I'm a big-time football fan. Always have been, since I was seven or eight. I love the game, love the pageantry, love the controlled violence. Football is the ultimate team game -- one player misses an assignment and the efforts of his ten teammates is wasted. A single player can carry a basketball team or a baseball team or a soccer team, but a single outstanding football player surrounded by mediocre ones is destined for failure.
Let me tell you, I'm not liking football very much this season. You see, my rooting interests are stinking up the joint. At the college level, my beloved Nebraska got creamed last week by USC, and on Saturday needed a last minute touchdown followed by a missed field goal to squeak by Ball State. At home. Ball State. We gave up 40 points. To Ball State. At home.
During the Devaney/Osborne years my Huskers would have rolled Ball State for six-hundred yards and a 53-6 pasting. Today, the vaunted "Blackshirts" (Nebraska's once-proud defense) are leaving holes so large that even I could probably go for 153 and four TD's, and I'm 47 years old.
Sunday was even worse, as my St. Louis Rams continued their free fall into the nether regions of the NFL. The Rams lost 24-3 to Tampa Bay, a team that won only four games last season, and the final score was in no way indicative of how bad it was. Down just 3-0 at the half, at no time did one have the sense the Rams were ever in the game. The Rams are now missing -- due to either injury or suspension -- four offensive linemen, a defensive lineman, a starting linebacker and their two starting cornerbacks. The Rams have guys now starting who were in street clothes just two weeks ago. 0-16 is starting to look realistic for this bunch this year, and the coach is a dead man walking.
If it weren't for my son's Pop Warner flag football team, 4-0 and coming off a big win versus our biggest rival, this football season would be a total loss. Maybe I should become a soccer fan.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment