I'll apologize in advance: this is going to be a long post. 

I was thinking this evening about why I love the sport, game, and all of the associated elements with American football.  I think the love of the sport was cemented by playing.  In high school I played every year.  I was not a great athlete then, nor am I one now.  I was never a standout, didn't win any awards, and wasn't given the merest hint of a look by a college - any college.  That didn't bother me, however, nor does it bother me now.  For in my high school days, now almost twenty years ago, I didn't play for glory or a reputation; I played because I loved it.

As I started thinking about it, I realized that I have only fractured memories of those days.  I can't tell you about the games or the opponents to any degree.  There was a game in my junior year that was a special game; I'll get to it later because it deserves mention all its own.  No, my memories are shards of moments in time.  Lounging in the spacious gym with the lights off, laughing because one of the team leaders had covered his entire torso with Mineral Ice.  The damn fool ended up running around and doing exercises because he was so cold!  We laughed like fools, and then joined him, for we too suddenly realized that Mineral Ice is damn COLD stuff!  I remember my head coach talking about getting hit in the 'nacho chips.'  Why he chose 'nacho chips' as a metaphor for taking one in the privates is beyond me.  But that was his description.  The practice field was pitted and baked, hard as a rock and scarred.  We prayed for rain, and the one day that we got a torrential downpour, we played for a long time in fumble (oskie) drills.  Everyone who participated was covered head to toe in glorious, stinky, slimy mud.  Coaches wouldn't let us enter the gym to get to the locker room without taking the hose to us.  The explosion I had one practice when we were running the same play over and over, and the punk sophomore in front of me knew it, and kept diving inside, resulting in me getting screamed at by coaches for not doing the proper thing.  I recall yelling back, feeling as angry as I'd ever felt in my life.  That next play the little punk sophomore got driven backwards ten yards and then I pancaked his sorry butt.  I was a tight end in those days, and getting pancaked by a tight end had the rest of his buddies teasing him.  The practice my junior year after a game in which we were blitzed to death, and got crushed.  The toughest guy on our team that year was the full back.  My job, on the scout team, was the inside linebacker, and my job was to blitz every single play.  His job was to block me.  We ran at each other from 5 yard distances, and I don't think my head ever hurt as badly as it did after that practice.  I noticed that he was as exhausted as I was after that long practice.  I remember the dreaded rippers, and how they sapped the strength and the wind after twenty or thirty yards, but giving up meant failure, and that wasn't an option, either. 

My senior year I was a two-way starter for Burgettstown High School.  We were a bad team - I think we won one or two games.  I remember the second game of the year.  The defense had the defensive end flexed out a yard or two wider.  I remember that I was totally baffled by that, and missed block after block.  The coaches were screaming at me on the sidelines, and Saturday morning's film session was equally pleasant.  I made my first catch in that game, though, a short 'pop' play (as we called it) that went for twelve yards and a first down.  The only problem was that I got hit hard in the side of my knee.  I remember being told not to show any pain to the opponent; that's hard to do when your knee suddenly refuses to work.  I remember the 'rain game' in which the thunderstorm's downpour was so powerful that we could barely see the sidelines.  The coaches couldn't get the defenses called, so I called my own.  For a play or two; then the lightning forced a halt, and we continued the game on Saturday afternoon.  On that game I crushed a running back when the opponent ran a misdirection play and I wasn't fooled; in that same game I got beat by a running back on a passing play that resulted in the game-winning touchdown.  I didn't jam him at the line - that was my mistake.  I remember the Homecoming game in which I was wide open by twenty yards...and the pass was thrown tantalizingly out of my reach.  I remember playing against someone who worked at the same restaurant that I did, and that on one play I had to block him, and I drove him backwards 15 yards while the running back had his hand on my back, guiding me to block as he followed me downfield. 

On the season's final game we were once again 1-9, facing Washington High School, who again was one of the top AA teams in the state.  There wasn't any surprise in this game.  They beat us, beat us up, and kicked us sadly to the curb.  I had a big twenty-five yard catch in that game, and it was thrown somewhat behind me.  I had to turn and jump for it, and two defensive backs hit me at the same time.  I don't remember feeling any pain; I'd caught the ball.  Later, at the school dance afterwards, I was told many times about how great that catch was, and it felt really damn good.  But other aspects of that game weren't so good.  I was literally tossed aside by a defensive player that had inches, weight and strength on me.  He then crushed our running back.  Our running back didn't finish that game; he separated his shoulder as a result of that big defensive end (but not on that play that I distinctly remember). 

My junior year was a difficult one for me.  I was almost good enough, but not quite, and the sophomore who was playing the inside linebacker position that should have been mine was (in truth, now) a much better athlete.  He was the right player for that game.  However, on a magical night which I'll never forget, he was yanked, replaced by me, and well, this is how it turned out.  This was the night of my life in terms of sports achievement.  You might read this and believe that there isn't much to it, and perhaps you're right.  But it's my highlight.

It was the fall of 1990.  Burgettstown High School carried a 1-8 record into the season's final game.  Wash High had always been our biggest rival.  A few years prior both our school and theirs battled for our conference supremacy.  Going back a few years, Wash High and my school had battles that were reminiscent of the 70s Raiders/Steelers wars.  Accusations about letting the grass grow too high were made to slow down Wash High's faster, quicker backs.  It was our Super Bowl.  I remember that week clearly.  We chanted all week "Beat Wash High" during practice.  Then, on Friday, we got our traditional season finale dinner - a steak dinner.  All week that Beat Wash High had become our mantra.  We installed a new defense - a 4-3 scheme we called the Diamond.  But our secret weapon was an offense borrowed straight from the NFL - the Silver Strech offense.  It was Detroit's Run n Shoot offense in the late 80s, and we set that up.  Wash High that year, coming into that game, was 9-0 and ranked second in the AA classification in PA.  They had not given up more than 1 TD in a game all year.  Their 4-4 defense was so good that no one could run on them, and their lineman and 'backers so fast that the passing game didn't have a prayer, either.  Guy Montecalvo was their coach, a highly respected local coach, and a very good one.  We had a quarterback known for more his 'endowment' and his stupid looks than his ability to play the game.  But we had a spread offense, something that no one had dared run against Wash High all year, and something they weren't expecting.

The game started with our offense on the field in our spread formation.  Their linebackers were looking around in confusion.  Before the game we'd kept up with our Beat Wash High mantra, and seeing their defense looking around in bafflement added to it.  But we didn't do much in terms of scoring.  The first quarter ended with us down 14-0 and it looked all the world like the game was going to end.  The second TD was a run that went right through the sophomore linebacker that had taken my starting position.  He was pulled; I was told that I'd be going into the game.  I knew the defense, knew my responsibilities, and was ready.  On the ensuing kickoff, we got the jump that we needed with our kick returner took it to the house.  Our place kicker was in the honor society, and was kind of a fat kid, and a nerd.  The nerd kicked the extra point using the soccer-style motion.  On the very next possession for Wash High, when I was in the game, I got the two best two plays of my entire football playing career.  A blitz was called, and it was a pass play.  I shot the gap, and the QB saw me coming but I reached out just enough and got his shirt.  I twisted away and brought him down with me.  A sack!  The next play was a sweep exactly in my direction.  All year we'd been taught to read and react; read the play and shoot the gap.  I did it exactly and perfectly as coached, shooting the gap and burying their good RB in the backfield for a 3-yard loss.  We forced them to punt, and then our offense, the goof-ball QB, tough RB, and tall, lanky WRs, moved the ball steadily down the field.  Our spread baffled them; they couldn't figure it out.  Next thing you know, a TD pass was thrown to a diving WR on a quick slant.  The nerd kicked his 2nd straight extra point.  Score: 14-14.  It remained that way.  Our locked room was loud and jubilant.  It felt like a win to us; we'd just managed to forge a tie game with one of the state's best schools.  Their vaunted defense was being picked apart by our spread attack.  I was a hero in the locker room as well, with the only sack of the first half and that 3-yard tackle for a loss. 

The second half had us going up 21-14 after the nerd kicked yet another extra point.  The offense had again moved the ball steadily against their vaunted defense, and still, their linebackers couldn't react to our offense.  On defense we continued to play well, our Diamond defense making it hard for them to run against us.  I can't remember what was different about that defense.  It might have been nothing - just a ploy to get us to think we were doing something else.  But whatever it was, it was working.  We stopped them again.  Then, they did manage to score, but they missed the extra point.  We held a slim 1-point margin.  Somewhere in there was a play in which I took the hardest hit of my playing life.  I was following the play, scraping off as the backside linebacker.  Out of no where I was hit as hard as you can be hit in high school ball.  I remember that for the next two plays I had very little idea of where I was, what I was supposed to do.  On the tape you can see that I'm woozy even.  But I didn't leave the game.  Later, after watching the game film, I saw how the fullback had peeled off, saw him, and just unloaded on me.  Not fun.  We scored our fourth TD of the night.  The nerd kicked his fourth extra point.  Then, on the ensuing kick-off, he reached out in desperation and just managed to clutch the shoulder pads of the returner; without his stand-out play of the night, he would have scored easily and perhaps that game wouldn't be nearly as memorable for me.  But he held on, and even the late TD Wash High scored didn't change the game.  We won the game, and the celebration was on.

There's a picture of our team on Wash High's field.  We look like we won the Super Bowl.  Steam is rising from our bodies, and there are muddy faces split with wide, youthful grins.  The final score was 28-27, and Wash High's season was ruined; they lost the next week in the first round of the playoffs.  We'd taken something out of that team that year.  In the locker room after the game, the celebration was tremendous.  But then I remember the bus ride home being utterly silent.  No one had any energy left to celebrate.  We'd left it all on the field.  Every last ounce.  I ended up that game recording 4 tackles total along with my 1 sack.  On Monday we held our final film session.  The coaches bought Big Macs for everyone.  I'd never eaten a Big Mac before that Monday afternoon; I don't think I've eaten one since.  But that hamburger was the best hamburger you could ever taste.  We walked around the high school that Monday Lords of all that we surveyed.  The flim session was a joyous event, as all of the big plays were celebrated.  The kicker's kicks and last-gasp tackle.  Our kickoff return for a TD, and the 3 TD plays we earned later in the game.  The antics of our mad-man middle linebacker moshing by himself, with himself, in the middle of the field. 

I think that in one respect I was lucky with this game.  Some athletes taste one kind of glory of a local or state championship.  Others maybe have a signature win or two.  But not that many people have the win that no one can see coming, when the underdogs through pure luck or pluck pull off the tremendous upset.  It was Applachain State beating Michigan - that's what our upset felt like.  We had no business beating Wash High that year, and yet we did it.  So I got to taste the glory of that kind of win, perhaps one of the rarest team wins you can have, especially in high school football. 

It was in those days of August two-a-days, and summertime lifting sessions, that my love of football were seeded.  I remember not liking practice but loving the games, and despite losing records, having fun playing the game.  I remember the disappointments of the losses, and since they were so rare, the thrill of the wins.  I remember bits and pieces now, and they are both highlights and lowlights, but they are mine.  I think that it takes time and distance to appreciate those moments.  As a college student I wouldn't have placed the same degree of importance on those events.  They were, after all, the things that most western Pennsylvania high school kids did.  We played football; that's what we did.  But time and experience has changed those memories.  They are more than they were, to me.  They are routine in many ways, but they are important.  And cherished.  They are the root of a love affair with the game of football.  This is why I'm a fan.  This is why I love football.