Notable deaths last week
One point on one card, a couple of points on some others. Ken Norton fought the greats, but the decisions he needed to be great never seemed to go his way.
He busted Muhammad Ali’s jaw to hand him only his second defeat. But he lost two narrow decisions to Ali the next two times they’d meet, including their final 1976 fight at Yankee Stadium.
And after he lost by just one point to Larry Holmes in their 1978 heavyweight title fight, Norton’s career was all but over.
Norton, who died at the age of 70, was forever linked to Ali for their trio of fights. Ali was beating everyone around him at the time but he always had trouble with Norton, even in the two fights he won.
Hiroshi Yamauchi, who ran Nintendo for more than 50 years and led the Japanese company’s transition from traditional playing-card maker to video game giant, has died. He was 85.
Kyoto-based Nintendo said Yamauchi, who was also known for owning the Seattle Mariners major league baseball club, died of pneumonia at a hospital in central Japan.
Yamauchi was Nintendo president from 1949 to 2002, and engineered the company’s global growth, including developing the early Family Computer consoles and Game Boy portables.
Eiji Toyoda, a member of Toyota’s founding family who helped create the super-efficient “Toyota Way” production method, has died. He was 100.
Toyoda served as president from 1967 to 1982, engineering Toyota’s growth into a global automaker. He became chairman in 1982, and continued in advisory positions up to his death.
Joy Covey, who helped take Amazon.com Inc. public as the Internet retailer’s chief financial officer, has died. She was 50.
She died on Sept. 18 after colliding with a minivan while riding her bicycle downhill on Skyline Boulevard, near Portola Valley, according to police. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
Choreographer and dance instructor Patsy Swayze, the mother of late actor Patrick Swayze, has died. She was 86.
The younger brother of New York Giants coach Tom Coughlin has died.
The Giants announced that John Coughlin of Hackensack died on Monday night at Hackensack University Medical Center. He was 63.
Marcel Reich-Ranicki, who grew up in Poland and Nazi Germany, survived the Warsaw Ghetto and went on to become post-war Germany’s best-known literary critic, has died at age 93.
The sharp-tongued Reich-Ranicki established himself as West Germany’s premier arbiter of literary taste after arriving with no money in 1958 from communist Poland, where he had served as a diplomat and intelligence agent in the late 1940s.
Jackie Lomax, a singer-songwriter who worked with The Beatles and enjoyed a long solo career, has died at age 69.
Loyal Gould, a former Associated Press foreign correspondent who later chaired journalism programs at Ohio State, Wichita State and Baylor universities, has died. He was 86.
Former Georgia and NFL offensive lineman Scott Adams has died. He was 46.
Adams played six seasons in the NFL. He began his career as an offensive guard with Minnesota in 1992. He started a career-high nine games in 1993 with the Vikings. Adams also played for New Orleans, Chicago, Tampa Bay and Atlanta.
The tough former communist guerrilla who led a bloody but failed insurgency against British rule in Malaysia in the late 1940s and early 1950s died in Bangkok last week after decades in exile. He was 88.
Chin Peng, whose real name was Ong Boon Hua, was the last of a breed of Asian anti-colonialist figures that included Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh, Indonesia’s Sukarno, Myanmar’s Aung San and Cambodia’s King Norodom Sihanouk, who died last year. Chin Peng’s dubious distinction was that unlike the others, he didn’t win his struggle.
Rick Casares, a star running back for the Chicago Bears who was once their all-time leading rusher, has died. He was 82.
A five-time Pro Bowl pick and a member of the 1963 championship team, Casares played 10 seasons in Chicago and ran for 5,675 yards. He was the Bears’ all-time leading rusher until Walter Payton surpassed him and currently ranks third.