There are plenty of great things about Concord native and NBA champion Matt Bonner, but his unabashed love for sandwiches has to be near the top of the list. He even started an online sandwich blog about his tasty travels around the country. (How do we get one of those?)
His pride in his hometown is equally admirable – unless you REALLY like sandwiches – and he took advantage of an opportunity to combine those two passions and bring some acclaim to a local business when his team, the San Antonio Spurs, visited the Boston Celtics on Feb. 12.
And in keeping with his reputation as an unselfish player, Bonner shared the wealth with his teammates.
Bonner, with much logistical assistance from his father, Dave, ordered roast beef sandwiches from Beefside Seafood on Manchester Street to feed the entire Spurs team following the Feb. 12 contest, sharing a New England favorite with the perse – and tall – San Antonio roster.
“I was in Florida and got a call from one of my people that Dave came up and said Matt wanted to buy lunch for his teammates,” said Bill Ray, who owns Beefside with his wife, Susan. “He wanted to give them something he grew up on and really loved. He eats in here all the time when he’s in the area.”
The Bonners ordered 45 roast beef sandwiches, to be delivered to the Boston Garden by Dave Bonner, and with Ray in Florida, he had manager Bobby Doulliette oversee the production of the grub. Since the sandwiches were to be eaten within two or three hours, Ray wasn’t worried about the travel interfering with the quality.
“I wouldn’t put these things on dried ice, because you’re not going to have the same animal, but they were going to have them within a couple of hours,” Ray said. “They were happy with them – we gave them some barbecue sauce on the side. It was great.”
Bonner even noted the gesture in a video he made for NBA.com, where he took viewers to one of his other favorite sandwich shops in town, Cimo’s South End Deli, formerly Ordway’s. He also confessed his love for fluffernutter sandwiches, which he was shocked to find were not staples of youth diets outside of New England.
Bonner isn’t the first local celebrity athlete to frequent Beefside, either. Former Major League pitcher and Concord native Bob Tewksbury used to stop in for breakfast just about every other Saturday for awhile after he retired, Ray said, bringing a small group of teachers and other acquaintances with him.
Tewksbury would always pick up the tab, Ray noted.
Matt Alosa, the former Pembroke high school basketball star who played professionally overseas before returning to coach at his alma mater, is also a regular.
“We are very grateful to have some local athletes, especially the ones who made it big, come in here and patronize our place and say good things about it,” Ray said.
