The unlikely champion, for now
I have a really important announcement to make and since my husband refuses to be impressed, I have to brag about it here. Also, the shelf life of this accomplishment may be short, so time is of the essence.
I am the weekly and season leader of Gary Blackerby’s Million Dollar Football 2020 Pool, and nobody is more surprised than me, or more bewildered than the people I am currently beating.
To help you understand what an unlikely accomplishment this is, I will let you in on a conversation with my man from Monday night while I was watching the Arizona - Dallas game.
Me: “Okay, so that guy should have been called for holding and he wasn’t. I even saw that...”
Mr. C: Saw what?”
Me: “The defender grabbed the guy’s jersey.”
Mr. C: “ Yeah, he was tackling the guy who had the ball.”
Me. “If you have the ball, it’s OK for the other team to grab your jersey, then?”
Mr. C: “Yes.”
Me, after watching football every single season, on some level for 51 years: “Oh”.
I’m slow on the uptake.
I LOVE Hawk football and I literally cut my pigskin teeth on it 51 years ago. I’m a huge homer, and I don’t pretend to be impartial, which is one reason I miss being on the sidelines this year, slyly reporting sports for the Leader on Facebook Live.
It has always been with the mutual understanding that I have close to no technical knowledge of football as far as what constitutes a penalty - short of a facemask.
I have virtually no natural understanding of the game, but a very deep enthusiasm for it. Which is why I gave up my spot at Hawk stadium this year for somebody who has a child playing, and I’m watching from home on the link provided on the school’s website.
But, I always pick our Hawks to win. Always.
This week’s game will be tonight at 7 again, and you can get to the game on the internet by going to www.ipcisd.net, scroll down an you’ll find a link to the live game.
After my kids graduated IPHS I added Texas Tech to my football teams of choice, because both of my babies are now Tech Alumni. I spread my wings in the college football world to include Washington State when coach Mike Leach left Texas Tech and landed there.
In the past, I have never watched pro football, and most people around here would clutch their pearls if they asked me the name of any player on the Dallas Cowboys. I don’t know who any of them are after Troy Aikman.
However, because of Texas Tech, I now watch two NFL teams, which is probably WHY I’m leading virtual experts in a pool I have no business being in.
In the past couple years, two of my Texas Tech favorites went to the pros - Coach Kliff Kingsbury (swoon) is now coaching the Arizona Cardinals; and quarterback Patrick Mahomes is leading the Kansas City Chiefs.
Monday night, the two teams were playing other teams back to back, which gave me a chance to show off my lack of football knowledge to my husband.
So, when I announced to him after the games - both of which I picked correctly, by the way - I was in first place in the pool, he kindly responded, “How?”
My secret is this: I have feelings about who will win, and also fairly big feelings about mascots and colors. That’s it.
Go forth on your football pool with that knowledge and conquer.
