ORANGE COUNTY SPORTS HALL OF FAME : Timmons Parlays Net Success Into Gold-Medal Prominence

It’s shortly past 5 a.m. at Irish Spud Murphy’s boxing gym in San Diego, and the man who “grew up on the mean streets of Newport Beach” slammed his locker shut, strolled across the hardwood floor and began punching the speed bag.

And now, weighing in at a trim 205 pounds, Steve Timmons, a two-time Olympic gold medal winner . . . in volleyball?

What’s this? Timmons, a middle blocker-turned-brawler? He’s really pounding the leather instead of killing it?

Well, not quite.

Timmons, who will be inducted into the Orange County Sports Hall of Fame next Thursday, had some time on his hands last summer after he and Karch Kiraly, tired of world travel, left the U.S. national volleyball team.

While playing part time on the beach circuit, he and some pals at a regional sports network taped a tongue-in-cheek video about his obsession with fighting Mike Tyson.

The video aired more than nine months ago, but Timmons, 31, still gets jabbed about it.

“I was down on the beach the other day and this guy walks by and says, ‘Hey, kick Tyson’s (butt)’ ” Timmons said. “He really thought I was going to fight him.”

But Timmons, a muscular 6-foot-5, does look like a boxer. His red hair is shaved at the temples and moussed into a new-wave, Marine-style cut, similar to the one worn by boxer Drago in “Rocky IV.”

Timmons, though, is the first to admit that he wasn’t The Greatest in the ring. If Muhammad Ali floated like a butterfly and stung like a bee, then Timmons floated like an anchor and stung like a moth.

The video is a convincing one, complete with interviews with boxer Henry Tillman (“He takes a hell of a shot. I never knew volleyball guys were that tough . . . “) and promoter-manager Dan Goosen (“He’s the fastest heavyweight I’ve seen since Muhammad Ali”).

There was even an interview with the challenger himself.

Announcer: Who are you going to fight, Steve? Someone from the bum of the month club?

Pugilist: (glaring into camera) I want to kick all those football players’ butts who say they can beat Mike Tyson. I’ll start with (Tony) Mandarich and then I’ll go on to (Mark) Gastineau. All those overpaid, overweight football players; I want them all. They’ll all go down.

He never landed a punch or was pulled off the canvas, but Timmons, the former floppy-haired basketball standout at Newport Harbor High School, has endured more than a poke to the chin.

He has taken on the underdog role, a serious knee injury, a fledgling business and the best volleyball players in the world.

And he’s still standing.

STEVE TIMMONS: THE WONDER YEARS

Volleyball wasn’t Timmons’ first sport, nor his second. He played flag football, swam and surfed, but his best moves were on the basketball court.

“My heroes were Pete Maravich, Jerry West and Wilt Chamberlain,” Timmons said. “I always wanted to be like them and I wanted to play in the NBA.”

Timmons lived in Riverside until the sixth grade, then moved to Newport Beach with parents Dennis and Holly, brother Kevin and sisters Heidi and Jill.

Timmons played basketball during his four years at Newport Harbor. At the end of his junior season, he was coerced into trying out for volleyball by Charlie Brande, who was coaching the Sailors’ junior varsity at the time.

“He was watching volleyball practice one day and he saw those guys diving on the floor and he said, ‘I don’t want to dive,’ ” said Brande, now the Corona del Mar coach. “He saw them passing (bumping) the ball and he said, ‘I don’t want to pass.’ I told him, you’ll never have to dive or pass the ball, just block and hit it.”

The sport wasn’t quite that simple, as Timmons quickly learned.

“I really knew nothing about it,” he said. “Some of the other players didn’t like me coming out that late because they had been training for a while. I played and had fun, but I really didn’t take it that seriously.”

Said Brande: “Steve was always joking around. But once the scoreboard lit up, he was all business. He picked up the sport very quickly.”

Between his junior and senior years, Timmons grew . . . and grew . . . and grew. He sprouted from a thin 5-11 to a gangly 6-4.

Timmons says his growth spurt and a bad fall during a basketball game gave him tendinitis in his right knee. After graduation, he took a year off from volleyball and began a construction job at a custom-home site in Big Canyon.

“After a couple of months I realized I didn’t want this in my future,” he said.

Timmons quit his job and spent the next few months surfing and bodyboarding. In the fall of 1978, he enrolled at Orange Coast College.

He helped Orange Coast win the state community college basketball title in his first and only season at the school. The volleyball team finished fourth.

Near the end of Timmons’ freshman year, then-USC Coach Ernie Hix offered him a volleyball scholarship. Timmons was quick to accept.

“San Diego State was the only other school interested besides a half-hearted letter from Boise State to play basketball,” Timmons said. “I was ready to move out of Newport and move on with my life. I took a chance with volleyball.”

STEVE TIMMONS MEETS JAMES McDONALD

Timmons joined a college team that many consider the best ever. The Trojans won the NCAA championship in Timmons’ first season with a lineup that included Pat Powers, Tim Hovland and Dusty Dvorak, a former Laguna Beach High standout who also played on the 1984 Olympic team.

“There weren’t any big names I knew in volleyball when I first came to USC,” Timmons said. “I never knew a national team existed. I didn’t know about the pro leagues. My main goal was just to get into a good school like USC.”

Drawing on his success at Newport Harbor and Orange Coast, Timmons tried out for the Trojan basketball team after his sophomore year.

“I figured I could help USC turn it around in basketball,” he said.

His goal was short-lived.

During a practice, James McDonald, who later played tight end for the Rams, drove to the basket on Timmons, who was set to take a charge. McDonald hit Timmons. Timmons hit the floor.

“I felt the pain run down my legs,” Timmons said. “I fractured a vertebra. I took some time off and got some rest.”

And put to rest his basketball career.

STEVE TIMMONS CHASES A GOAL

Back on the volleyball court, Timmons earned All-American honors his junior year. After the season, Doug Beal, then coach of the U.S. national team, invited Timmons to try out for the squad.

The U.S. team was a doormat on the international scene when Timmons joined in 1981. Funding was scarce. Some players lived out of their cars, slept on the beach and pieced together a life on a $10-a-day meal allotment.

“That was a fun summer,” Timmons said. “After practices, we would go down to the beach and jump in the water with our uniforms on to wash them. I had a sandwich and a drink and that was pretty much our $10 for the day.

“We looked forward to the trips just so we could have a bed and three meals a day. You have no other responsibilities; you’re in college or just out of college.”

During that summer, Timmons shared an apartment with Kiraly. They became friends, and together they would become two of the most dominant players in the world in the next eight years.

“They were a good combination,” said U.S. Olympic Coach Bill Neville, who was an assistant coach when Timmons played. “Karch was fabulously focused, and he was a role model for Timmons. I think they filled each other out.”

Kiraly was a soft-spoken biology/pre-med major from UCLA. Timmons, a Trojan, was rowdy and looking for a good time.

“At first, our friendship came out of respect for our ability,” Timmons said. “Karch was a very serious guy and I was always the jokester. I loosened him up and he educated me.”

Timmons and Kiraly trained full time with the national team after finishing college. But while Kiraly excelled, Timmons was struggling to earn a spot on the roster.

“When I first saw Timmons, he was just a big gangly kid,” Neville said. “He was very raw and was under a lot of peer pressure. He came in with proven players from his alma mater. But I took to him right away. I saw he had that deep fire in him.

“In order to become great, I knew someone had to ride him hard, and that was me. You’ve heard of the concept ‘Tough Love’? I had to work him real hard.”

Despite Neville’s tutoring, Timmons still had much to learn.

He was called into the coaches’ office one day and was told he wouldn’t be traveling with the team to Argentina. He echoed his disappointment as he and Kiraly walked across the parking lot.

“When we got to (Kiraly’s) car, it had been broken into and all our belongings had been stolen,” Timmons said. “I thought, ‘How much lower can I get?’ ”

STEVE TIMMONS GOES TO HAVANA

Of all places for Timmons to play the match of his life, it had to be Havana, Cuba.

The fans were hostile, the conditions sub-par and the locker room musty. But filling in for an injured Craig Buck, Timmons played so well against the Cuban national team in February, 1984, that he knew he had made the U.S. roster.

“I can still remember going into that dank locker room knowing I had made it,” Timmons said. “I couldn’t sleep at night during that tour because I was so excited about playing the next day. I was pumped the whole time. Something happened to me in that tour. It was really weird.”

Five months later, he earned most valuable player honors while leading the United States to the gold medal. It marked a turnaround not only for Timmons, but the entire U.S. program.

“It was a totally different feeling than (winning) in 1988,” Timmons said. “It was like climbing up a mountain without your shirt on. You got the chills and goose pimples after the match.”

The climb got steeper three months after the Olympics, when Timmons blew out his right knee in a match in Seoul.

“I went down to dig the ball and it felt like someone hit it with a hammer,” Timmons said. “I looked down and it looked like my kneecap split in two.”

Doctors operated on the knee, repairing tendon damage. They gave Timmons no guarantee he would play again.

While recovering at his parents’ house, Timmons passed the time by scribbling down marketing ideas for an optic yellow volleyball and a line of beachwear. Those ideas became a reality when a Vista-based firm, using an outline of Timmons’ head as its logo, began marketing the products in 1987.

“I had to have something to look forward to after my volleyball career,” he said.

But Timmons wasn’t ready to retire. Seven months after the injury, he was back on the court and the U.S. team was winning every major tournament.

At the 1988 Olympics, on the same court where he injured his knee, Timmons led the U.S. squad in kills (188) and blocks (43). He had 38 kills in seven blocks in the gold-medal victory over the Soviet Union.

“We started to feel the pressure right around the Olympics,” he said. “But every victory we had convinced everyone that we were the best.”

STEVE TIMMONS MAKES A CURTAIN CALL

Tired of the constant travel, Timmons and Kiraly left the national team last summer for the pro beach tour.

“For nine years Karch and I traveled and sacrificed our life style,” Timmons said. “We had some time off after the 1988 Games and we realized what we were missing.”

In February, Timmons married Jeannie Buss, president of the Forum’s volleyball and tennis association and daughter of Lakers owner Jerry Buss. They’ve settled into a house in Manhattan Beach, but Timmons will be back on the road soon.

In the fall, Kiraly and Timmons will be off to play pro indoor volleyball in Italy. Timmons signed a two-year deal worth more than $1 million with a team in Ravenna.

And he still hasn’t ruled out playing in the 1992 Olympics at Barcelona. He said there’s a strong possibility that he and Kiraly could reunite with Buck and Dvorak for a shot at a third gold medal.

Neville said he would welcome them with open arms.

“Steve has overcome a lot of adversity and he always comes back stronger,” Neville said. “I need some role models for the younger players, and he’s definitely one. He’s the kind of guy who keeps coming up off the canvas. That’s why he’s a champion.”

STEVE TIMMONS

Volleyball Player

Age: 31

Hometown: Newport Beach

High School: Newport Harbor

Colleges: Orange Coast College, USC

Accomplishments:

Led the U.S. Olympic team to gold medals in 1984 and ’88. Was named the most valuable player of the 1984 Olympic Games.

Led USC to the NCAA championship in 1980.

Helped the Orange Coast College basketball team win the state community college title in 1979.

Two-year letterman in volleyball and basketball at Newport Harbor.

Playing on the Assn. of Volleyball Professionals beach tour and will play professional indoor volleyball in Italy next fall.

Marketing an optic yellow volleyball and beach clothing with Redsand, a Vista-based firm.

Will be inducted into the Orange County Sports Hall of Fame on Thursday at Disneyland Hotel.