(2nd of 7 blogs on Tommie Smith)

Not long after the ceremony, The Bee sports staff embarked on a project to select the central San Joaquin Valley's greatest athlete. That's a well-worn but always popular question among sports fans, and everyone on the staff put in their two cents.

I've always loved Tom Seaver, the Fresno High graduate and Hall of Fame pitcher -- the only pitcher in the live-ball era to have at least 300 wins, a .600 career winning percentage and a career earned run average under 3.00.

Fresno's Bill Vukovich was the greatest Indianapolis 500 driver of all time, no matter what A.J. Foyt's fans might say.

Dutch Warmerdam, using a bamboo pole, was the world's first 15-foot vaulter.

Bob Mathias not only was the first two-time Olympic gold-medalist in the decathlon, but he won his first gold medal at age 17.

But I didn't vote for any of them. I figured the first step in picking the greatest athlete is picking the greatest sport or event. Baseball and auto-racing are niche sports, and pole-vaulting is a niche event. As to the decathlon, if we were picking the greatest stock of all time, we wouldn't choose a mutual fund.

Boxing or running. The greatest sport is one of those, because they require talents most elemental to humanity's survival. Fight or flight.

I chose running -- specifically, sprinting -- because it's the one attribute vital to both fight and flight. You can't catch prey without speed. You can't avoid being prey without speed.

And that's why I picked Tommie Smith, not only as the Valley's greatest athlete of all time, but the world's greatest athlete. Because he was the greatest sprinter.