Talk:Billy Mills

To do to improve
CJLippert 02:42, 27 March 2007 (UTC) The following quote and citations should be removed because they degrade the accuracy of the article and represent a lowering of Wikipedia standards: "Billy never owned his own pair of new shoes until the night before the Olympic Games." Having entering the the US Marine Corps as a First Lieutenant in 1962 and not owning a new pair of shoes until 1964 are mutually exclusive events. It is an insult to imply that he mismanaged a First Lieutenant's pay to the extent that he couldn't afford a pair of track shoes. Attending the University of Kansas on an athletic scholarship and being a three time NCAA All America athlete, graduating in 1962, also makes it increasingly unbelievable that he did not own a new pair of shoes prior to the USMC issuing him low-quarters and combat boots. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ussfa344 (talk • contribs) 21:30, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
 * in-line citation
 * more references
 * picture?
 * reword the POV statements
 * What is he doing today?

YouTube links
This article is one of thousands on Wikipedia that have a link to YouTube in it. Based on the External links policy, most of these should probably be removed. I'm putting this message here, on this talk page, to request the regular editors take a look at the link and make sure it doesn't violate policy. In short: 1. 99% of the time YouTube should not be used as a source. 2. We must not link to material that violates someones copyright. If you are not sure if the link on this article should be removed or you would like to help spread this message contact us on this page. Thanks, ---J.S (t|c) 04:59, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Bill Mills Is the Only American 10,000m Olympic Winner
Should the article's introductory sentence be revised to make clear that Mr. Mills is the only "American" (or "U. S. athlete") 10,000m Olympic winner? The revision would not diminish his Native American identity (which the rest of the article makes clear) and, rather, might introduce the magnitude of his 1964 victory more pointedly.

DBK (talk) 23:43, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

"Who said "Look at Mills!"?
SI.com says that it was not Bud Palmer, but an anonymous fan who yelled this. http://joeposnanski.si.com/2010/10/14/thirty-two-great-calls-2/?eref=sihp

(#14 in the list)

Kakashi64 (talk) 17:15, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

You will note that SI is even unsure of its statement and gives higher credit to this point I put into the article. It took me a lot of search to find any documentation to match up the particular name of Dick Bank with the lore within the media of the sport (which I am a part of). Here's an additional source. It was absolutely not a random fan in Tokyo (a press box is a secure location, especially at the Olympics, even before 1972), it was the expert analyst NBC hired to give color. Dick Bank was a writer for Track and Field News and a source for inside the sport information like he provided here and opinionated writing such as here]. He would be a logical person NBC would have sought out for such a role. The common technique in a Play by Play booth is to have an expert closely associated with the sport in conversation with a more seasoned announcer who (frequently in regards to a less popular sport like Track and Field) leads the conversation. Bud Palmer was a former basketball player and the seasoned network play-by-play announcer. When Bank realized what was happening--Mills coming from behind--(and it was not being covered by Palmer), he shouted over Palmer. It was a great moment in television coverage of the Olympics, bringing the real drama to the American television audience and it would not have happened had Bank remained confined to the role the common decorum would have defined for him. As your source calls it, one of the greatest calls in sports history. It is a further comment on the corporate structure of NBC not to have recognized the magic the ad lib brought to the public, that Bank was immediately fired rather than being praised. Trackinfo (talk) 18:20, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Billy Mills and this incredible performance are such an enormous inspiration and part of what makes the moment so touching (my father has never forgotten the live call) is Dick Bank's sudden burst of energy, joy, laughter and almost childlike excitement. The fact that he then got fired by the squares at NBC for his contribution only adds to the depth of this awesome story. Someone more poetic and knowledgeable then I could, perhaps, correctly relate this injustice to Billy's life or even to the history of the Oglala, but the least I can do is recommend that someone make a Wikipedia page for Dick Bank. I would, but I'm too minor of a Wikipedian to make a page yet. Joel.sbateman (talk) 04:06, 13 August 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Billy Mills. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120227074044/http://www.trackandfieldnews.com/discussion/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=40416&start=0 to http://www.trackandfieldnews.com/discussion/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=40416&start=0
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110610231907/http://www.usatf.org/statistics/champions/USAOutdoorTF/men/m10000m.asp to http://www.usatf.org/statistics/champions/USAOutdoorTF/men/m10000m.asp

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 13:42, 20 July 2017 (UTC)