Former SMU SID Jim 'Hoss' Brock, Cotton Bowl Exec Dead at 74

[MrMustang1965]

Former Cotton Bowl Athletic Association executive director Jim "Hoss" Brock, a legendary figure in college football, died Thursday morning. He was 74.

Brock had been hospitalized since February after suffering the first in a series of strokes. Brock died at the Prestonwood Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Plano.

In a sport filled with colorful characters, few matched Brock, best known for always having a cigar in hand and his universal greeting of "Hoss."

"There was no such thing as a stranger to Jim," said Rick Baker, the Cotton Bowl Athletic Association's president. "He knew everyone in the world of sports, and everyone knew and respected him.

"Brock's greatest passion was college football, and most of all he loved the Cotton Bowl. His name was synonymous with the bowl industry. Texas hospitality was his chief commodity and nobody did a better job of selling it than Jim 'Hoss' Brock."

Brock served as CBAA executive director from 1979 to 1992 and chairman of the team selection committee in 1993.

He seemed to have a sixth sense as to what made a good matchup and was usually successful in making it happen. In the 1980s, the Cotton Bowl hosted three Heisman Trophy winners: Bo Jackson, Doug Flutie and Tim Brown.

Brock, a Fort Worth native and TCU graduate, served as sports information director at TCU and SMU before joining the Cotton Bowl. He also was a volunteer for the United States Olympic Committee on several occasions, working in media relations, and was a member of the Salesmanship Club.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent ... ba324.html

[mrydel]

Hoss was a wonderful man and a pleasure to be around. A person of endless energy. RIP Hoss.