football

STOP WAVING THE FLAG

STOP WAVING THE FLAG

I usually hate it when football teams carry the American flag into the stadium before a game.

We’ve all seen the pre-game ritual at a big time college football program, that awkward commingling of sport and patriotism. Ninety thousand fans, some intoxicated and shouting profanities at an out-manned opponent who’s mostly just there to collect a $1 million check. The out-manned opponent’s program has historically been so sad the school fight song is by Sarah McLachlan. There are six different mascots cavorting across the sidelines as the big time school’s student section aggressively chants a rhyming obscenity, many of the students shirtless and inebriated, when here comes the home team with a designated player, perhaps a linebacker who was ejected earlier this season for spearing a guy who was lying prone on the ground, carrying the American flag.

MAKE MEMORIAL STADIUM A HOSTILE PLACE TO PLAY

MAKE MEMORIAL STADIUM A HOSTILE PLACE TO PLAY

You people are too darn nice.

For as long as I can remember Memorial Stadium in Lincoln has had a well deserved reputation for being kind to visiting teams. Win or lose fans in the end zone often applaud the visitor as players head for the locker room after the final whistle. Fans are also very quiet. Many of them don’t even scream when the visiting offense is backed up on its own goal line.

SCOTT FROST VS. HISTORICAL FIGURES

SCOTT FROST VS. HISTORICAL FIGURES

The electronic and print media around here clearly loves Scott Frost. Never before in history has a coach with a career head coaching record at Nebraska of 4-8 been so revered. However, I don’t think our sportswriters and broadcasters go far enough in their adulation. You can’t just compare Frost to past and current coaching legends. The man transcends mere sport. Now that his second season at the helm of the Husker football team is nigh the time is right to take a few minutes to gauge the brilliance of this shining star. I think the best way to do that is a head-to-head match up featuring Frost vs. renowned historical figures.

BIG TEN MEDIA DAYS DIARY

BIG TEN MEDIA DAYS DIARY

The mind-numbing tedium; the absurd repetition; the hatred; the anger; the ugliness; the jealously; the bitterness; the line dancing. Of course I’m talking about Big Ten Media Days in Chicago. Below is my only slightly exaggerated running diary of the 2019 meetings.

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SUPER SUNDAY PREDICTIONS

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SUPER SUNDAY PREDICTIONS

Anyone can try to predict which team will win Super Bowl 53, formally known as Super Bowl XXXXLLLLVIIIIIII. Instead, I will attempt to forecast how the CBS Super Bowl broadcast will go down, from start to finish, hitting most of the highlights. Fasten your seat belt - some of this ain’t pretty.

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HUSKER ROAD TRIPPIN’: NEW ORLEANS

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HUSKER ROAD TRIPPIN’: NEW ORLEANS

Some of my fondest childhood memories revolve around my extended family traveling to Husker football away games inside a Buick that was pulling a camper.

This was back in the halcyon 1970s a few years after the Huskers had won back-to-back national championships and it was all but impossible to score tickets to home games without paying a guy on the street named Guido $400 for a pair of seats that may turn out to be fake. One sign you’d just purchased fake tickets from a scalper: there was a photo of Guido on the ticket. Another sign your tickets were fake: you’d buy nine and all nine would read “Row 22, seat 7.”

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THANKFUL IN NEBRASKA

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THANKFUL IN NEBRASKA

University of Nebraska Cornhusker football fans have gone through a miserable stretch for most of the past several years. It’s been difficult because these are proud folks who expect excellence in the program. Still, I think Thanksgiving would be a good time for Husker fans to stop and count their many blessings.

Below is a partial list.

NIX THE BALLOON RELEASE, NEBRASKA

NIX THE BALLOON RELEASE, NEBRASKA

I sort of hate it when the University of Nebraska football team scores its first touchdown in a game because it means that thousands of red balloons will be released into the atmosphere and eventually land where the balloons may be encountered by hungry wildlife. Some of that wildlife will be strangled to death; entangled in the balloons and not be able to get to real food sources; or possibly have the balloon just eaten block their intestines or bind to their beaks leading to a slow, tortuous death. None of those sound like a good way to go.

Imagine you’re a beaver or a sea turtle or even a skunk. (C’mon, skunks have feelings too!) You’re hungry and haven’t eaten in days when along comes this bright, floating object and it plops down right in front of you. It’s basically the animal version of Jimmy John’s. It landed beside you so of course you’re going to eat it, right?

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ELECTRIC FOOTBALL: A LOVE STORY

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ELECTRIC FOOTBALL: A LOVE STORY

It’s back. I’m referencing a recent list of “Most Popular Toys” which to my surprise and delight included electric football, perhaps the greatest game ever even though it has, let me double-check - yep, it has almost zero in common with actual football.

For the uninitiated - and never having played electric football is sort of like never having watched a sunrise - electric football is contested on a tiny, tinny board made to look like a football field. Electrical vibrations cause the ball carriers and defenders to move up and down the field. It’s somewhat less realistic than a 1950s Japanese-made “King Kong” movie.

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NOT SO FAST, USA TODAY

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NOT SO FAST, USA TODAY

USA Today just featured an article speculating that the University of Nebraska could possibly fire Scott Frost and pay off his hefty salary to the tune of $26 million. Which got me to thinking about the plausibility of this happening. I decided that the following are more likely to occur:

* Jason Peter is named spokesperson for the Nebraska Nice campaign.

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PLEASE TALK GOODER

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PLEASE TALK GOODER

I’d like to issue a plea to TV football play-by-play personnel and analysts to work on their grammar game. Or, to put it into football commentator vernacular, please talk good. 

I’ve been on a crusade for several years now - mostly conducted on Twitter which is to proper grammar what the Taco Bell jingle is to Pulitzer Prize-winning non-fiction - to get football commentators to stop saying “Michigan is on their own thirty" and “Look at Notre Dame - they’re ready to make their move.” This is fifth grade English, guys. Michigan, Notre Dame, USC and even Florida State are “its” not “theys.” “Michigan is on its own thirty" is correct. Or, “The Wolverines are on their own thirty" is correct.

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A MILLION LITTLE THINGS

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A MILLION LITTLE THINGS

Scott Frost said something very significant at his post-game press conference last Saturday after the humiliating loss to Purdue. It didn’t resonate with many. The vast majority of fans and media chose to focus on his remarks about shaking up the depth chart.

It occurred about five minutes in when a visibly upset Frost was discussing the Huskers’ mistakes and his face turned sort of a purplish-green-mauve-chartreuse color and he kind of resembled the Incredible Hulk with veins popping and he was shaking while cutting up a Blackshirt with a scissors and there was steam coming out of his nostrils and small pieces of fire and smoldering ash from his ears and he looked like he was about to ram a huge hole into the wall with his head. Which would’ve been awful since they just finished patching all 73 holes in the athletic dept. walls put there during the Pelini era.

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IT’S OK TO CRITICIZE SCOTT FROST

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IT’S OK TO CRITICIZE SCOTT FROST

I need to clear something up. There seems to be some confusion over whether it’s all right to criticize the University of Nebraska football coaching staff now that the team is off to its worst start since 1945. While Scott Frost and company are probably doing some good things to lay a foundation for the future anytime a team begins a season 0-3 and plays beneath its potential, criticism is warranted.

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FANTASY FOOTBALL: A NON-PLAYER’S PERSPECTIVE

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FANTASY FOOTBALL: A NON-PLAYER’S PERSPECTIVE

I’ve never played fantasy football. But I’m thinking of joining a league next year because I’ve always wanted my life to revolve around something silly. Since I don’t play cornhole, I don’t plank or own a selfie stick, that leaves FF.

Don’t get me wrong. I envy the escapism of fantasy football. I’m using “silly” in a complimentary sense. 

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ALL-AMERICAN MEETS KID

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ALL-AMERICAN MEETS KID

In the early 1970s my big cousin Denny wrote letters to numerous Husker football players. Denny wrote to star players, scrubs and incoming freshmen. He wrote to coaches. I’m pretty sure he wrote to equipment managers and trainers and even to the mascot, a surly type who was too busy to respond. In fact roughly half the players replied with an autographed photo. The signatures on several looked eerily similar.

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A GUIDE TO MEMORIAL STADIUM FOR DUMMIES

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A GUIDE TO MEMORIAL STADIUM FOR DUMMIES

Attending a Husker football game at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln is an experience to be relished. It’s also not for the faint of heart. Below are some handy tips for those planning on going to their first game.

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SCOTT FROST: THE SAVIOR

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SCOTT FROST: THE SAVIOR

Scott Andrew Frost is the University of Nebraska’s new head football coach and expectations are high. Perhaps not since FDR’s second term have expectations for anyone been this high. The last time the hopes and dreams of so many rested on one man’s shoulders Neil Armstrong was about to step off Apollo 11 and onto the surface of the moon.