It is early Monday morning, Martin Luther King Jr. Day. But Don Buford is not standing on a stage and talking about having a dream.
That's not his style. Besides, he has already lived one himself, the kind Dr. King preached about.
Buford has a new job, which is to enhance dreams for others. Few could be better suited.
The former major league baseball star will turn 76 on Feb. 2. He lives in Sherman Oaks and was happily retired to a life of four rounds of golf a week. The family was raised, he had done his work, his stature as a major league player for the White Sox and the Orioles over 10 seasons was established. Life was summertime, and the living was easy.
His was a story of success and good fortune, at a time when minority athletes swam upstream a lot.
He played high school football at Dorsey, a running back weighing 150 pounds, "soaking wet," he says.
He also played infield on Dorsey's baseball team, although the term "infield" was questionable.
"Just dirt," Buford says.
He wrote lots of letters to big schools, even visited UCLA and a few others, but was turned down. This was 1957, 10 years after Jackie Robinson had broken the major leagues' color barrier. Walls remained up.
Asked whether the college turndowns were because he was 150 pounds or because he was black, his eyes flash and he says, "Both."
He went to L.A. City College for a year, was recruited off the campus to play quarterback two weeks before the first game with Pierce College, knew little about the position and ended up making a long touchdown run for a 6-0 win.
"Quarterback," he says, laughing. "I didn't throw for 600 yards. I didn't even throw for six."
The next year, he walked on to the USC baseball team. He asked legendary coach Rod Dedeaux whether he could, Dedeaux said OK, and Buford became the first black baseball player at USC. That was 1958, the year USC and Dedeaux won one of its many national titles. Buford even played running back and defensive back, still 150 pounds, on the Trojans football team. He needed financial aid, Dedeaux had none, and they worked out a deal in which he would play both sports and be funded by football.
"I remember starting spring football practice No. 7 running back on the depth chart," Buford says, "and by the end of the camp, I was No. 1."
For Buford, this was all a prelude to a major league baseball career that got him to the Orioles, from the White Sox, in 1968, and made him part of the famed Baltimore team that produced legends such as Boog Powell, Jim Palmer and Frank and Brooks Robinson. Buford was the left fielder and leadoff hitter with that bunch.
They were managed by Earl Weaver, a legend himself, who died last week.
"Earl gave me my shot," Buford says. "I had known him in the minor leagues. He once ordered Dean Chance to hit me with a pitch. When I got traded to Baltimore, Earl was the third base coach and Hank Bauer was the manager."
Buford came to the Orioles as a utility player. Second and third base, where he played with the White Sox, were taken. So he asked Weaver to tell Bauer he could also play the outfield. Weaver suggested Buford tell Bauer himself. Buford did, but Bauer said he was sticking with the lineup he had. Then Bauer was fired at the All-Star break, Weaver took over, and the switch-hitting Buford was on Weaver's first lineup card in the outfield, where he remained for five years.
He ended with a career .246 batting average in 1,286 games. That included an incredible statistic that marks his career: In 4,553 at-bats, he hit into only 34 double plays, a major league record.
He remained with the Orioles, eventually serving five years as the team's farm director. That was under Frank Robinson, his Hall of Fame teammate and Orioles manager.
