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My fame is getting annoying. I just wanted to be left alone on the Wake Forest football field last Saturday during the team’s annual Spring game when next year’s starting quarterback, Mitch Griffis, entered my space.
“You’re Sammy Sportface. You’re that sports blogger who writes about the Wake Forest football team off and on depending on if we win or lose and whether you can emotionally control yourself. Can I have your autograph?”
“Mitch I’m kind of trying to lay low. I don’t want to draw a big crowd around me.”
“Come on, Sportface. I read your blog after we turned the ball over eight times against Louisville and you wrote about eating eight apple turnovers while that happened. That blog lifted my spirits at what was a low point in our season. It taught me the value of overeating to drown your sorrows. You’re doing important work, Sportface. I need your autograph so when you croak I can tell my grandkids I knew you.”
“Mitch I’ll give you my autograph under a few conditions. First, promise me you won’t throw five interceptions in five minutes like Sam Hartman did against Louisville. Promise me when you guys go to Death Valley this Fall you win the game. Promise me you’ll beat Carolina and throw for more yards and touchdowns than Drake Maye. And promise me you’ll win the ACC Tournament, go undefeated, and crush Georgia in the national title game.”
“I can’t promise that Sportface,” said Griffis. “We lost a lot of seniors and this will be my first year as the starting QB. And as you could see during today’s Spring Game, we didn’t get any five-star guys to play cornerback and safety so we are probably going to get beat deep constantly again this season.”
“I can’t stand another season watching that,” said Sportface. “Sportface will not be signing autographs today. If I give you one, the other 98 guys on the team will want one, too. When you’re rich and have dozens of followers like me, you can’t be all things to all people.”
“I thought you loved Wake Forest football,” he said. “I would think you would love for our players to jock-sniff you.”
“Sure I like being jock-sniffed. But being a Wake Forest football fan isn’t healthy for my moods, Mitch. I fly up and down and all around. I get hopeful you’ll win and go way overboard in my pre-game rituals, sending photos to my friends, and watching games on the jumbotron outside the stadium four hours before kickoff. When you win, I overreact. When you lose, I overreact. A national championship is what I crave and I need you guys to do that so I can get together with my Wake friends in some sunny place and do splash dives in the hotel pool after hoisting the national title trophy over my head with you guys carrying me on your shoulders. I want that. I need that. Before I die, this needs to happen. But when it doesn’t I get somber and down and despondent and turn inward. Time is running out in my life. A Wake Forest national title needs to happen soon or I’ll never know what that feels like.”
Griffis starts to back away.
“Maybe I don’t want your autograph. You sound like a creepy old curmudgeon. I thought Sammy Sportface was the biggest Wake Forest football fan in the world besides TJ and DJ. Sounds like you’re disloyal. You don’t have faith in us. You turn against your alma mater, the great academic institution that is Wake Forest that gave you five Ds. I look to you as an older person for wisdom and maturity. Instead what I see is a whiney self-centered overweight guy who needs to get over himself.”
“You’re so right, Mitch. This is about my issues, not Wake Forest football. This is about Sammy Sportface being ill-equipped emotionally to handle watching his alma mater’s football team lose football games. My priorities are out of whack. I need to become more balanced. It’s a struggle.”
Staring at the ground, Sportface turns and starts walking out off the field in Truist Stadium.
“Hey Sportface,” says Mitch. “Catch these.”
He tosses Sportface eight apple turnovers. Sportface catches them, goes to the Wake Forest team bench, and eats all eight of them, alone, head down, re-watching YouTube highlights of the eight turnovers against Louisville
No one else comes up to him for his autograph.
“Eight turnovers,” Sportface mumbles to himself. “Only way to cope with seeing that happen again is to eat eight apple turnovers.”
Go Deacs.
Author Profile
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Sammy Sportface, a sports blogger, galvanizes, inspires, and amuses The Baby Boomer Brotherhood. And you can learn about his vision and join this group's Facebook page here:
Sammy Sportface Has a Vision -- Check It Out
Sammy Sportface -- The Baby Boomer Brotherhood Blog -- Facebook Page
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