Samuelson Turns Loss Into Asset for U.S. Volleyball Team

A peek into Bob Samuelson’s room gives you a pretty good idea that this guy is a little different.

The door has the cast of “Bonanza” pictured above a cutout of Bart Simpson.

Spray-painted on one wall is his graffiti mural of his grandmother sporting a a Mohawk haircut alongside a tribute to the Sex Pistols’ Sid Vicious. On another wall is a Michael Jordan-Mars Blackmon cutout, a “Crack Kills” poster and two paintings by Patrick Nagel, one of which is in the lower right-hand corner, upside down and tilted sideways.

Above a picture window is a mural of cartoon dinosaurs.

On another wall, next to The Far Side calendar, the Winnie Mandela sticker and the Burger King Kids’ Club bag, is a framed picture from Sports Illustrated of Samuelson standing at attention alongside teammates Steve Timmons and Mark Arnold during the the National Anthem before a United States volleyball match against the Soviet Union.

The cutline: “A Cut Above the Rest.”

The room is a shrine to diversity.

And the inhabitant is tall like Hoss Cartwright but with the athletic ability of Little Joe. His sports heroes are intimidators. He plays the game with the ferocity of a character from a Stephen King novel.

He looks like Charles Bronson’s worst nightmare. He will try to be exactly that to the Soviet Union (10-4) tonight at the Sports Arena (7:30 p.m.) when the U.S. national team (5-9) begins its final weekend of World League Volleyball play.

It’s easy to pick Samuelson out of a crowd. He shows up and people stare.

“When I walk into a public place, a club, a restaurant, naturally people will turn and look,” he said. “I’m 6-5 and I’m bald. Of course, they’re looking.”

The baldness is caused by alopecia, a condition that caused his hair to begin falling out less than six months after graduation from Playa del Rey’s Westchester High School in 1984.

“It’s just something I learned to accept,” Samuelson said. “It’s a part of my personality now, of who I am. I don’t think about it anymore.”

But he wasn’t always comfortable with it. Most shy guys just out of high school wouldn’t be, and it was no different for Samuelson, who turns 25 at the end of the month. After he entered Pierce Junior College in 1984, a friend noticed a bald spot in Samuelson’s light brown locks. It got bigger. Then another spot developed. Doctors told him about alopecia, that it was not uncommon. He could lose all the hair on his head or all the hair on his body. The spots got bigger until he finally shaved his head except for designs--the Nike stripe, arrows, a gecko monster--in the shrinking areas where hair could still grow.

Little did he know that the condition that would make him clam up socially would play a major role in his becoming an opposite hitter and middle blocker on the U.S. national team.

“I think that when I first lost my hair, it helped me become a much better athlete,” Samuelson said. “I worked out. That’s all I would do. I wouldn’t go out at all. I just played volleyball and water polo. I just focused myself. That gave me a source of self-respect. If I could be a good volleyball player, then I would be good at something.

“Back then, I was so scared to go anywhere and meet people. I would just hang out at the gym all the time. I think I developed a lot in those two years because I didn’t do anything else.”

First-year U.S. Coach Fred Sturm has noticed the fruits of Samuelson’s labor.

“Bob’s a very gifted athlete. He’s unlike anybody else on the team because he’s so fast and explosive along the net,” Sturm said. “If he’s playing well, he can make a lot of things happen on the court.”

After leading Pierce to the state volleyball title in 1986, Samuelson was named California’s junior college player of the year. He also played in 1986 Olympic Festival, then starred at Cal State Northridge.

At Pierce, Samuelson not only developed as a player, but also as a person. His friends were few, but solid.

“It makes you realize that if people are going to be your friends, they’re going to like you for what you are, not what you look like,” he said. “I feel maybe I’ve made more quality friends because they like me for who I am, not because I look really cool or have a lot of money or whatever. It’s what’s on the inside.”

And Samuelson learned the hard way that people can be insensitive.

“It’s not so much what they’ll say to your face, but when you’re near them and the things you overhear,” he said. “People make a lot of assumptions. Also, people can be very rude. They walk up to you and say, ‘Do you have cancer?’ Well, no, but what if I did? What if you had cancer and only had a month to live? Is that any of your business? How would that make you feel?”

Samuelson’s appearance makes him a fan favorite in Japan and Europe, but an easy target in South American countries. He gets it worst in Brazil. He walks into the arena and things get thrown at him. If there’s a personality on the team, he is it.

“I don’t want to be a target for people to throw things at,” he said. “It happens. What can you do?”

Still, Samuelson relishes the public eye and the opportunity it presents.

“I feel like it’s a privilege to be a role model, not a responsibility,” he said. “Not a lot of people have an opportunity to influence people’s lives, especially young people.

“Although I don’t go out of my way to be an outstanding citizen, it’s the way I’ve chosen to live my life. It’s important to present yourself in a classy manner. I think it’s important to show you can be a top-notch athlete, a world-class athlete, and still be a nice guy to young kids who look up to you and not be a jerk.”

He signs autographs. He poses for pictures. He holds babies. He remembers being in Dodger Stadium when he was a kid and Rick Monday chatting with him and a friend for a couple of minutes that Monday could have spent in the dugout.

“That makes a difference for a kid who idolizes somebody else’s life,” Samuelson said. “I try to approach everybody that way, win or lose, and it’s not just being a role model. I think everybody in life should be that way.”

Ben Cartwright would approve.