Mike Wagner—USC to Mars… Not Far Away Remembering a 2019 Interview Jim O’Brien
Mike Wagner (#23), circa 1979
Mike Wagner wants to improve his golf game, make his swing higher and more consistent, learn how to read music to play the piano, enjoy bicycling in a safer manner, and read books about all the U.S. presidents. “I’m a big believer in setting goals,” he said while eating a plate of spaghetti bolognese bravo at Bravo on Route 19 in Cranberry Township, not far from his home in Mars, Pennsylvania. I had a personal favorite, eggplant parmigiana with a chopped salad, and it was sensational. I met Mike at 1 p.m. and we both pulled into our parking spots at 12:58. There was one car between our vehicles. Talk about good timing. I reminded him that we had once met at Bravo in North Fayette. I looked it up in my book Steelers Forever, and the date was Wednesday, April 10, 2002. Mike had suggested 1 p.m. that time, too. And that seemed like only yesterday. Now we were meeting on Wednesday, January 6, 2019, nearly 17 years later. I also met him for lunch at King’s Restaurant when he was playing for the Steelers in the early ’80s and he was living in Upper St. Clair. I used to run into him at the post office. I know he liked to play golf at St. Clair Country Club, and often showed up at celebrity fundraisers for several good causes. So, Wednesdays are good for meeting Mike Wagner. Remember the movie Any Wednesday? It starred Jason Robards as a well-to-do Manhattan businessman who had a mistress (actress Jane Fonda) in a New York hotel. I told Mike that I once attempted to interview Kordell Stewart in the Steelers’ locker room and he snubbed me. “Don’t you know the rules,” Stewart scolded me. “I only do interviews on Wednesdays.” 20
UPPER ST. CLAIR TODAY
The previous visit with Mike was on a you about something relating to me not bright, sunny day. This meeting was on a playing in Super Bowl XIV?” he asked for day when it never stopped raining. Never. openers once we were seated. Pittsburgh experienced record rainfall in Mike still hasn’t shared that story with 2018 and it looked like 2019 was on its me. I just know that he and Jack Ham did way to setting a new record. The parking not play in that Super Bowl game and, lots along the rivers were shut down due worse yet, they were not in the team photo to flooding. for that season. As Mike walked toward me in the parkInjured players and players on the ing lot, he looked much like the fellow I reserve squad were never on the sidelines had talked with in 2002—still walking when Chuck Noll was the coach. Why? ramrod straight, still taut, and still look- Noll had those guys sit in the last row ing like he could chase down any receiver. of the press box at home games. Today, This Wednesday, Mike weighed in at 170 mostly in hoodies and sweat suits, Steeler pounds. “Every decade I make a conscious players are generally directly behind effort to drop ten pounds,” he said. “I Coach Mike Tomlin. bicycle 20 miles each day and, yes, I’ve Mike was eager to tell me about Franco fallen off my bike more than a few times. Harris and Rocky Bleier, two of his favorite Bicycle people will tell you that it’s par Steelers this side of his former roommate, for the course. Uneven roads, pot holes, Jack Ham. He smiled when I told him I’d cars suddenly moving in on you, lots of spoken to Randy Grossman on the phone obstacles.” earlier that morning and that Randy had His hair, including his eyebrows and requested that I give Mike his regards. mustache, may have had a little more Randy is also one of Mike’s favorites. “He’s curl to them, and there’s some gray on a smart man,” said Mike. “And he makes the sides of his handsome head. But, he funny observations.” That’s Randy. looked terrific, as always. Mike is most “They’re all good guys,” added Mike. accommodating, while careful in what he “We had a lot of good guys on our teams. says, still recalling how Chuck Noll told One of the things that says a lot about the his players to be careful when speaking Steelers of my day,” said Mike, “is that to sportswriters. I tell Mike he looks like we genuinely care about one another. I he just walked out of a window at Brooks just went to a funeral for Ron Johnson in Brothers. Even when he’s wearing a dark Detroit, and many of the guys were there. I blue jersey. didn’t call anyone to go out with me; I just I noticed that he slid the chair to his felt I had to be there. When we see each left, away from the table, so he could ex- other, it’s not just ‘hi’ or ‘hello’ We hug one tend his left leg. “It was rubbing against another, and we mean it.” my knee,” he said. He still has some wounds and soreness from his playing days with the Steelers. He’s had his share of surgeries and repairs and rehabilitation. He asked the hostess to seat us in a corner where we could talk, without eavesdroppers. Mike smiles at some of my questions, as Noll often did during press conferences, but he tells good stories. Sometimes the smiles are smug smiles. Left to right: Chuck Noll and Mike Wagner, late 80s at the “You still want me to tell Ray Mansfield Memorial golf outing; photo by Jim O’Brien Summer 2020
