Stan Grayson ‘72

Very good player--great leadership qualities. I believe he spent some time as the head finance guy for New York City

Ted Wells is a credit to his alma mater.  But I don't expect him to be invited to give one of the Kraft-Hiatt Lectures each year funded by Robert Kraft and family.

I have seen Stan at at least one HC football game down at Fordham. Anyone recognize the gentleman in the middle (he said rhetorically)? 😉 Also a famous athlete alum who was also at Vince Rougeau’s inauguration.

You forgot Jimmy Schnurr in your recap. He started, Doyle did not (perhaps a few games, but not consistently).

Don Sasso started as a junior; solid contributor; (maybe as a soph too, I wasn't around then) but blew his knee out and hardly played his senior year.

www.sports-reference.com/cbb/schools/holy-cross/1971.html

Agree that Stan was a wonderful guy and a great leader.   An injury his senior year kept him out of several games down the stretch; had as much to do with another postseason near-miss as anything else.

When Stan was a freshman in 1968-1969, I was a senior and one of the student managers of the basketball teams (freshmen and varsity). Seeing Stan regularly during basketball practices, I got to know him fairly well during that year. After my graduation, our paths did not cross for many years.

Fast forward about 50 years. I attended a HC football golf outing (not sure if it was 2018 or 2019). I saw that Stan was there and went toward him to say hello. Before I could say a word, he recognized me, said my name, and said that he was happy to see me. I was amazed. Stan is a class act all the way.

What a zany two years I had as manager:  the end of the Jack D era and the beginning of the Blaney era....things happened that if I hadn't witnessed them (or in a couple of cases, heard first hand from someone that did); I never would have believed they occurred.

We'll all have to read about it in the tell all book.

Nice to know he's done well in the field of education. cumberlandacademy.org/about/advisory-board/

agree- and he was a heck of an athlete

Past Perfect; Eddie Jenkins is Worcester's link to '72 Dolphins.


Link/Page Citation
Byline: Jennifer Toland

BOSTON - Eddie Jenkins' cherished team photo of the 1972 Miami Dolphins - matted, framed and signed by all the players - hangs on the wall in the far right corner of his downtown office. It's faded from all those years and all that sunlight coming in the window that overlooks Causeway Street, but there's Jenkins, No. 28, seated in the second row, four in from the right.

Just months before that picture was taken, Jenkins was a senior at Holy Cross, studying hard, running around Fitton Field and preparing to go to law school.

"I could have never imagined what was to come," said Jenkins, who was drafted by the Dolphins in the 11th round. "Absolutely not."

Jenkins became part of history playing for the Dolphins in 1972, not to mention Worcester's proud link to the NFL's only undefeated team. The Patriots, unbeaten through 14 games, are on course to join Miami's exclusive club. New England, going for win No. 15, faces the Dolphins at Gillette Stadium today.

Jenkins' life as a football player, first at St. Francis Prep in New York, then at Holy Cross, where he played running back behind Joe Wilson, and finally for three seasons in the NFL, ended more than 30 years ago, and he has gone on to an accomplished career in law.

The 57-year-old Jenkins, a graduate of Suffolk Law School, formerly worked in private practice, as a prosecutor with the Middlesex District Attorney's office and as a labor lawyer with the Department of Labor. He is now chairman of the Massachusetts Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission. He doesn't usually wear his Super Bowl VII ring to the office, but he guessed - correctly - that last Tuesday afternoon's visitor might like to check it out.



With its 17 diamonds, representing the Dolphins' 17 wins in 1972, it was the perfect prop. There are 16 small diamonds surrounding a large center diamond set in aquamarine. Inscribed on one side of the ring is Jenkins' name and "Winning Edge." On the other side, "Perfect Season."

Jenkins was a running back, but his name was down the depth chart from Larry Csonka, Mercury Morris and Jim Kiick, and he saw his action in 1972 as a special teams player. He knows people tire of hearing Patriots coach Bill Belichick's "one-game-at-a-time" prattle, but that was the Dolphins' approach in 1972 as well.

"We didn't know it was going to be a perfect season," Jenkins said. "It just kept building. Honest, it was game by game. No one ever thought about this perfect season."

Jenkins, who grew up in Flushing, N.Y., was one of 28 black students former Holy Cross president Rev. John Brooks recruited to the largely white HC campus during the racially tense late 1960s.

This past March, Jenkins, along with his old HC roommate, noted attorney Ted Wells '72, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas '71, Pulitzer-Prize winning author Ed Jones '72 and investment banker Stan Grayson '72, were featured in a BusinessWeek magazine article about the experiences they shared as students at Holy Cross and their special relationship with Father Brooks.

Jenkins keeps a copy of the spread, which he had both Father Brooks and Jones autograph during a dinner party at his house, in his desk.

"I was an inner-city kid, I came from humble roots, and I wanted to go to college," Jenkins said. "My father said, `You want to change America. This is your best chance to go and understand what the power structure in America is all about.' Someone gave me a chance. That person was Father Brooks."

Jenkins played in just three freshman games at HC before breaking a rib. All but two games of his sophomore season were wiped out because of the hepatitis outbreak.

He played in just 20 games at Holy Cross, and his teams won just seven games, but he made a mark with his speed and in 1970 against Boston University, Jenkins was on the receiving end of the longest pass play in HC history, a 99-yard completion from Colin Clapton.

Jenkins was just back from a memorable weekend in Miami celebrating the 35th anniversary of the '72 season and the Dolphins' first victory this year. He was thoroughly engaging as he talked about his time at Holy Cross (he called HC's Dennis Golden his first mentor besides his father), his brief but memorable NFL career (he also played for the Giants, Bills and Patriots), highlights of the '72 season (he'll never forget Larry Seiple's fake punt in the AFC Championship Game) and the achievements of this year's Patriots team.



Some of his former coaches and teammates have been vocal in rooting against the Patriots' run at perfection. Jenkins is not opposed to the Pats. Coach Don Shula said earlier this season that if New England went undefeated, an asterisk should accompany the feat because of the "Videogate" scandal.

"I talked to Shula in Miami over the weekend, and I told him, `Coach, you're quite a big hit up in Boston,'" Jenkins said. "He has the right to think what he wants to think. My whole thing is this - it should never hurt the team. That's Belichick. They fined him. It hurt their organization, but don't put that on the players."

Jenkins knew he was a long shot to make the Dolphins in 1972. "I mean, 11th round out of Holy Cross?" Jenkins said. "They don't even have 11 rounds anymore." When he arrived for his first training camp, he remembered what one of his HC coaches told him. "You have to let Shula remember your name. You have to stand for something."

Jenkins caught Shula's attention by fumbling the first ball he touched in practice, but soon earned the reputation as a smart, assiduous go-getter, who ran hard in practice during the day and studied the playbook hard at night.

"I was a third-string running back who just wanted to be part of something very special," Jenkins said.

Jenkins missed all of the 1973 season with a shoulder injury and was with the Giants, Bills and Patriots in 1974. He played a total of 14 NFL games. In 1975, Jenkins was in Packers training camp. His reps were limited, and he went to coach Bart Starr to discuss his future. "Coach Starr said, `Eddie Jenkins, you're going to make a great lawyer,'" Jenkins said.

After graduating from Suffolk, Jenkins settled in Boston - he lives in Roxbury - and has been an active member of the community. He runs a youth basketball program at the Roxbury YMCA called "No Books, No Balls." If the kids don't study and make their grades, they can't play basketball. He was also one of the founders of the 1,000 Black Men mentoring group, a program that takes gang members off the street and educates them. Jenkins is chairman of Urban Edge, the largest nonprofit housing corporation in New England which develops affordable housing in parts of Roxbury and Jamaica Plain.

He teaches at Suffolk Law. In 1990, Jenkins, dismayed at the handling of the infamous Charles Stuart case, ran against incumbent Newman Flanagan for Suffolk County DA.

Jenkins has two children. His son Julian, a former defensive end at Stanford, played for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers last season. Jenkins has a picture of Julian chasing then-USC running back Reggie Bush taped to the wall behind his desk. His daughter Jasmine is a junior at Bowie State University.

Jenkins has been back to Holy Cross for a number of reunions, and he's looking forward to returning to campus in April for the 35th anniversary of the Black Student Union. He said Worcester holds a special place with him.

Jenkins said last week's Dolphins victory was emotional - "People were crying," he said. He took a number of photos with former teammates and coaches that he has stored in his digital camera. The lanyard with his aqua blue and orange credential from the weekend is draped over the 1972 team photo. The memories will never fade.

"I've been blessed," Jenkins said, "to have been put at the intersection of so much history."