While watching the Patriots-Panthers preseason game last Saturday night, I saw a commercial for the “Super Bowl Collection”–Super Bowls I-X and XI-XX in 5 DVD collections. Well, if they have up to 20, they’ve got to have plans for at least up through 30, so I scrambled online to Amazon.com to see what I could find out. Good news: Super Bowls XXI-XXX comes out the first week of November. Score! Just in time for my birthday and the holidays. I wrote in my profile that the only thing that would beat this would be 5 DVDs of just Steve Young.
Hmmm….
If Bill Simmons was allowed to program a whole weekend of NBA TV, during which he did a 24 hour Larry Bird marathon, I think I am allowed to give a list of Steve Young moments I want on DVD or on a weekend of NFL Network (well, provided I have NFL Network at the time it airs. That’s my next goal in life. 1) Graduate college. Done. 2) Move to Boston. Done. 3) Get NFL Network. Still working on it.)
So I thought about it as I went to bed. And here’s a partial list.
1) Super Bowl XXIX. A no-brainer. (And can I just say that while I was looking on Amazon for the DVDs, I finally finally found the 1994 San Francisco 49ers season yearbook video. You know, the collection they make for every Super Bowl Champion? I think the Patriots one is called “3 Games to Glory II” or something like that. I should know this by heart–that and “Still We Believe: The Red Sox Story” is for sale absolutely everywhere. Well, anyway, I finally found it–I didn’t own it originally because I was too young to order it when it came out. Guess what I’m buying after I finish buying my textbooks?)
2) The Deflection Return. I forget the team it was against, but it’s when he threw the ball, and two defenders jumped up in tandem to deflect it. They succeeded…but who ended up catching it?
Steve Young.
For years, my father has defended Young in any discussion about great quarterbacks by saying one sentence. “Only one quarterback that I can remember has ever caught his own pass.”
3) The Run Against the Vikings: October 30, 1988–This is when Young was still a backup. Legend has it that this run was the first time Chris Berman said, “He could….go….all….the…way!!!!!” I am unsure as to if this is true, but when I was in middle school, that run was used all the time in highlight reels. Of course, I didn’t see it when it happened: I was all of 6 years old and was a tad more concerned with first grade at the time.
4) The Spike Against The Bears, NFC Divisional Playoff, January 1995–I mentioned this in my 5 Hottest Quarterbacks entry in January. The Bears just were steamrolled over by the Niners, and it was the first and I think only time I ever saw Steve Young spike the ball after he ran it in for a touchdown.
5) “There’s Joy in Mudville” The 94 NFC Championship Game– If you lived in Western NY in January 1995, even if you hated the Niners, you loved this game, because it denied the evil Cowboys a third straight Super Bowl. I still have the newspaper from the day after that game, and the lead headline of the sports section reads, “THERE’S JOY IN MUDVILLE,” commenting on the soggy state of Candlestick Park during that game.
6) Monday Night Football Opener 1994, Niners vs. Raiders–This is when Jerry Rice broke some record that I’m blanking on against the Raiders. The Raiders were never even in it. I loved that game. I have the newspaper clippings from he day after that game somewhere in my mess of a room (I just moved into a new apartment. Don’t ask me where anything is.)
7) The Comeback II: Niners v. Packers, 1999: I remember screaming at the television with my entire family. We couldn’t believe they had finally beaten the Packers in the playoffs. I had given up on that game too–my father had actually walked into the kitchen, resigned that the Niners had lost. And all of a sudden, Owens made that catch and they won. Great ending. Young’s last playoff victory.
8) Any Niners game where James Brown broke in during the third quarter to say, “With the Niners up a gazillion to 3 against some really bad team, we are now switching you to a more competitive contest.” I only want those because I never got to see the rest of those games because we were switched out of them.
Those are the immediate 8 that I think of off the top of my head. There are definitely more, I just need more time and more resources around me to figure them out.
Consequently, this past week, ESPN Page 2 named Young’s 1994 season sixth out of the 100 greatest individual seasons in the past 25 years. Right on, ESPN. He was the highest ranked football player. Argue what you may, but I think Steve Young takes whatever accolades he can get, considering he’ll probably have to wait a while to get into the Hall of Fame (throwing my famous Hall of Fame trip off by a few years), so let him have this little one.
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So I have become a fantasy football junkie. For the first time in my life, I have been invited to play–and not just in one league, but in two. I am going into this hard-core. I am determined for this not to be a repeat of my fantasy baseball league, where I lost all hope back in June. I haven’t won since the end of May. This is because I barely know baseball. I know enough…but not enough to really succeed. I gave it a good shot though.
But the thing with fantasy football is…well, I know football. Now, had I done fantasy football when I was 15, I would of seriously kicked everyone in the world’s butt, as I regularly did with football picks during my entire adolescence (and as I still routinely do now that I’m entering my mid-20s–eek, in 4 months I will be in my mid-20s. Freaky moment right there.) So this should ultimately be far less embarrassing than baseball was.
Out of my two teams, I have to say the Boston Bearcats outdoes The Bearcats (okay, I lack all imagination with team names.) And this is because of one reason: I drafted one far later than the other–aka, I had more time to research. Unfortunately, The Bearcats is in the most competitive fantasy football league you could probably ever be in (otherwise known as the MCFFLYCPEBI….or not.) I swear, the commish (one of my good friends from Ithaca) should probably change the league’s name to that. But not to fret–the core of both my teams is exactly the same: McNabb and T.O. My dad and I agreed that has the makings of an excellent team. It also could completely tank, but let’s hope they’re as prolific as they are being made out to be. Both my defenses totally rock as well: New England in one, Baltimore in the other. Speaking of Patriots, I also have David Givens, i.e. the only football player Marsha knows because she was forced to watch the Super Bowl and thought he was the hottest. He’s also a pretty good wide receiver. I know, I know, WRs don’t make fantasy teams, running backs do. Well, I do have to say I’m set with The Bearcats on the RB front: Bettis and Staley. Hate the Steelers, love their RBs. Anyone whose nickname is “The Bus” gets on my team.
So as of Thursday, we will see if I can contest in the land of fantasy football after a good two years of wanting to be a part of a league. Of course, I’ll still pick games. I need to back up my ego on something.
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On the non-football front, the last week has been nuts. I moved into a new apartment and started my graduate assistantship with the Student Activities Office at Boston University. So far it is an awesome position–the office, the professional staff and the students are great. We went on a retreat to the Cape and it was very informative and a lot of fun. I just have to get used to not being student staff, but on par with the professionals. It can be very confusing. I’m still working for my Boston Mom at PERD (my boss there, Barbara, has been amazing this summer–she has become like my best friend in Boston, or at least my second mother) as well. I love my jobs…except for the florist. That is on the backburner. I’ll be there when I have time…which looks to be never.
My new apartment is nice as well, and Caitlin and I are busy reliving freshmen year at Ithaca. Caitlin’s first day in the apartment, we had crab rangoon. It’s just like three years ago…except we’re 22, not 18, we’re in an apartment in Chestnut Hill, not Tracy’s and I room in Terrace 5 and we’re in grad school, not undergrad. Oh, and the crab rangoon is not from Jade Garden on the Commons, but Chang’s House on Commonwealth Ave.
I should mention my two weeks of Olympics devotion–even though my Summer Olympic devotion is far far less involved than my Winter Olympics devotion is. For one, I was way disappointed in the makeup of the women’s gymnastics team–no “Scrunchie Girl.” Plus, I honestly don’t think Annia Hatch deserved a silver medal on vault. She’s a consistent vaulter, but not an awesome vaulter. In the individual vault event, there were at least two, three people better than she was. Plus, how can you leave off Holly Vise? It was just a weirdly put together team, but they did get it right with Courtney Kupets and Carly Patterson. Swimmers are fun to watch, but since I can’t swim all that well, I can’t relate. And that’s about it. Give me figure skating, hockey, and bobsledding over softball, beach volleyball and basketball any day.
I don’t know when I’ll get the chance to post again, but I’ll try my best to make it soon!
First off, he called ESPN “dumb.” Oh Steve, for all of your smarts, you can sure put your foot in your mouth sometimes. Like the time you called out Phil Simms on national television. I despise Simms as well, and think he was wicked overrated as a quarterback (just like his son), but I’d never call him out on it on national television.