Briar Patch
(Page 2 of 2)
If you're wondering how much it costs to make an elevator smell like a wallet, and only a complete degenerate wouldn't wonder, the tab was $50,000.
YOU'VE GOT TO BE A FOOTBALL HERO TO GET ALONG WITH THE BEAUTIFUL GUYS
It should be interesting to note how the keepers of Texas Stadium revise their record books between now and the opening of next fall's football campaign.
No player—not Calvin Hill or 0.J. Simpson or Larry Brown or Duane Thomas, wherever he may be—had, prior to last February, been able to (1) gain as much as 209 yards rushing in a single afternoon, (2) race 92 yards from scrimmage for a score, or (3) account for five touchdowns in a single game.
Linda Jefferson, a 5-4, 135-pound running back for the Toledo Troopers, did all three and then some as women's professional football, of all things, was added to the state's sport menu.
Long before the visiting Troopers and the brand new undefeated, untied but untested Dallas Bluebonnets lined up for the opening kickoff, the enthusiastic public address announcer had repeatedly informed the 2,842 eye witnesses that they would, right there in the luxury and comfort of the finest football stadium on the planet, be "seeing history in the making." The crowd responded with appropriate enthusiasm. Bed sheet banners waved in the stands insisting that "Everything Goes Better With Bluebonnets On It" urging the hometown gals to "Tromp the Troopers."
The latter was no small task since the three-year-old Toledo team, part of the six-team National Women's Football League, has never been defeated.
Still, the Bluebonnets made it interesting, sending two Troopers to Irving Community Hospital with a broken arm and fractured ankle respectively ("We're gettin' 'em, offense. That's two down. We're wiping those broads out ...") before falling to a 37-12 defeat.
One may be tempted to take the whole thing lightly; but a second glance at defensive tackle Bobbie (Super Sugar) Grant, a none-too-dainty 265 pounds, should dispell any such notions.
Women's professional football is, for that matter, not all that new. It has been with us, safely restricted to the East, for six years now. A Cleveland show business agent named Sid Freedman is the father of the WPFL and is listed as owner of every woman's team in existence—except the Dallas franchise. It is owned by a group of Dallas businessmen headed by Sears buyer Al Mathews who is also the general manager.
Mathews recognized the vacuum that existed in the Southwest. Last fall he placed an ad in a Dallas paper urging any women interested in becoming members of a pro football team to contact him. Twenty nine responded that same day and the Bluebonnets were off and running.
Mathews, next in need of a coach, remembered friend Richard Benat who had been a halfback of modest achievement at Dallas' Bishop Dunne High School and the University of Bridgeport (Conn.). When Mathews found him he was nearing the end of his first season as an assistant coach at his alma mater.
"Al called," the youthful and dead serious Benat recalls, "and we chatted for some time. Then he asked me how I would like to coach a professional team. I was beside myself. Then, he told me it was a women's team." Nevertheless, Benat agreed to return to Dallas where his time is now split between coaching the Bluebonnets and selling insurance for Penn Mutual.
"The first thing we did," he notes, "was to weed out the strippers, women wrestlers and dopeheads from those who answered the newspaper ad. What we now have is a 42-woman roster made up of the finest young ladies I have ever been associated with."
The team is composed of women ranging in age from 17 to 27 who, almost without exception, were outstanding as high school basketball, softball or tennis players. They are, they will collectively admit, tomboys who simply never grew out of playing boys' games. While most are single or divorced, there are four married players on the team. Cheryl Griffith, currently sidelined with a knee injury, is spending that time generally set aside for practice taking care of her five children. Defensive end Willie Johnson leaves her three with a babysitter when she leaves for practices on Saturday and Sunday afternoons and the regular Wednesday night "skull session."
Among the Bluebonnets one will find several students from Dallas' El Centro College, one Texas Women's University drop-out, a North Texas State ex, one holder of a Master's degree, numerous secretaries and one certified public accountant. There are two nurses and one inhalation specialist who comes in handy when a teammate has the breath knocked out of her.
Which is very likely since neither the Bluebonnets nor the Troopers did much that would generally be considered lady-like during their recent encounter. Let it be said that they do not play football as you would expect girls to play unless you count the occasional pulling of long hair which flows from beneath a number of helmets (such a deed is illegal, punishable by the same 15-yard penalty which accompanies clipping and the grabbing of a face mask).
Save for less than picturesque kicking and the inability of quarterback Barbara O'Brien to keep a spiral on the ball when attempting to throw deep, the game was remarkably similar to that played by the menfolk. NFL rules govern the women's game with the lone exception being that they play 12-minute quarters. There was vicious tackling, imaginative offensive and defensive alignments, powerful running from Bluebonnet fullback Jody Williams, dazzling open field work from the high scoring Ms. Jefferson and all the delightful grunts and groans NFL Films brings into your homes weekly.
All for contracts which assure each player a paycheck of $25 per game, stock in the franchise and a bonus if any profit is realized. Needless to say each worked for minimum wages during that first game.
"It was," said fullback Williams, who gained 72 yards on 17 carries, "the greatest experience of my life. I love it. And I'm going to get my number changed to the same one Walt Garrison (of the Dallas Cowboys) wears."
Which brought your admittedly inexperienced women's pro football writer around to one final question: "Is there anything, uh well, different about the protection you wear from that worn by men?"
Jeri Chesser, a defensive tackle who works in a Dallas stock brokerage firm, fielded the question. "All we are allowed to say is that, yes, we have special padding . . . but the coach has told us not to discuss it any further."
Should the popularity of women's football grow as Mathews predicts ("We'll be selling this place out in two years…") , Playtex might well have to add a new garment to its line.
SPRING SCHMALTZ
I am an Easterner. The harbingers of Eastern spring are crocus and robins. The first, a brave flower that spears through dead leaves and old snows to bloom; the robin, a bird whose little migratory red breast has been copyrighted by childhood.
If I waited for them in Texas, I could wait forever. The surest signs of spring are the flowering peach blossoms, forming pink and white pearls along the branches; the generous green grass which suddenly grows so quickly and lavishly, that responsible people have a never-ending race with the lawnmowers to tame it down.
But mostly the sun. I have heard predictions that in a few months, just when other U.S. springs are becoming ripe, Texas switches to summer. And like an eclipse, it becomes dangerous to look at the sky or to fling yourself on the grass for a tan; that unless you're surrounded with air conditioning, it's hard to breathe out and breathe in, that scorching and parching is the sun's summer business.
If that's so, then this spring is doubly precious. The sun is filmed in blossoms and blue sky with a few grazing, sheepish clouds; eavesdropping, nut-picking squirrels flood the market; mamma birds run catering service all day and sing so strongly, they seem to be piped in. And the wind is balmy as a first class ocean cruise.
The evenings, when the wind settles down, are perfection, beginning with a blazing sunset that seems to mimic every calendar set-up. The warmth blankets down in the grass, or hangs like freshly washed clothes from endless lines of branches.
I've heard Texans brag about the bigness of their state, the strength of their cattle and a whole twanging list of infuriating etcs.
But the greatest Texas treasure, to me an outsider, is the graceful weather and bouquet of March and April. Can't bust em. These are the real spring sale days—when happiness is free. The best commercial, run off by the weather man, predicts mild weather and calm winds.
Pages: 1 2
My Library
