Interestingly, it is so common for the wives of pro athletes to work tirelessly on behalf of charities that it proved impossible to come up with a difinitive list of the “most” charitable. So instead we just put together a list of women whose charitable activites stood out to us. By all means, if you know of other examples of player wives doing amazing charity work, let us here it. The more publicity these people get for their endeavors, the better.

One month ago we announced that Spud Webb would be taking his talents to New York City to coach a basketball team composed of dancers from Rick’s Cabaret NYC.  Spud’s team was expected to take on teams made of dancers from the other Rick’s Cabaret locations around the United States, but the league (Rick’s Basketball Association) was disbanded when the NBA lockout officially ended just days after Webb was hired.

But just when it seemed like our dream of watching strippers play basketball would be nothing more than that – a dream – Dennis Rodman has come to save the day.

Recent reports have indicated that Rodman plans on creating his own basketball team with the sexy women from Headquarters Gentlemen’s Club, which is also located in New York.  The NBA Hall-Of-Famer is set to hold tryouts for women over 5’10″ who are interested in joining the team, and he has also challenged the women of Rick’s Cabaret NYC to take on his team of strippers in a charity match.

Sexy women jumping and running up and down a court in tiny shorts and shirts!  And its all for charity!  What’s not to like about this idea?

Hat Tip – [Fox Sports]

The 2011 edition of the Teddy Bear Toss game was held this past Sunday, and once again it was a hit.  Although, for a while it almost seemed as though a Hitmen goal would never come.

Nearly 40 minutes into the game, the visiting Medicine Hat Tigers held a 1-0 lead, and goaltender Tyler Bunz appeared to be in the zone.  But with 1:39 remaining in the second period, Hitmen rookie Calder Brooks broke the shutout and set off a flurry that saw over 25,000 stuffed animals land on the ice.

It took over 20 minutes for the Hitmen players, staff and volunteers to clean the ice, but when the action resumed in the third period, it appeared as though the clean-up had taken just enough out of the Hitmen players to allow the Tigers to escape with the 2-1 victory.

It was a disappointing way to end one of the season’s biggest game for Calgary, but it wasn’t all bad news, as a total of 25,303 stuffed animals were collected and will be delivered to the Alberta Children’s Hospital, as well as over 50 other agencies around the city.

Here is a look at what a teddy bear storm looks like.

Hat Tip – [Calgary Herald]

Was it Rondo’s best alley-oop pass this year?  That question remains up for debate, but I can assure you that somewhere in America there is a coach from Rondo’s past who is watching this video and saying to his players, “See! I always told that Rajon to use his head!”

Hat Tip – [Dime Magazine]

Professional athletes worked hard to get where they are, and they continue to work hard day in and day out to stay on top of their game. However, the guy who picks up my garbage works pretty damn hard, too. Same goes for the dude who drives the bus down my street and the lady who brings my mail. But they don’t get paid millions of dollars a year. Now, I’m not saying professional athletes shouldn’t get paid a lot. I’m just saying that, even with all their hard work, they are still pretty lucky they were born with natural ability and provided the opportunity to develop it. And while today’s TMZ culture prefers to focus on the less virtuous activities of our sports celebrities, there are also a great many who know how lucky they are and give back to society. Instead of spending all their free time relaxing on tropical islands sipping Mai Tais, they go around visiting sick children and donating money to inner city schools. So let’s take a moment to shine the spotlight on good guys for once, instead of the dopes getting arrested for shooting people in night clubs (usually members of the Cincinnati Bengals). To that end, here’s 9 of the most charitable professional athletes of all time.

9. David Robinson (Basketball)

He was known simply as “The Admiral” during his days in the NBA winning championships for the San Antonia Spurs. But in addition to being one of the greatest centers in basketball history, David Robinson is also a seriously generous dude. In 1997, Robinson donated an unprecedented $5 million to found a college prep academy in an economically challenged San Antonia neighborhood. But he didn’t stop at $5 million. In fact, to date, David Robinson and his wife have donated over $11 million to Carver Academy. And it’s not even named after him. However, the NBA’s community service award is.

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Robinson_(basketball)

8. Eric Lindros (Hockey)

In November 2007, on the day he announced his official retirement, former NHL all-star and MVP Eric Lindros also announced that he would be making a $5 million dollar donation to the London Health Sciences Centre in London, Ontario. Lindros was born at the hospital, and over the course of his career had numerous procedures performed there. Now, it may seem strange that Lindros’s $5 million gift ranks higher than David Robinson’s $11 million gift. But what you have to understand is this: over the course of his career, David Robinson earned twice as much as Eric Lindros. In other words, for a hockey player, $5 million is pretty freakin charitable.

Source http://sports.ca.msn.com/other/photos/gallery.aspx?cp-documentid=26281909&page=3

7. Warrick Dunn (Football)

It’s not clear exactly how much money Warrick Dunn has donated over the years, but that (undoubtedly huge) number isn’t important. The number that is important is 100. That’s the number of single parent families the former Tampa Bay Buccaneer has helped out by making a down payment on a home. His aim, with his Homes for the Holidays program, is to help other single parents provide what his mother—a police officer killed while working as a security guard to make extra money—was never able to provide: their very own home. Talk about a direct impact in your community.

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warrick_Dunn#Charity

6. Andre Agassi (Tennis)

Tennis great Andre Agassi didn’t have a classy country club upbringing. His Armenian-Assyrian father was a bit of a taskmaster who once forced the 9-year-old tennis prodigy to play a match against football legend Jim Brown for $10,000 (later reduced to $500 after Agassi won the first two sets 6-3). This probably explains why he went on to be quite a rebellious young man whose tennis career almost ended before it began. Today, he wants to make sure other kids get the same second chances he got. So in 2001, in his home town of Las Vegas, Agassi founded a tuition-free charter school for at-risk youth called the Andre Agassi Preparatory Academy. Since 2007 alone Agassi has donated over $3,000,000.

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andre_Agassi#1970.E2.80.931985:_Early_life

5. Tiger Woods (Golf)

The last couple of years have been pretty rough (insert golf joke here) for Tiger Woods. His public image has become a little tarnished, to say the least. So you might assume that Tiger is on this list simply because he donated a truckload of cash as a pathetic public relations ploy. But I’m here to tell you, no matter what you think of his sexual misdeeds, the guys is legit when it comes to charity. He donated $9.5 million in 2007 and another $1.35 million in 2008 to the Earl D. Woods Sr. Scholarship Fund and the Tiger Woods Learning Center, both of which help underserved kids get to college.

Source http://www.givingback.org/Programs_Services/GivingBack30.html

4. Lance Armstrong (Cycling)

Lance Armstrong has done so many amazing things. He beat testicular cancer. He won the Tour de France seven times in a row. He made Americans pay attention to the Tour de France. He got everyone and their uncle to wear goofy yellow bracelets. And, last but not least, amidst all these other things, he started one of the most successful charitable foundations in recent memory. In addition to giving speeches and needling other rich people to donate money for cancer research, Armstrong himself pledged to donate $5,000,000 over ten years back in 2008, putting his money where his mouth is.

Source http://www.givingback.org/Programs_Services/GivingBack30_2008.html

3. Dikembe Mutombo (Basketball)

He used to be known mostly for his trademark “no, no, no” finger wag after blocking shots, but now former NBA Defensive Player of the Year Dikembe Mutombo is better known for his amazing dedication to charity. In 1997 he founded the Dikembe Mutombo Foundation to improve the lives of people in his native Democratic Republic of Congo. SInce 2001 he has donated at least $15 million dollars to build a hospital in his hometown of Kinshasa. That’s putting your enormous salary to good use.

Source http://www.nba.com/rockets/news/Mutombo_Named_Most_Generous_At-160367-822.html

2. Roberto Clemente (Baseball)

The top two names on this list hail from an age when professional athletes were not bazillionaires. So being “charitable” back then meant more than just giving money. It meant giving of yourself, and using your celebrity status to draw attention to the plight of others. Coming in at #2, therefore, is one of the greatest baseball players and one of the most important philanthropists of all time: the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Roberto Clemente. Clemente made $125,000 in 1970. Today, with inflation, that would be a little let than a million bucks. He wasn’t a brand in and of himself like the Lebrons and TOs we have today. But, in addition to being a kind of Latino Jackie Robinson, making Latin American players mainstream in Major League Baseball, Clemente worked tirelessly to bring money, food, and other desperately needed goods to poor people in his native Puerto Rico, as well as elsewhere in Latin America. And if he wasn’t delivering goods, he was holding baseball clinics for children. Roberto Clemente died at the age of 37. He was bringing food and supplies to help victims of a terrible earthquake in Nicaragua when his plane crashed. Though shocking and tragic, his death was fitting. Today, Major League Baseball’s humanitarian award is named the Roberto Clemente award.

Source http://www.robertoclemente.si.edu/english/virtual_legacy.htm

1. Muhammad Ali (Boxing)

Muhammad Ali’s charitable legacy is not measured in dollar signs and decimals, but by the countless stories of his willingness to bring joy to others. As President Barack Obama put it, “We admire the man who has never stopped using his celebrity for good — the man who helped secure the release of 14 American hostages from Iraq in 1990; who journeyed to South Africa upon Nelson Mandela’s release from prison; who has traveled to Afghanistan to help struggling schools as a United Nations Messenger of Peace; and who routinely visits sick children and children with disabilities around the world, giving them the pleasure of his presence and the inspiration of his example.” Muhammad Ali is the first, the original charitable athlete. And he’s been at it for 50 years now.

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/boxing/ali.htm

Additional Source: www.givingback.org

As for his latest video, Keenan teamed up with two members of the reigning World Series champion San Francisco Giants; Cody Ross and Brian Wilson.  The three of them, and Giants’ mascot Lou Seal, got together to perform Taio Cruz’s “Dynamite” in an effort to raise awareness for a charitable event that Ross and Wilson are holding at the team’s May 25th game against the Florida Marlins.

The event is appropriately named “Dynamite: A Fundraiser For Keenan Cahill.”

At the age of one, Keenan was diagnosed with MPS Type 6, a rare genetic lysosomal storage disorder.  He underwent a bone marrow transplant one year later and was required to remain in isolation for almost a year, in order to prevent infection.  Keenan has had to undergo several surgeries since then, but has battled through these obstacles and is currently a freshman in high school, as well as an internet sensation.

Here is a look at their promotional video for the fundraiser.

The 31st edition of the event, which is held every year to help raise money for the “USC Swim with Mike Foundation,” took place on Saturday, and it gave everyone in attendance the opportunity to check out the gorgeous USC Song girls perform a few dance routines before getting wet for a good cause.

For those of us who were not fortunate enough to see this beautiful sight in person, the following gallery should help provide an idea of what we missed.

It was the Knights 9th Annual Sun Life Financial Teddy Bear Toss in support of the Salvation Army.  Fans are encouraged to bring stuffed teddy bears and other plush toys to the game.  Once the home team scores their first goal, those in attendance litter the ice with the stuffed animals, which are collected and distributed to less fortunate children in the community for Christmas.

This year’s final teddy bear tally was 8232, a London Knights record.  They all came flying onto the ice after Justin Taylor recorded the Knights first goal of the game against the Guelph Storm at 7:49 of the first period, a short-handed marker that would tie things at 1-1.  London never looked back as they poured it on for the remainder of the game, cruising to an easy 8-1 victory.

It was a great night for a great cause, and when it was all said and done, neither the raining of teddy bears, not the opposition Storm could slow down the London Knights on this night.

It was all part of his charity bowling event during the Wade World Weekend in Chicago.  After showing off his bowling skills, Wade took to the mic for some Boyz II Men, “End of the Road.”  Let’s just say that after bowling was finished, Wade no longer had any skills to display for those in attendance.

We can’t blame the guy for trying, but the Miami Heat superstar just doesn’t share the same capabilities as fellow NBAer Ron Artest when it comes to singing.  The crowd seemed to enjoy it, but next time he may want to take a cue from his former teammate Shaq and stick to the lip singing.

The Foundation’s website describes the Foundation as “a non-profit organization promoting social enrichment, education and physical fitness among youth.  The Foundation assists youth in reaching the educational and athletic goals they set through mentoring and setting examples in the community.” The Foundation has programs in Toronto and Dallas, has worked closely with organizations such as the Toronto Special Olympics raising important funding for community projects.

Many would argue that with the amount of money North American professional athletes earn, this charity work is to be expected.  However, lest we forget that there are thousands of financially successful people in other professions who in many cases earn more money than these athletes and perhaps do not concern themselves as much towards community initiatives.  In fact, given the fame that is so closely associated with pro athletes, they are also given a platform to promote their charities and gain support from the corporate sector in supporting their cause.  Examples such as Chris Bosh, prove as evidence that this platform is not only recognized, but utilized as well.

The list of athletes who have made charitable contributions is endless, and I feel that this is often overlooked due to negative stories involving athletes in regards to crime or drugs.  Indeed, these people earn significant amounts of money playing the games which they love, but in most cases, pro athletes are amongst the most generous and compassionate public citizens.

In order to pledge donations to the Chris Bosh Foundation Click Here.

If your interested in finding out which sports franchises are making different daily contributions in their communities, then Progressive Avenue will list in detail which teams and players who are helping local charities.