Sports writer

Found myself a little part time gig this fall, covering sports for Riverparishfootball.com

My new boss is a little excited.... So am I...

P.S. I still need a DAY job ...

Who Dat

My black and gold feather boa wreath has been tucked away in a plastic bag in my closet since February, along with several pairs of over sized black and gold Mardi Gras beads, an assortment of Fleur de Lis and a black and gold rendition of the American flag.

I took them down -- reluctantly - after the Saints' humiliating loss to the 49ers in the second round of the playoffs. Like every other loyal Who Dat, I wasn't ready for the season to end just yet. And certainly, not like this -- losing in the final seconds of the game on a play every Who Dat in America could see coming.

I was embarrassed.  We expected more than this. We were better than this.

At the time, I posted to my Facebook friends -- a group that includes a large amount of fellow fans as well as several sports writers and other assorted newspaper folk -- that I felt like a spouse in a really good, strong marriage. I still loved my Saints, I said,  but I was really, really mad at them.

Then came the rumors about "Bountygate." The Saints were being investigated for having a bounty system in which players were paid bonuses for not just hitting opposing players, which they are paid to do and expected to do and do well, but for trying to actually hurt them, cause injuries, have them carted off the field on a stretcher. And the coaches not only knew about this,  but instigated it.


Then, I posted, I felt like the Saints had cheated on me.

Well now I feel like they got her pregnant. With twins.

Yesterday the NFL brought the hammer down on our beloved Saints, the team that lifted a region and indeed a whole nation from the mud and the muck left in Katrina's wake. Coach Sean Payton, suspended for a year. General manager Mickey Loomis, suspended for eight games. The team fined $500,000. Our former defensive coordinator, who allegedly organized the whole thing (I'm a crime writer now), banned indefinitely (and that's a good thing).

But it hurts like hell.


Some of my fellow Who Dats are angry, insisting that Commissioner Roger Goodell is picking on "us," making an example of "us," trying to insure that we will NOT  be the first home team to ever host a Super Bowl (Super Bowl XLVII is in New Orleans next February). Really?

Some are insisting that every team is doing it (so it must be OK) and we are being singled out. Or that we did nothing wrong.

Only a handful -- like me -- believe we got what we deserved.

As a sports writer for 23 of my 25 years in this business -- and as a fan for all of my life -- I know that football is a violent sport. Hitting is part of the game. Injuries are part of the game. And hard hits are rewarded, with pats on the butt, slaps on the helmet, stickers, Player of the Week honors, spots on the All-Metro team and championship trophies. But when a player intentionally sets out to injure and or maim another -- even for what we consider to be pocket change -- well, that's crossing the line. And that's what we did.

I am a long-suffering fan. I endured the humiliating losses, the humiliating seasons, the jokes, the 'Aints. I once wrote "Don't laugh," when I was asked to select my favorite team on my Sports Illustrated subscription card.

And the night "we" won the Super Bowl, I took my daughter and danced in the street, celebrating with unprecedented joy the end of our suffering.

But now our halo is crooked and our one shining season is tarnished. People are talking about asterisks next to our name.  We are, once again, a laughingstock. Worse, we are said to be "dirty."

But I still believe.

So I will hang my wreath on my front door in the fall -- heck, maybe even tomorrow.  I will cheer for them this season and next, no matter who coaches them, no matter who quarterbacks them, no matter who runs the ball into the end zone. 


But I am embarrassed. I expect more than this. We are better than that. 

Who Dat.

The final horn

20 years.

More than 300 Friday nights. A few Thursdays and Saturdays. One or two Sundays.

I've frozen. I've sweated. I've been eaten alive by mosquitoes.

I spent one whole night in the company of a giant banana spider, but didn't know it until I was ready to leave.  Another right beneath a very active bee hive.  And there have been more wasps than I care to remember.

Oh, and the pigeons in the million dollar City Park Stadium.

I've eaten more than my share of chili dogs and nachos and jambalaya and sunflower seeds. And just ask my dentist about the Jolly Ranchers.

I've seen more tiny towns in Louisiana than I ever cared to. Benton. Farmerville. Iota. Cecilia. Avoyelles. Vidalia. Acadiana. Scott --  just to name a few.  Most were wonderful adventures filled with warm, friendly people. And food.

Some were not.

There was the time I arrived in one tiny little town where the temperatures reached the 20s and snow threatened to fall.  I naively told the press box staff that I was in this far off land to cover the visiting team. The home team in the warm and cozy press box promptly pointed at the tiny visiting press box on the other side. I got there and found no room at the inn, thanks to a not-even-local radio station.  Me? I had to watch the game, keep my stats and write my story on top of the visiting press box. In the snow.

There were the 7 o'clock games I had to get to for 3, otherwise there would be no room at all. Games I barely made. Games I thought would never end. Games I didn't want to.

And never a deadline missed. Not a one.

I've pretty much seen it all in 20 years as a sports writer.  Great games. Great plays. Great players -- before they were famous. The Manning boys, Peyton and Eli, back when they were boys. (Sat next to dad, Archie, in the stands when Eli played basketball.) Dawan and Laron Landry. Corey Webster.  Mike Scifres. Ed Reed.

Then the men in ties told me I wasn't any more. A sports writer. I was a crime writer now. And a receptionist. I was benched. And it broke my heart.

So I found a way to stay in the press box, offering to do what I did for free. I did stats for the local high school where my husband coaches, where my stepson coaches, where all our friends are on Friday nights. It kept me in the game. Kept me in the press box.

But last Friday night, was different.

It was the big rivaly game. Hahnville vs. Destrehan. A series that dates back to 1946. A game I've covered more than a dozen times. One of the ones I had to be there for 3.

But this time, I wasn't in the press box. I was in the visitor's stands.

And it hurt.

It didn't just hurt my heart, which so wished I would be writing it up for the next day's editions. It also hurt my back. And my hips. And my legs.  It was cold. The bleachers were hard. And I am getting old.
 
It's hard to admit that, but it's true.  And 20 years of hunching over stat sheets in cheap plastic school chairs or beat up old office furniture that has been exiled to the press box -- or no  chairs at all -- have taken their toll.  The hips and the back are shot. I have a semi-permanent hump in the middle of my back. And bleachers are not my friend.

There have many times over the years when I have wondered how long I would be able to chase teenaged boys. The fact is,  I can't any more. The truth is, I don't want to.

So, last Friday night was my last high school football game. This time, I decided.

The team's season is over. And so is mine.

Next year I'll take the Friday nights off.  Hopefully, The Coach and I will be able to stay home with the new grandbaby my stepson and his wife are expecting. Or maybe we'll go out to dinner. Or, maybe we'll just stay home and play a game with our daughter.

That won't hurt at all.

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