1999 Week 3
September 21, 1999
I'm finally getting settled in to this exciting college football season. Thursday night games, Saturday night games, doesn't matter, this is the finest sport on earth. Well, except for the Melon Festival Wrestling matches at that gentleman's club down the road from Ma's house. I just feed Ma a couple mint juleps and she's happy, then I head down for some real action. They got this one cute little gal, Winona Jugg, she'll knock you over, pin you down, then sing some Conway Twitty ditty while straddling your waist and your face.
But back to football. There were some fairly stunning upsets last Saturday. I bet Bear was turning over in his grave watching 'Bama's sieve-like pass prevent defense (hey, Tide DBs, I like a good hit of ganja as much as the next Rasta mon, but I don't think you should be passing the Dootchie in the end zone while the game's still going on).
But the game that shocked the most people was Wisconsin's 17-12 loss at Cincinnati. The result wasn't unexpected; what was shocking was UW's choice of opponents. Wisconsin's known for scheduling pathetic patsies like Chico State, NSE Louisiana, and the University of Iowa. What was going on in Barry Alvarez's mind when he decided to schedule Cincinnati?
Granted, the Bengals aren't really a very good team, but even a college fan like me knows that a lousy NFL team can beat a good college team. The pros have far better steroids in the professional ranks and they can just pick up those fat Badger linemen, set them aside, and smack the hell out of the Great Dane (kinda like the way I smack the hell out of every Calico I see. Can't stand those male tomcats, they spray on my shoes all the time just because my foot odor makes them think I'm in heat).
Generally college teams are smart enough to avoid scheduling NFL teams. Of course, the one college/pro matchup we all used to look forward to was the annual College All-star game, played at Soldier Field in Chicago, between the best seniors in college and the NFL champions.
My favorite such College All-Star game was played in the mid-50's. The defending NFL champions were the Detroit Lions and they went to Chicago to take on the college players.
The night before the game Lion QB and former Aggie great Bobby Layne took his boys out for the official pre-game drinking contest between the pros and college players. This never affected Bobby too much, he was a lot like me, always at his best when hung over.
While out at the bar, they prepared to take on the college all-stars, led by Notre Dame legend Paul Hornung and Tennessee star Johnny Majors. Johnny told me the whole story years later during the glory days at Pitt. It was one wild evening.
Hornung got things going (the college guys won the toss) by getting everyone to do straight shots of tequila. It looked like Bobby and his team had a bit of a lead after the first few quarts. Then Bobby and company moved on to the rum.
After another 10 rounds of shots, most of the college players had already passed out (some of them weenie East Coast kids couldn't handle anything stronger than a G/T). The Lions looked to be still going strong, though Tobin Rote started dancing on the table then tried to hit on one of the college guys (no wonder why Tobin's son, Kyle Rote Jr, ended up playing that wussy sport of soccer).
The college kids were in deep doo-doo by then. In fact, after the alcohol started flowing in their veins for a while, the only ones left standing were Hornung and Majors. The Lions still had a number of guys left, led by Layne.
It was the college guys' turn to choose the liquor and Johnny, being the Vol man that he is (at least through the early 90's before they fired his butt), knew what to do: He pulled out some of Tennessee's finest, Jack Daniels.
Usually Layne and company could handle whiskey pretty well. But little did they know that Johnny had filled the bottle, not with Jack, but with stuff from his Tennessee neighbor's still. It wasn't Jack Daniels, it was some sort of concoction made from distilled iron filings and pig slop.
Within seconds the Lions were all sick to their stomachs and they passed out. So did Hornung. But Johnny, weened on "Mr. Taylor's Special" since an early age, drank it right down. He was the only one left standing, so he was declared the winner. The Downtown Athletic Club even held a special second vote and gave Johnny a brand-spanking new "Heisman Drinking Trophy", to make up for his controversial loss to Hornung the previous December.
The football game the next day was cancelled due to a severe rainstorm. Some people in Chicago were confused at the rainout since it was sunny and 80 degrees that day. In reality, due to an outbreak of trichonosis among both squads (trust me, I speak from experience, you never want to drink distilled pig slop), neither team was in any shape to play.
In future years the organizers of the game instituted new rules limiting pre-game drinking to 8 shots per person, on the day of the game only. Eventually, the next, wimpier generation of football players' stomachs couldn't even handle that, so rather than change the tradition of binge drinking before the contest, the organizers cancelled the game.
And that's why there's no more College All-Star game. But those of us who remember the contest will always marvel at the Johnny's brilliant performance.