Tuesday, September 12, 2006

In Which I Fall Out of Love with the Washington Redskins

I arrived home later than usual last night. Even before saying hello to the family, I ducked into the den to set the TiVo to record the Washington-Minnesota game, which was just starting. I like watching the football with the TiVo; zapping past the commercials is particularly enjoyable, and the halftime inanities whiz by in a lovely blur.

After the house had settled into its evening calm, I snuggled into the couch and waved the remote at the TV. Some five minutes into the proceedings, Minnesota's Brad Johnson completed a long pass to the Washington five-yard-line, and (I think it was) Joe Theismann exclaimed, "Well, it's a good thing the strong safety was there, because otherwise that's a touchdown!

Oh really, I thought. So according to your brilliant, highly paid expert insight, Mr. Fucking Genius Color Guy, absent the only nearby defending player, the man who caught the ball would have actually been able to run unimpeded into the opposing goal? Gosh, I'm sure glad you're here to open my eyes, because I would otherwise have mistakenly believed that the man intended to throw the football into the stands, pull down his pants and fart into a bottle.

The camera panned around FedEx Field, picking out particularly moronic fans with painted faces, wearing ultra-stupid studded rubber chainmail and waving maces as if they believed themselves in a Rob Zombie video, shrieking and leering for the cameras. The Redskinettes pranced lunatically, with idiot grins pasted to their makeup-caked faces, their Barbie bellies, flatter than steel roadplates, flashing in the lights -- you know: eye candy. ABC unveiled its new method of introducing the starting players, which consisted of one of the Neanderthals mumbling the names of the other knuckle-draggers, with thuddingly unfunny humorous asides. This lasted slightly longer than the last Ice Age. Sober-faced and howlingly insincere references were made to the anniversary of September 11. Jamie Fox came into the announcers' booth and just went on and on and on and on and on with self-regarding, Hollywood-Asshole blather, while seeming irritated that play did not actually stop on the field so all in the stadium could bask in the glow of his gigantic, luminescent ego.

And I asked myself the question:

What, exactly, are you enjoying about this?

The cameras then found the owner's booth, and there, sitting with that revolting little gnome Daniel Snyder, was Tom Cruise and his Zombie Stepford Honey, and at that point I suddenly found myself falling, falling, falling out of love with the Washington Redskins.

I've been a follower of the team since 1966, the Lombardi Years, and stuck with them through good times and bad, through George Allen and Jack Pardee and Joe Gibbs I and Ritchie Petitbon, through Sonny Jurgensen and Billy Kilmer, through Edward Bennett Williams and The Squire, through Norv Miserable Turner and Jay Schroeder, Doug Williams, Mark Rypien, Stan Humphries, Rich Gannon, Cary Conklin, Heath Shuler, John Friesz, Gus Frerotte, Jeff Hostetler, Trent Green, Brad Johnson, Rodney Peete, Jeff George, Tony Banks, Kent Graham, Shane Matthews, Patrick Ramsey, Danny Wuerffel, Tim Hasselbeck and Rob Johnson.

And losing to a 2-14 dog-assed Dallas team about 40 times in a row.

And that horrible, awful, atavistic fucking racist fossil of a team name.

And Dan Snyder -- that Tom-Cruise-fellating, imperious Potomac-tree-clearing, filthy-money-grubbing, parking-gouging, traffic-snarling little sack of Napoleonic shit -- finally killed my love for the team.

So long, Skins. It was a good ride. I'll always remember Doug Williams. I'll always hate the dog-assed Cowboys, even if nobody else remembers a time when no one -- that's no one -- wore Dallas apparel in Washington and lived to tell about it.

So long.

13 comments:

helmut said...

Football is stupid. Joe Theisman is an idiot.

roxtar said...

I can get you one in business class on the Eagles bandwagon, or standing room only with the Steelers. Plenty of good seats everywhere else, although you'll probably want to end up a little closer to the Super Bowl.

The Redskins fans are dressing up in Raiders drag these days? Jesus, they really have jumped the shark....

Uncle Rameau said...

good time to be a Football Cardinal fan, as Leinert grows with a great corps of receivers... as long as the Bidwells are among the corpses...

I recently dreamt of a Monday Night in the early seventies, watching Larry Wilson, MacArthur Lane and Jim Hart. Glory days, such as they were.

And I never thought I would miss Cosell as much as I do. If you can mellow out over Cat Stevens...

Jeremy said...

Seems to me you ought to be cross posting here.

Doc Nebula said...

My boys the Bucs took a historical shellacking this last Sunday, too. Then we got back from the sports bar (you gotta go out to see a Bucs game where I've recently relocated) and SuperFiancee promptly got hit with some kind of respiratory shit that is still kicking her ass, and I should be home with her right now, but two days off work is all I can afford especially since they're gonna fire my ass if I take off any more, and I get BACK to work and the sonsofbitches have scheduled two Saturdays of mandatory overtime.

So don't cry to me about your goddam Redskins. If the fucking Bucs had won on Sunday none of this would have happened, I'm sure, and if that miserable cocksucker Simms could have gotten the team even onto the SCOREboard once, I imagine at least some of it would have been abated. (If I had to choose, I'd choose having the respiratory thing miss our house entirely; but I sure wouldn't mind if the mandatory Saturday OT had struck someone else's workplace, too.)

Besides, the Redskins kicked my boys out of the playoffs last year on the flukiest fucking pair of touchdowns I have ever seen in my goddam life. Fuck them eternally. Get yourself an honest bunch of losers, like the frickin' Bills.

Anonymous said...

Boy, that was hardcore Highlander.
Ruthless.

I just want to amen Neddie on Washington "Redskin" love gone sour.

After Daniel the jerk Snyder bought them and all their high priced "free" agent purchasing with little to show for it except mediocrity and the highest payroll since the NY effing Yankees, I just yawn and say uggghhh...what a hateful team. It mirrors perfectly what America has tuened into, has been turning into in this fall from grace, this flight from respectability.

Anonymous said...

It's taken you this long to fall out of love with the Skins!?!? For me it started slowly back when John Kent Cooke lost the team. Then it took another season or two of Daniel Snotnose's constant meddling to complete the withdrawl program.

But does it really matter any more? With free agency the way it is now, very few players stay with any team for more than a few seasons. With that constant turnover of names, and the lack of long term loyalty by the players to any given city, what's the point of fans being loyal? Every year you end up rooting for a new set of strangers.

Having said all that, I'll no doubt change my mind once the Skins get a winning streak going. I'm such a whore.

Anonymous said...

You can check out anytime you like, Neddie, but you can never leave.

Good luck trying.

Mike Kretzler said...

Helmut's right: Football is stupid.

Doc Nebula said...

Oh, yeah... I don't think Scientology allows fellatio, giving or receiving.

I mean, otherwise, it might be a fun religion.

Kevin Wolf said...

Neddie, some of the stuff you wrote last season made me wish I was more of a sports fan.

Now I'm very glad I'm not.

Kevin Wolf said...

By the way, there's always NASCAR.

Anonymous said...

Neddie, some of the stuff you wrote last season made me wish I was more of a sports fan.

Yeah, seriously. I had been looking forward to taking bets on whether or not you'd prepare the chili on the right week this year.