob Mendoza
Sport(s) American baseball
American football
Biographical details
Born San Diego, California
Playing career
Position(s) Outfielder
Accomplishments and honors
Awards
Breitbard Hall of Fame Coaching Legend
Dan Fukushima Lifetime Achievement Award
SDSU Rugby Player of the Year (1967)

Robert (Bob) James Mendoza (born in San Diego, California) is a former American baseball player and a San Diego Hall of Champions inductee. After retiring from baseball, he continued his education and went on to teach, coach high school sports, and officiate in varsity basketball.

Biography

Mendoza graduated in 1956 from Lincoln High School where he lettered nine times in three sports: football, baseball and basketball.

In 1958, he was named Player of the Year in Baseball and Most Valuable Conference Player of the Year in Baseball at San Diego City College. The same year, in '58, he was drafted as an outfielder by the Red Sox and his contract later sold to the San Francisco Giants.[1][2] But he left baseball to continue his education after playing 3-1/2 years for the Red Sox organization.

At San Diego State University, he was named the rugby team’s Player of the Year in 1967.[3] After obtaining his Bachelor of Arts from San Diego State University, Mendoza played Rugby football for the Old Mission Beach Athletic Club (OMBAC). He later obtained his master's degree from the United States International University in San Diego.

He coached football, baseball and golf at Samuel F. B. Morse High School, as well as officiated over varsity basketball. Before that, he was a baseball coach at Mission Bay High. In 1982, he coached Sam Horn, the number-one baseball draft in the country at the time. The same year, Mark McLemore, who Mendoza also coached, was drafted by the California Angels in the 9th round amateur draft.[4]

Mendoza and three teammates were featured in the San Diego Union-Tribune as San Diego County’s first Little League team stars, six decades earlier, in 1949. The September 2009 story was on the heels of a county team making the World Series that year.[5]

In the 1960s, he was a Triple A volleyball player in two-man, on-the-beach volleyball, teaming with Al Scates, current men’s head volleyball coach for UCLA. He played for an indoor volleyball league with the Wildcat Volleyball Club and was the league's archivist for many years.[6]

He has been a regular winner of OMBAC's annual Over-the-line tournament.[7]

Awards

In November 2011, Mendoza was inducted into San Diego Hall of Champions’ Breitbard Hall of Fame as a Coaching Legend.[8][9] In 2001, he was given the Dan Fukushima Lifetime Achievement Award by the California Coaches Association.[10] While at Morse as assistant football coach, in 1996 he was presented with a coaching award by the High School Sports Association.[11]

Personal life

For 23 years, he and his wife Cordelia Mendoza, an antiquarian and appraiser,[12] operated antique stores in Ocean Beach, California, including their last store, Cottage Antiques, which was named in 2010 on KGTV-10’s county-wide “A-List" for Best Antiques, placing first.[13] He is the son of the late Benny Mendoza, a welterweight boxer in San Diego in the 1930s,[14] and son-in-law of the late James M. Scott, who was a Senior Olympian.[15] Mendoza lives with his wife in the Loma Portal neighborhood of Point Loma in San Diego.

References

  1. ↑ "Lexington Nebraska Red Sox 1958".
  2. ↑ "1958 Lexington Red Sox Statistics -- Register - Baseball-Reference.com".
  3. ↑ "WOD 8/10/12 | Miners Town". Crossfitminerstown.com (scroll down). 2012-08-10. Archived from the original on 2013-04-08. Retrieved 2013-02-08.
  4. ↑ "Mark McLemore Statistics and History - Baseball-Reference.com".
  5. ↑ "First base".
  6. ↑ Features; Megan Kaplon. "Articles: Tuesday Night Tradition — By Megan Kaplon — Volleyball Magazine Articles". Volleyballmag.com. Archived from the original on 2013-01-29. Retrieved 2013-01-24.
  7. ↑ "OTL returns with all its off-color fun and flair - For a 58th summer men and women of all ages will relive their youth during a pair of weekends smacking softballs in the traditional marathon Over the Line (OTL) competition. The sport is a three-p..."
  8. ↑ "Baseball players on USA team".
  9. ↑ "Coaching legends to receive honors".
  10. ↑ "Dan Fukushima Lifetime Achievement Award". calcoachesassociation.net.
  11. ↑ "ProQuest Archiver: Titles".
  12. ↑ "Directory of ANA Qualified Appraisers". Appraisers National Association.
  13. ↑ "Cottage Antiques - San Diego A-List".
  14. ↑ "BoxRec - Benny Mendoza".
  15. ↑ Ray Huard (2002-01-01). "Man Near Top of Most". San Diego Union-Tribune.
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