10/08/2026
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 8, 2026
COLORADO SPORTS HALL OF FAME TO INDUCT 6 NEW MEMBERS
Tom Nalen, Carlos González, Jenny Barringer-Simpson Headline 62nd Class, to be Enshrined in 2027
DENVER -- The Selection Committee of the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame and the board of directors selected six individuals -- including Denver Broncos Ring of Famer Tom Nalen, former National League batting champion Carlos González from the Colorado Rockies and three-time Olympic runner Jenny Barringer-Simpson — to be inducted at the 62nd annual banquet, set for April 15 at the Hilton Denver City Center (1701 California St.).
Joining Nalen, González and Simpson as April inductees are 13-time PGA Tour winner Dave Hill, much-respected former longtime Broncos media relations/PR director Jim Saccomano and Bolder Boulder co-founder Steve Bosley. The Selection Committee will pick the 2026 Athletes of the Year in January 2027 as the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame recognizes collegiate, high school and Olympic/Pro athletes at the Hilton Denver City Center banquet.
Tom Nalen, a center who spent all 14 years of his NFL career with the Broncos (1994-2007), proved a mainstay of an offensive line that helped Denver to its first two Super Bowl titles — concluding the 1997 and ’98 seasons. He made 188 NFL starts, second only to John Elway among Bronco position players.
During Nalen’s career with the Broncos, running backs rushed for at least 1,000 yards in a season 11 times, including Terrell Davis’ 2,008-yard campaign in 1998. Despite being a seventh-round pick in the 1994 NFL draft — out of Boston College — Nalen was named a Pro Bowler five times, a first-team All-Pro twice and a second-team All-Pro once.
Nalen was inducted into the Broncos Ring of Fame in 2013 and has been nominated for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He now serves as the offensive line coach at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Carlos González played a decade of his 12-year Major League Baseball career (2009-18) for the Rockies, where the outfielder was affectionally known as “CarGo”. During that time in Denver, he was the NL batting champion in 2010, hitting .336 with 34 home runs, 117 RBIs, and an NL-leading 197 hits and 351 total bases. He made just one error in the field that year. All told, González finished third in NL Most Valuable Player voting in 2010.
For his career, the Venezuela native was a three-time All-Star, a three-time Gold Glove winner, and a two-time Silver Slugger Award recipient.
González came to the Rockies on Nov. 12, 2008 as part of a trade that sent Matt Holliday to Oakland. On July 31, 2010 against the Cubs, González hit for the cycle, including a walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth inning. Two years later, he smacked home runs in four consecutive at-bats over a two-game stretch. Manager Jim Tracy once noted that CarGo was not just a five-tool player, but a “six-tool player”.
As a Rockie, González hit .290, with 227 home runs and 749 RBIs, stealing 118 bases and posting a .988 fielding percentage.
González also spent time in the majors with Oakland (2008), Cleveland (2019) and the Chicago Cubs (2019).
Jenny Barringer-Simpson, who retired from competitive running in late 2024, was a three-time Olympian (2008 while still at the University of Colorado, 2012 and 2016) who captured the bronze medal in the women’s 1,500 at the 2016 Games, becoming the first American woman to medal in the event. She also won the 1,500 at the World Championship in 2011.
At CU, Simpson won four NCAA individual titles — three in the 3,000-meter steeplechase and the other in the indoor 3,000. In 2009 alone, she broke six NCAA records. She remains the only woman to ever finish under 4 minutes (3:59.89) in the 1,500 in NCAA history. In 2009, Simpson won the Honda Sports and Bowerman awards as the nation’s top collegiate female track and field athlete.
Simpson was named to the inaugural United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) Collegiate Hall of Fame in 2022. She was inducted into the CU Athletic Hall of Fame in 2019.
Simpson, 39 at the time, suffered sudden cardiac arrest after collapsing following the Sir Walter Pop Up Mile event in North Carolina on June 16. In the wake of the cardiac arrest, Simpson now has a pacemaker and defibrillator. She’s been diagnosed with Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Cardiomyopathy, which makes it “dangerous for me to return to running,” she said on Instagram. “That chapter has ended.”
Three times, the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame has honored Simpson as one of its athletes of the year.
Dave Hill lived in Colorado during much of the prime of his golf career, which included winning 13 times on the PGA Tour and capturing the tour’s Vardon Trophy for lowest season-long scoring average in 1969.
In the Centennial State, Hill captured the second PGA Tour victory of his career, at the 1961 Denver Open, played at Meadow Hills Country Club. Then from 1971 through 1981, he captured four titles in the Colorado Open, which remains a record. All those Colorado Opens were held at Hiwan Golf Club in Evergreen, where Hill lived at the time.
Hill, who represented the U.S. in three Ryder Cups, was also one of the owners of Park Hill Golf Course in Denver during the 1970s and early ’80s. His record as a player was such that he was part of the first class of inductees for the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame, in 1973 along with Babe Zaharias and Babe Lind.
Hill, known for being unashamedly outspoken with a very gregarious personalty, passed away in 2011 at age 74.
Jim Saccomano spent 36 seasons as a mainstay of the Broncos’ considerable media/PR efforts. To show the esteem in which he’s held, the press box at Empower Field at Mile High has been officially known as the Jim Saccomano Press Box since December 2013.
“Sacco”, then the team’s vice president of corporate communications, retired following the 2013 season. The longest-serving full-time pro sports administrator in Colorado history, Saccomano transitioned to a consulting role with the Broncos for several years after his retirement. During roughly that same time period, he also co-hosted “Sideline Stories with Jim Saccomano on 9News for a decade.
In 2022, after working 27 Super Bowls during his career, Sacco received an inaugural Award of Excellence from the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Saccomano, a graduate of both Metro State (undergraduate) and the University of Colorado (Masters), has chaired the NFL's media relations and international committees and has served on the league's postseason, radio-television and special projects committees.
He has received numerous awards throughout his career, including the inaugural Pete Rozelle Award (1990), given annually to the NFL's outstanding public relations staff, and the Charlie Callahan Award for Public Relations. In 2010, he was recognized with a lifetime achievement award from the Order Sons of Italy in America Colorado Foundation. Sacco also has authored several books about the Broncos. Prior to his Broncos days, he worked for the Denver Bears.
Steve Bosley joined 2008 Colorado Sports Hall of Fame inductee Frank Shorter in co-founding the Bolder Boulder, which debuted in 1979. The 10-kilometer race, one of the largest in the world, now often draws in excess of 50,000 runners on Memorial Day. Over the last 47 years, more than 1.5 million people have run in the race. Bosley previously served as the event’s executive director.
A former Bank of Boulder president and University of Colorado Regent, Bosley agreed starting in 1980 to have the Bolder Boulder conclude at CU’s Folsom Field, a tradition which continues to this day. Over the years, the race has donated thousands of dollars to CU’s cross country and track programs.
The Bolder Boulder has become a Memorial Day tribute, with selected Medal of Honor recipients being recognized annually, and flyovers and skydivers during race day.
During the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, Bosley served as a senior referee for the men’s and women’s marathons. He was the 1991 road race management race director of the year and was chosen for the inaugural class of Running USA’s Hall of Champions in 2008.
In 2025, CU inducted Bosley into its Athletic Hall of Fame. In late 1976, Bosley led the fundraising effort — through the Bank of Boulder — to send Ralphie the buffalo and her handlers to the 1977 Orange Bowl. Bosley and the bank then purchased the buffalo calf who became Ralphie II and donated it to CU athletics.
Tickets for the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame Banquet are $300 each and Sponsor tables start at $4,000. For additional ticket and table information, please contact the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame (www.coloradosports.org or 720-258-3535). The Colorado Sports Hall of Fame & Museum is located at Gate 1 on the west side of Empower Field at Mile High, at 1701 Bryant Street in Denver.
Since its inception in 1965, the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame has inducted 298 individuals prior to this fall’s selection meeting. The first class of inductees featured Earl “Dutch” Clark, Jack Dempsey and former Supreme Court Justice Byron “Whizzer” White. Kordell Stewart, Fat Lever, Steve Foley, Gigi Fernandez, Wendy Koenig and Harry Hollines were inducted into the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame in April.
