Budgie: full page tribute in the Globe & Mail
Note the last part, where the supporter's tribute is mentioned....
Soccer star and world champion was 'an unbelievable iron man'
A gifted and natural athlete, he was best known as the Canadian who won ABC TV's Superstars contest three consecutive times between 1977 and 1979. After that, the network changed the rules
PETER MALLETT
June 26, 2008
He was a gifted Canadian soccer player who was banned from competing in America's most popular made-for- television athletic competition because he was just too good.
After Brian (Budgie) Budd won his third consecutive ABC Wide World of Sports' Superstars competition between 1977 and 1979, the notion of a relative unknown competitor from the obscure sport of soccer defeating top major-league and Olympic athletes was too much for network executives to fathom. His success forced them to invoke the infamous "Brian Budd rule" that banned any competitor from the event after they had won it three times.
"He stood out above other athletes," said CFL Hall of Fame quarterback Tony Gabriel, who had lost to Mr. Budd in the competition. "That just gave him an aura. ... Someone who kind of raised the bar and the standard for those competitions." During the 1978 contest, Mr. Budd topped U.S. Olympic pole-vaulting champion Bob Seagren and Cleveland Browns star Greg Pruitt.
The son of an Atlantic Canadian couple who first settled in Toronto before moving to Delta, B.C., Brian was the second of four children and the only boy. His father was a strict disciplinarian and they did not enjoy a happy relationship. One of his favourite childhood stories was how his father, Leighton, introduced him to swimming.
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