A List of Things That Happened After the Last Triple Crown Winner at the Belmont

On June 10, 1978, Affirmed beat Alydar for a third time to win the Triple Crown. At the time, it might not have seemed like as big of a deal. Secretariat broke a 25-year drought in 1973, and then Seattle Slew had just won all three races the year before. Little did we know at the time, but 12 other horses since 1978 would go into the Belmont with a Triple Crown chance but not come up victorious.

So, it’s been 37 years. A lot has changed in this world, including me no longer wearing plaid pants (as far as you know) and going to preschool. But it’s still kind of amazing to think about some cultural and sports events that have happened after the last Triple Crown to put this drought in perspective.

–ESPN, the sports and cultural giant in today’s world, hadn’t even gone live on air yet. (September 9, 1979)

–That’s also true of MTV (1981), Nickelodeon (1979), USA Network (1979) and pretty much every other cable channel you can find on your television today. Ted Turner had started developing his “superstation”, but the call signal TBS was not being used yet (1979).

–“Animal House” hadn’t been released in theaters yet (July 28, 1978), and neither had “Grease.” (June 16, 1978).

–ABC’s 20/20 was four days old and “Dallas” had debuted two months earlier.

–However, the following venerable and oft-syndicated television shows had yet to even debut on television and would make their first appearance that fall: Taxi, WKRP in Cincinnati, Mork & Mindy (RIP Robin Williams), Diff’rent Strokes, and the White Shadow.

—Keith Moon was still alive. (September 1978)

–So was John Wayne (June 1979)

–Kobe Bryant wasn’t born yet (1978)

–and neither was Manny Pacquiao (1978) and the vast majority of athletes in professional sports.

–Joe Montana was still in college at Notre Dame.

–Larry Bird and Magic Johnson had not played against each other in a basketball game yet.

–Michael Jordan had yet to be cut from the high school basketball team (or put on the JV team).

–Jack Kent Cooke still owned the Los Angeles Lakers. In fact, only one current principal owner of a NFL, MLB, or NBA franchise was also the principal owner of that franchise in 1978: Bill Bidwell of the NFL’s Cardinals.

–Tim McCarver, Davey Johnson, Jim Fregosi, and Lou Piniella were all still in MLB … as players.

–The video game “Space Invaders” was released (June 1978).

–The Village People song “Y.M.C.A.” had not debuted yet (December 1978).

–U2 had yet to record their first single (1979).

–The Rolling Stones were still playing a summer concert series that began right after Affirmed’s victory. Wait. Some things have remained comfortably constant.

[photo of Affirmed via horseracingpics.com]