Volume 1, Issue 1: Tackling Is For Dopes
I remember the first time I got rocked in football. Like, really rocked. “Rocked” in the sense of I was definitely concussed from the helmet-to-helmet hit I suffered at football practice in middle school. I remember how scared I was in the moments that followed where I couldn’t initially get up and my back felt, well, weird. My body was out of sorts and man I was scared. As was my dad.
This is important to note, as my dad, being a person who served in the marines, was and still is a tough person. We have joked for years about our Eric and Red Foreman relationship, but it’s different when you’re a kid living in that period of time. Our relationship now is far different than our relationship then. My dad was a “throw some dirt on it” guy and I was a “are we sure I don’t have lymphoma” guy. So when my dad, who was one of the coaches on the football team raced over after Adam Gustafson took my soul, I knew this could be bad. Yes, I’m a worrier by nature, but I never really saw my dad in that way before that hit. He, too, wondered I suspect, that the two of us running in any Peachtree Road Races together in the future may not be in the cards anymore.
It turned out to be a stinger, though, which was obviously a much better result than what it could have been. I played safety, which was obviously a mistake for my size and frame at the time, and I hate tackling. Fuck, I hated tackling. I liked catching passes. I liked running routes. I liked covering wide receivers and vice versa. That tackling shit was for losers in my eyes. The fun was in catching the ball. To this day, I love throwing the football around with my dad. I remember the last time we threw the ball around in front of their house in the middle of the dang road. I didn’t care. I was throwing the football with my dad.
So I have mixed feelings when it comes to my time playing youth football. I really hated the tackling, the uniforms, the practices in the scorching Georgia heat, etc. Family friends literally tried to intervene on my behalf to get my father to let me quit before I really hurt myself. I was good at baseball, soccer and basketball, but football was too physical. The best players on my team loved to hit the shit out of everybody. They loved the Oklahoma drills. I died inside.
But football had its moments. I remember the first time I intercepted a pass. I saw it coming the whole way. I saw Loganville’s QB make one read to the tight end and I was tasked with covering this large, country figure. I leaped in front of the Red Devil at the right moment and picked the ball off. My great grandparents were in attendance for this game and I remember looking over to the sidelines at them, my grandparents and my mother cheering. I couldn’t make an important tackle to save my life, as my mom loves to remember my coach screaming at me as I raced towards the sidelines one game that I’d “better make that tackle” only to very much not make that tackle. Deion Sanders was ahead of the curve. Tackling sucks. Interceptions rule.
Football is for a different kind of athlete. I was never worried I’d become a real-life Kenny Kawaguchi from Backyard Baseball playing any other sport growing up. I could play basketball or soccer for hours and love every second of it. I could play football for hours and contemplate all the different ways I could have a heat stroke or tear my collarbone. Joey Cantrell was energized when he came to middle school football practice. He was ready to deliver some CTE. This made him a good running back behind a terrible offensive line. I’m lucky to have just survived.
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I recorded five podcasts this week that you can find here:
1) Musey & Thomas: "Prisoners"
2) The Full Ride: BYU Blows Out Navy, Bowlsby On COVID-19 and College Football Week 2 Picks And Previews
3) Sowards Says NFL Week 1. Plus Jonathan Tayler Thomas Talks MLB Yankees Are Hurt Edition
4) AEW 'All Out' Fallout, Balor Wins NXT Title, and WWE Cuts With Jim Varsallone of the Miami Herald
5) Saturday Conversations: Georgia Tech Head Basketball Coach Josh Pastner
WHAT I’M JAMMING TO
WHAT I NEED TO DO
Get a PO box. I’d like to start writing handwritten letters to friends, readers, family, whoever, and I’d like for you beautiful people to mail me cool stuff to Knoxville so that I can keep adding to my room and place. Interior design is not my strong suit.
Have a great weekend, humans.
Best,
Chase