Tadpoles and Somersaults

BobLee
January18/ 2000

…. On a beautiful Autumn Saturday afternoon in Kenan Stadium the loudest cheers are for (1) a girl basketball player, and (2) somersaulting cheerleaders… you can figure it’s not going too well for Carolina Football.  That would be correct.  BobLee gets into all that.  … Meanwhile in “The Carter” Daniel shows he’s human but just barely.  The State Fair opens but the sideshow freaks took a wrong turn and ended up guess where? …. If you thought CaroLoonieLand was a bloody slaughterhouse BEFORE …. you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet ….

The best way to describe it would be “The Star Wars cantina scene meets Jason Voorhees and Freddie Kruger at The Little Big Horn”.

   The past ten years have seen turmoil aplenty within Triangle-area collegiate sports especially if one includes “Duke Lacrosse” in that broad category.  Simultaneously with all that has been the evolution of the phenomenon of Internet message boards.

One of the reasons that digging up old bromides about “hanging Dean in effigy” and “they gave Beamer six years” and “it was just one pair of sneakers” does NOT apply to New Millenium sports fandom is these public access mosh pits.  They did not exist during those old days scenarios.  For that matter neither did AIDS, Ebola Virus and Kim Jung Il.  Or Paris Hilton …  maybe that’s why we call’em “the good old days”.

I feel confidant in saying on October 14 that by December 1, John Bunting will no longer be the Head Football Coach at UNC.  How will that eventuality be orchestrated?  I’m not sure that anyone knows what will transpire twixt now and then.  “Maybe” it will actually be conducted in a dignified professional fashion that will not cause Bill Friday, Erskine Bowles and Andy Griffith to burn their diplomas …… naaah.

It would be nice if we could simply play out the remaining six games in some sort of reasonably competitive fashion sans incidents on AND OFF the field.  It would be nicer still if the team rallies and manages to win one or two of the remaining games “for Coach Bunting”, or “for themselves”, or “for all those howler monkeys slicing their wrists and throwing feces at each other.

There is nothing in recent history to say life could be so uncomplicated.

We told you last week that the media monster will demand to be fed … ergo one or more key UNC administrators will be goaded into making a public statement about “the Carolina football program”.  Whatever they say will be highly combustible and will simply make matters worse.  Of course “saying nothing” will make matters worse too.  I guess what I’m saying is that 

“it’s all going to GET WORSE”!

    Carolina venerable “Punxatawney Mo” has already spoken.  Like the legendary Pennsylvania groundhog, UNC’s benevolent Burlington benefactor Maurice “Mo” Koury attracts microphones and satellite trucks whenever there’s a wisp of smoke coming from Carolina athletics … there be a bit more than a wisp these days.  Even before “the South Florida Bulls ran roughshod thru the Kenan china shop”, “Mo” proclaimed that it was hard to see progress in Carolina football.  “Mo speaks” is a traditional rite of passage usually occurring a few weeks before Steve Kirschner starts polishing the water pitchers for a “presser” in the Skippa Bowles Hire’em and Fire’em Room in the Smith Center.

Somewhere between “Mo speaks” and “get out the water pitchers” you can count on a 3-ring circus of geeks, freaks, Keystone Kops, Little Rascals, bloodthirsty fuzzy-cheeked know-it-alls, 45 y/o Little League rightfielders and more bloviating human hairballs than Bill Gates and Algore ever imagined when “the Internet” was being conceived.

Since they have already been thru the prelims of “lets all send Dickie an e-mail” … “lets all send Moeser a letter” … and now even “lets all send the BOT a flaming bag of dog poop”, one can only imagine what truly ludicrous demonstrations of angry mob insanity await.

Using NCSU’s recent “Herb Must Go … Now Whatta We Do?” campaign as a benchmark, I’m betting our CaroLoonies can establish new depths of abject fan base embarrassment for “the University of The People”.  If you thought Charles Kuralt’s Utah mistress was “something” just watch the next six weeks.  I’m betting Stu Scott wears a Dook sweatshirt on SportsCenter by Thanksgiving.  Heck … Mad Mohammed The Not-A-Terrorist might burn his UNC meal card and claim Central Prison as his alma mater of choice.

Did you hear that John L. Smith and Sylvester Croom have both “bought lots in Governors Club”?  Really?  Yep, done deal!  … is he kidding?  It’s true, I read it “on the premium board”! … gotta be true then.

Of course no matter what embarrassment these no-life cyber sickos bring to bear on a once proud institution, they will justify their idiotic behavior ala Timothy McVeigh, Ted Bundy, and Mark Foley.  They will rant and spew and rationalize under the handy umbrella of “That Damn Dickie made us do it”.  That one diminutive and well-intentioned little administrator could single-handedly cause such chaos is rather remarkable.

Between now and mid-late December, UNC will find itself a new head football coach.  The criteria that will be used by a quite credible search committee will be totally different from Dickie’s Wild Ride of six years ago.

Selfishly, as a humorist, I could not have asked for a better time than that.  I’m sure you all recall … armed with his toothbrush in one pocket and an NCAA Coaches Directory in the other pocket, Dickie purchased a “See America” Pass from Greyhound and set out on a memorable scavenger hunt that would have worn out Diogenes or even Ulysses.

This time will be much more conventional.  The Swagger crystal ball shows a “search committee” headed by someone who has “actually done something notable” in their life.  I don’t have a name but I am confident that such an individual does exist within the UNC alumni base.  Rick Dees maybe … or Dan Cortese … or Lewis Black … or the Henderson Street sniper … or Nakhtar Ndijae.  OK … relax, I’m pretty sure it won’t be Nakhtar.

Hey, I know … MIKE NIFONG!  He’s a UNC Law alum and certainly “accomplished”.  How many folks do you know that have single-handedly ruined the reputation of an entire city?

Yes … Mike Nifong will head the “search committee” composed of the perquisite diverse hodge podge of transsexual dwarfs, faculty squirrels, Meez’s Filipino house boy “Enrique”, Jack Evans’ lawn gnome and, of course, Mikey’s gal pal and also UNC alum … “Kim The Embezzler” fresh from her Andy Warhol 5 minutes on 60 Minutes. 

And I guarantee you they are not coming back with anyone named BUTCH DAVIS or any of the other “Big Name Coaching Legends” that the aforementioned “angry mob of loonies” will be screaming for 24/7 over the next six weeks.

   How crazy could it get?  I’d say the liklihood of Dawn Bunting riding a Harley thru “the Pit” dressed like Rambo and swinging an ax handle is about 68% depending upon the final score in Hooville.

As I have said before, and will be reminding you periodically in the weeks to come ….. If you don’t think this is going to be funny as hell … you just aren’t paying attention.  But just keep checking in right here and BobLee’ll make sure you don’t miss anything. 

 Aye Zigga Zoomba … y’all!

 >>><<< 

Who is/was Rick Dees?

>>><<<

   John Matuszak played in North Dallas Forty … also Caveman w/ Barbara Bach.

   There is actually nothing “funny” about well-intentioned men who simply come up short in their efforts to succeed at something.  That a savage public has to demonize them and create elaborate conspiratorial fantasies in order to publicly humiliate them is a sad testament to society.  …. Men such as John Bunting and Dick Baddour regrettably reveal their shortcomings in a public fishbowl and they and their families suffer the slings and arrows that come with such a high profile public life. …. that they are willing to compete on such an unforgiving stage is to their everlasting credit.  

   Want to e-mail BobLee?

[email protected]

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