Wolf
08-25-2007, 04:33 PM
In 1986, my dad and I attened an Oiler preseason game. (Yes, even then, 21 years ago, greedy NFL owners required season ticket holders to purchase preseason games as part of their package.) Then, like now and likely forever, there really wasn’t much sizzle to the exhibitions and thus, no reason to go, really. But we paid for them, Goddamn it, so my dad was going to attend come hell or boring football.
So we packed our dinners (my enterprising dad always brought food to the games in those days even though the Dome did not allow you to do so. He would hide it in his binocular case and then not spend a dime while at the stadium. Suck it, Bud!) and headed to the Dome, expecting to be bored and then bored silly watching future cuts try not to out suck each other.
And then it happened. A blur of baby blue broke across the middle, caught a pass, and then turned it upfield. He broke a tackle. He outran someone else. And we were… why, gosh darn it, we were rising out of our seats. We were (gasp!): excited. And then it happened again. Blur. Catch. Run. For many Oiler fans at that time, we had grown used to watching Tim Smith make catches and then fall down. He was, in the purest sense, a possession receiver: good hands, no speed.
THIS, however, was no possession receiver. His grand entrance into all of our consciousnesses forced us all onto the concourses to buy a program we had scoffed at an hour earlier as “a waste of money.” We hurriedly flipped through the pages for the rosters… who was this #81...?
Number 81, as it turns out, was Ernest Givins, a rookie wide receiver from, of all places, Louisville – a basketball powerhouse at the time. Regardless (or, were I Spencer Tillman: Irregardless) of where he was from, this guy blasted fresh out of a cannon and we loved it. He ran across the middle with reckless abandon. He made catches in traffic. He took hits and kept going. And he was fast. My God, was he fast. By game’s end, we were all abuzz about our new rookie wide receiver. And Givins was no flash in the pan. He would catch 61 balls his rookie season, averaging 17.4 yards a catch. He would add 148 yards rushing, including a 43-yard touchdown gallop, bringing his season total yardage (including 8 punt returns) to 1,290 yards with four touchdowns.
I was reminded of Ernest Givins Saturday afternoon while watching Jacoby Jones glide into the end zone at the end of his electrifying 80-yard punt return. He had looked good (but raw) in his first preseason game, flashing enough to think he might have a future in this league. Some day. But that future might be today after watching him carve up Arizona. It was 1986 all over again.
http://www.houstonprofootball.com/slant/slant82.html
So we packed our dinners (my enterprising dad always brought food to the games in those days even though the Dome did not allow you to do so. He would hide it in his binocular case and then not spend a dime while at the stadium. Suck it, Bud!) and headed to the Dome, expecting to be bored and then bored silly watching future cuts try not to out suck each other.
And then it happened. A blur of baby blue broke across the middle, caught a pass, and then turned it upfield. He broke a tackle. He outran someone else. And we were… why, gosh darn it, we were rising out of our seats. We were (gasp!): excited. And then it happened again. Blur. Catch. Run. For many Oiler fans at that time, we had grown used to watching Tim Smith make catches and then fall down. He was, in the purest sense, a possession receiver: good hands, no speed.
THIS, however, was no possession receiver. His grand entrance into all of our consciousnesses forced us all onto the concourses to buy a program we had scoffed at an hour earlier as “a waste of money.” We hurriedly flipped through the pages for the rosters… who was this #81...?
Number 81, as it turns out, was Ernest Givins, a rookie wide receiver from, of all places, Louisville – a basketball powerhouse at the time. Regardless (or, were I Spencer Tillman: Irregardless) of where he was from, this guy blasted fresh out of a cannon and we loved it. He ran across the middle with reckless abandon. He made catches in traffic. He took hits and kept going. And he was fast. My God, was he fast. By game’s end, we were all abuzz about our new rookie wide receiver. And Givins was no flash in the pan. He would catch 61 balls his rookie season, averaging 17.4 yards a catch. He would add 148 yards rushing, including a 43-yard touchdown gallop, bringing his season total yardage (including 8 punt returns) to 1,290 yards with four touchdowns.
I was reminded of Ernest Givins Saturday afternoon while watching Jacoby Jones glide into the end zone at the end of his electrifying 80-yard punt return. He had looked good (but raw) in his first preseason game, flashing enough to think he might have a future in this league. Some day. But that future might be today after watching him carve up Arizona. It was 1986 all over again.
http://www.houstonprofootball.com/slant/slant82.html