You gotta love the NFL combine, guys in shorts and catsuits running 40s while scouts and other assorted geeks look on with comic intensity. It's what a cattle call would be if you measured the cattles' vertical leap, and also asked them questions designed to reveal the cattles' character -- but which actually say a lot more about the character of the questioners.
The whole deal is kind of like those scenes in "The Right Stuff" where prospective astronauts are subjected to all manner of bizarre tests while creepy doctors in white lab coats look on with utter soullessness. That's especially true during the interview process, in which questions don't just come out of left field but some galaxy far, far beyond it.
Maybe you missed it, but a former NFL defensive end named Austen Lane agreed this week to reveal some of the stranger questions he was asked during his combine experience. Again, they reveal far more about the people asking the questions than the NFL hopefuls answering them.
One guy, for instance, asked Lane if he thought his mother was attractive.
(Um, gee, dude, I don't know. Sounds like SOME-body's got mommy issues, though).
Another question: "I see you have dreads. You smoke weed, don't you?"
(Well, let's see. I'm black, I have dreads, so, yes, I must smoke dope. I guess that question explains the Trump sticker on your car).
Another question: "If you could kill someone and not get caught, would you?" And also, "If you had to murder someone, would you use a gun or a knife?"
(Wow. Two questions about killing people. Didn't I see you on a "Criminal Minds" episode?)
Now, I'm sure Lane was only thinking all that, which explains the use of italics. But wouldn't you have loved it if he'd actually responded to any of the aforementioned questions that way? And wouldn't you have loved to have seen the response from the scout asking the questions?
I'm sure his verdict would have been "Not ready for our league. Attitude issues."
Which, I don't know, I would find strange. It's the NFL. Don't you kinda want guys with attitude issues, at least to a certain extent?
One more dumb question.
Saturday, February 27, 2016
Friday, February 26, 2016
Old school, taken to school
I revere Oscar Robertson. Greatest basketball player ever to come out of the basketball state, and don't even try to argue with me on that one. You'll lose.
But I find myself respectfully disagreeing with him right now.
I disagree with him because he went on "Mike&Mike" yesterday and said, essentially, that Steph Curry was nothin' special, that there have been great shooters before and there will be again. It was a refrain a lot of back-in-the-day greats regrettably succumb to, and its language is almost always the same.
So no real surprise when Oscar said this: "If I've got a guy who's great shooting the ball outside, don't you want to extend your defense out a little bit? I just don't think coaches today in basketball understand the game of basketball. They don't know anything about defenses. They don't know what people are doing on the court."
In other words: In my day, we'd have just guarded the guy better. 'Cause we guarded people in my day.
Far be it from me, an utter nobody, to dispute a Mt. Rushmore hoops legend on matters pertaining to basketball. But I've heard this one many times before -- Old-School Joes were saying the same thing about Oscar, back in his day -- and it hardly ever carries water.
The notion that nobody plays defense in the NBA anymore, see, is as wrong as it is persistent. Part of that is the instinct to mythologize one's own glory days, and part of it is how sentiment about those days tends to fog the memory. I've watched archival clips of NBA playoff games from Oscar's era, and what always strikes me about them is how much more slowly the game was played than I remember. And how players who I could have sworn never missed a shot missed plenty, sometimes badly. And how the defense doesn't look terribly different than it does today -- especially on those occasions when Oscar or Jerry West or Elgin Baylor was putting up a 50-spot.
Great players will always get theirs, in other words. Curry's no different, except in the sense that he's taken what West or Oscar or some other legendary sniper did and lifted it to another level.
Extending your defense can occasionally work if you're talking about a great shooter with great range. But Curry is an extraordinary shooter with range that borders on the extraterrestrial. The man's loading up the second he steps across the timeline, and he regularly jacks up shots -- and buries them -- from 30 feet and beyond. And so suddenly, if you're extending your defense to take that away, you're compelled to cover almost half the floor with five players.
In the NBA, it can't be done. You extend out to take Curry's shot away, he just goes around you. He does it all the time. And if he's going around you 25 to 30 feet from the basket, there are going to be huge expanses of open space he can exploit. And so you end up getting scored on anyway.
Yes, the man can be stopped. But only if he's having an off shooting night, and only if you focus your defense solely on him. But all that means is someone else nearly as skilled as Curry is going to have a huge night himself.
Extend your defense?
Might as well extend an invitation to your own funeral.
Sorry, Oscar.
But I find myself respectfully disagreeing with him right now.
I disagree with him because he went on "Mike&Mike" yesterday and said, essentially, that Steph Curry was nothin' special, that there have been great shooters before and there will be again. It was a refrain a lot of back-in-the-day greats regrettably succumb to, and its language is almost always the same.
So no real surprise when Oscar said this: "If I've got a guy who's great shooting the ball outside, don't you want to extend your defense out a little bit? I just don't think coaches today in basketball understand the game of basketball. They don't know anything about defenses. They don't know what people are doing on the court."
In other words: In my day, we'd have just guarded the guy better. 'Cause we guarded people in my day.
Far be it from me, an utter nobody, to dispute a Mt. Rushmore hoops legend on matters pertaining to basketball. But I've heard this one many times before -- Old-School Joes were saying the same thing about Oscar, back in his day -- and it hardly ever carries water.
The notion that nobody plays defense in the NBA anymore, see, is as wrong as it is persistent. Part of that is the instinct to mythologize one's own glory days, and part of it is how sentiment about those days tends to fog the memory. I've watched archival clips of NBA playoff games from Oscar's era, and what always strikes me about them is how much more slowly the game was played than I remember. And how players who I could have sworn never missed a shot missed plenty, sometimes badly. And how the defense doesn't look terribly different than it does today -- especially on those occasions when Oscar or Jerry West or Elgin Baylor was putting up a 50-spot.
Great players will always get theirs, in other words. Curry's no different, except in the sense that he's taken what West or Oscar or some other legendary sniper did and lifted it to another level.
Extending your defense can occasionally work if you're talking about a great shooter with great range. But Curry is an extraordinary shooter with range that borders on the extraterrestrial. The man's loading up the second he steps across the timeline, and he regularly jacks up shots -- and buries them -- from 30 feet and beyond. And so suddenly, if you're extending your defense to take that away, you're compelled to cover almost half the floor with five players.
In the NBA, it can't be done. You extend out to take Curry's shot away, he just goes around you. He does it all the time. And if he's going around you 25 to 30 feet from the basket, there are going to be huge expanses of open space he can exploit. And so you end up getting scored on anyway.
Yes, the man can be stopped. But only if he's having an off shooting night, and only if you focus your defense solely on him. But all that means is someone else nearly as skilled as Curry is going to have a huge night himself.
Extend your defense?
Might as well extend an invitation to your own funeral.
Sorry, Oscar.
Thursday, February 25, 2016
Culture of denial. Apparently.
So, that sound you just heard?
Oh, it's nothing. Just the air going out of all the sanctimony coming from Knoxville, Tenn., these days.
It turned up on the national radar when Peyton Manning was mentioned in a Title IX lawsuit filed against the University of Tennessee, alleging that a culture of neglect had sprung up around its athletic programs in regard to sexual assault. Tennessee could have done itself credit had it played its hand deftly thereafter, but so far it's only strengthened the case of the complainants with some remarkably ham-handed public relations work.
To wit: That disastrous dog-and-pony show the other day, when UT trotted out all its athletic coaches to "defend" the school's athletic programs. What could have gone a long way toward making Tennessee athletics look like it gave a damn instead came off as if it indeed didn't take this issue seriously -- except in the sense of exonerating itself.
Save for a few rote platitudes, the coaches seemed more defiant than genuinely concerned with looking into the charges against their programs. It was an appalling display, particularly for the female coaches. And it only got worse when the complainants added to the suit the testimony of sophomore wide receiver Drae Bowles, who alleges that football coach Butch Jones told him he'd "betrayed the team" by trying to help a woman who said she'd been assaulted by two football players.
Suddenly all that sanctimonious whinging about the honor of UT athletics looked even more pathetic than it already was.
I don't know if Bowles is telling the truth, although I'm trying to think of a scenario in which he'd lie. Jones, of course, firmly denies the allegation. But if he's lying -- and let's face it, he has every reason to -- Tennessee's next move is obvious: The school needs to fire him.
If it doesn't, it looks again as if it doesn't take these matters seriously. And the lawsuit gains even more traction than Tennessee's fumbling around has already afforded it.
Does that mean there's a lack of commitment to protecting women at Tennessee? Maybe. Does it mean there's less commitment there than at, say, Florida State, where a young woman's allegations of sexual assault against the school's star quarterback, Jameis Winston, was treated with a wink and a nod by the police and prosecutor's office, and with going-through-the-motions nonchalance by the university itself?
Possibly.
The ugly truth is, money talks in big-time college athletics, especially in the money sports. So it's doubtful Tennessee is any more cavalier about allegations that might damage the bottom line than any other Big Five school is. Tennessee's just the school in the crosshairs right now.
I wish that didn't sound so cynical.
But then, I wish there was a reason it shouldn't.
Update: Tennessee just keeps digging.
Oh, it's nothing. Just the air going out of all the sanctimony coming from Knoxville, Tenn., these days.
It turned up on the national radar when Peyton Manning was mentioned in a Title IX lawsuit filed against the University of Tennessee, alleging that a culture of neglect had sprung up around its athletic programs in regard to sexual assault. Tennessee could have done itself credit had it played its hand deftly thereafter, but so far it's only strengthened the case of the complainants with some remarkably ham-handed public relations work.
To wit: That disastrous dog-and-pony show the other day, when UT trotted out all its athletic coaches to "defend" the school's athletic programs. What could have gone a long way toward making Tennessee athletics look like it gave a damn instead came off as if it indeed didn't take this issue seriously -- except in the sense of exonerating itself.
Save for a few rote platitudes, the coaches seemed more defiant than genuinely concerned with looking into the charges against their programs. It was an appalling display, particularly for the female coaches. And it only got worse when the complainants added to the suit the testimony of sophomore wide receiver Drae Bowles, who alleges that football coach Butch Jones told him he'd "betrayed the team" by trying to help a woman who said she'd been assaulted by two football players.
Suddenly all that sanctimonious whinging about the honor of UT athletics looked even more pathetic than it already was.
I don't know if Bowles is telling the truth, although I'm trying to think of a scenario in which he'd lie. Jones, of course, firmly denies the allegation. But if he's lying -- and let's face it, he has every reason to -- Tennessee's next move is obvious: The school needs to fire him.
If it doesn't, it looks again as if it doesn't take these matters seriously. And the lawsuit gains even more traction than Tennessee's fumbling around has already afforded it.
Does that mean there's a lack of commitment to protecting women at Tennessee? Maybe. Does it mean there's less commitment there than at, say, Florida State, where a young woman's allegations of sexual assault against the school's star quarterback, Jameis Winston, was treated with a wink and a nod by the police and prosecutor's office, and with going-through-the-motions nonchalance by the university itself?
Possibly.
The ugly truth is, money talks in big-time college athletics, especially in the money sports. So it's doubtful Tennessee is any more cavalier about allegations that might damage the bottom line than any other Big Five school is. Tennessee's just the school in the crosshairs right now.
I wish that didn't sound so cynical.
But then, I wish there was a reason it shouldn't.
Update: Tennessee just keeps digging.
Wednesday, February 24, 2016
A poet? You know it.
Grand news now from the folks bringing you the 100th running of the Indianapolis 500 in May, or at least some of the folks binging you the 100th running:
You could be the Official Poet of the race!
Yes, that's right. The Arts, Culture & Youth Committee of the 100th Running Host Committee is sponsoring a poetry contest to determine the race's Official Poet, a practice that began in the 1920s when the race program included a poem. Poets are encouraged to submit an original poem by March 21, with the winner receiving a cash prize of $1,000 and two tickets to the race, plus the opportunity to read his or her poem at the track during the month of May.
Now, the Blob is usually an Iambic Pentameter This Zone, but for something like this, it's willing to make an exception. Already snatches of something that will never be confused with Robert Frost are percolating in its trash heap of a brain:
Stuck in traffic on race-day morn,
Wishing I had never been born.
Here's a guy in the Coke lot, and I know what he's thinking:
"It's 7 a.m. Time to start drinking."
Or:
Oh, Ray Harroun, oh, Ray Harroun,
Your Marmon Wasp doth make us swoon.
Partly because
It rode history's great tide,
Partly because
Of the carbon monoxide.
Or:
I miss the turbine.
I miss the Novi.
The Blue Crown Special,
And A.J.'s Coyo-tie.
But if I had my favorites
Among cars that are fine,
It's the ones I'm in front of
In this long bleeping line.
And, finally ...
That damn Coogan went loopety-loo,
Took out ol' A.J.
And Mario, too.
But for all his misfortune,
He could say without bias,
He never did crash
Like Danny Ongais.
You could be the Official Poet of the race!
Yes, that's right. The Arts, Culture & Youth Committee of the 100th Running Host Committee is sponsoring a poetry contest to determine the race's Official Poet, a practice that began in the 1920s when the race program included a poem. Poets are encouraged to submit an original poem by March 21, with the winner receiving a cash prize of $1,000 and two tickets to the race, plus the opportunity to read his or her poem at the track during the month of May.
Now, the Blob is usually an Iambic Pentameter This Zone, but for something like this, it's willing to make an exception. Already snatches of something that will never be confused with Robert Frost are percolating in its trash heap of a brain:
Stuck in traffic on race-day morn,
Wishing I had never been born.
Here's a guy in the Coke lot, and I know what he's thinking:
"It's 7 a.m. Time to start drinking."
Or:
Oh, Ray Harroun, oh, Ray Harroun,
Your Marmon Wasp doth make us swoon.
Partly because
It rode history's great tide,
Partly because
Of the carbon monoxide.
Or:
I miss the turbine.
I miss the Novi.
The Blue Crown Special,
And A.J.'s Coyo-tie.
But if I had my favorites
Among cars that are fine,
It's the ones I'm in front of
In this long bleeping line.
And, finally ...
That damn Coogan went loopety-loo,
Took out ol' A.J.
And Mario, too.
But for all his misfortune,
He could say without bias,
He never did crash
Like Danny Ongais.
Tuesday, February 23, 2016
Charades
So the best player in college basketball sat out the first five minutes of his team's game the other day, and that raised a question.
The question: Why punish Ben Simmons of LSU for not being what he isn't, and what even the coach who punished him knows he isn't?
Which is, of course, a "student-athlete."
Simmons is demonstrably not that. What he is, and what LSU coach Johnny Jones recruited him to be, is a sheer mercenary, brought to campus to bide his time for a year before going to the NBA. And if he could put butts in the seats and help LSU win some games (and fatten the bottom line) while he was doing that, so much the better.
Well, Simmons has held up his end, averaging 19.3 points, 12.0 rebounds and 5.1 assists for an LSU team that, despite him, likely will miss March Madness. Which means his value as a mercenary has been negligible.
I'm not saying that has anything to do with Jones benching him for an "academic issue" the other day. But you've gotta wonder.
You've also gotta wonder why "academic issues" are even an issue for someone like Simmons, who is no more a college student than I am. Yet he's compelled to go along with the charade -- and Jones, by benching him, was compelled to go along with it, too.
It's an absurd state of affairs brought on by the NBA's absurd rule that you have to be at least 19 to be eligible for the draft. But then, the whole business of college athletics is absurd these days. Witness the furor over Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh deciding to use spring break as a business trip for his team, which got NCAA czar Mark Emmert all exercised.
I think I know why. Like Simmons missing class (or whatever he did), all Harbaugh's doing is acknowledging what everyone knows: That college football on Michigan's level really is a business, and the players are not "student-athletes" but employees. And that ruins the illusion Emmert and his fellow bureaucrats are especially desperate these days to preserve.
To coin a phrase: Busted.
The question: Why punish Ben Simmons of LSU for not being what he isn't, and what even the coach who punished him knows he isn't?
Which is, of course, a "student-athlete."
Simmons is demonstrably not that. What he is, and what LSU coach Johnny Jones recruited him to be, is a sheer mercenary, brought to campus to bide his time for a year before going to the NBA. And if he could put butts in the seats and help LSU win some games (and fatten the bottom line) while he was doing that, so much the better.
Well, Simmons has held up his end, averaging 19.3 points, 12.0 rebounds and 5.1 assists for an LSU team that, despite him, likely will miss March Madness. Which means his value as a mercenary has been negligible.
I'm not saying that has anything to do with Jones benching him for an "academic issue" the other day. But you've gotta wonder.
You've also gotta wonder why "academic issues" are even an issue for someone like Simmons, who is no more a college student than I am. Yet he's compelled to go along with the charade -- and Jones, by benching him, was compelled to go along with it, too.
It's an absurd state of affairs brought on by the NBA's absurd rule that you have to be at least 19 to be eligible for the draft. But then, the whole business of college athletics is absurd these days. Witness the furor over Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh deciding to use spring break as a business trip for his team, which got NCAA czar Mark Emmert all exercised.
I think I know why. Like Simmons missing class (or whatever he did), all Harbaugh's doing is acknowledging what everyone knows: That college football on Michigan's level really is a business, and the players are not "student-athletes" but employees. And that ruins the illusion Emmert and his fellow bureaucrats are especially desperate these days to preserve.
To coin a phrase: Busted.
Monday, February 22, 2016
A lap for the ages
I saw 2006, as the shadows lengthened and Denny Hamlin chased the freight train down Daytona's backstretch for the last time.
I saw May in Indianapolis and Sam Hornish Jr. too far back to reel in Marco Andretti, until he reeled him in. It was the suddenness of it that stole your breath: One second Hornish was hopelessly adrift as he chased Marco into turn three on the last lap of the Indianapolis 500, and then they were through turn four and he was eating up the ground between them in voracious gulps. And then ...
Well. Then he caught Marco, passed him less than 200 yards from the yard of brick, beat him by a nose.
Fast forward to late Sunday afternoon, and deja vu all over again.
With a lap to go Hamlin was fourth and moving to the outside line with Kevin Harvick, the Daytona equivalent of a last-second heave from midcourt. Coming off two he was getting a push from Harvick but still hopelessly adrift of the leaders, Matt Kenseth and Martin Truex.
And then ...
Well. Then you blinked, and suddenly -- before the freight train even reached turn three -- he was right there. I don't know how he did it. Harvick pushing and skillful side-drafting by Hamlin, most likely. But, as with Hornish and Andretti, it looked like an optical illusion.
One second he was far too far back;.the next he was eating Kenseth alive with a huge run to the outside, and Kenseth was moving high to block. And then Hamlin was cranking the wheel and shooting the gap between Kenseth and Truex with the best Daytona move I've seen since Jeff Gordon going low to squeeze past Rusty Wallace back in 1999.
After that it was drag race, and Hamlin beat Truex by inches.
I've been watching Daytona 500s for a long time. That was the best finish I've ever seen.
It beats out by a nose Harvick edging Mark Martin on the last lap in 2007, and the fabled 1976 finish when Richard Petty and David Pearson crashed each other out coming off turn four on the last lap, and Pearson had the wherewithal to keep the clutch in and the motor running and limped under the checkers to win.
This was better. And if there was a throwback sense to it, it came partly from what Hamlin said when it was done.
Brand loyalty has always been a thing in NASCAR, but now there are so many brands the loyalty part weirdly gets lost sometimes. Not yesterday. Yesterday, Hamlin was calling it a win for Team Toyota, which had never won the Daytona 500 but dominated this running, finishing 1-2-3 and taking four of the first five spots.
Just another throwback moment on a day that rang with them.
I saw May in Indianapolis and Sam Hornish Jr. too far back to reel in Marco Andretti, until he reeled him in. It was the suddenness of it that stole your breath: One second Hornish was hopelessly adrift as he chased Marco into turn three on the last lap of the Indianapolis 500, and then they were through turn four and he was eating up the ground between them in voracious gulps. And then ...
Well. Then he caught Marco, passed him less than 200 yards from the yard of brick, beat him by a nose.
Fast forward to late Sunday afternoon, and deja vu all over again.
With a lap to go Hamlin was fourth and moving to the outside line with Kevin Harvick, the Daytona equivalent of a last-second heave from midcourt. Coming off two he was getting a push from Harvick but still hopelessly adrift of the leaders, Matt Kenseth and Martin Truex.
And then ...
Well. Then you blinked, and suddenly -- before the freight train even reached turn three -- he was right there. I don't know how he did it. Harvick pushing and skillful side-drafting by Hamlin, most likely. But, as with Hornish and Andretti, it looked like an optical illusion.
One second he was far too far back;.the next he was eating Kenseth alive with a huge run to the outside, and Kenseth was moving high to block. And then Hamlin was cranking the wheel and shooting the gap between Kenseth and Truex with the best Daytona move I've seen since Jeff Gordon going low to squeeze past Rusty Wallace back in 1999.
After that it was drag race, and Hamlin beat Truex by inches.
I've been watching Daytona 500s for a long time. That was the best finish I've ever seen.
It beats out by a nose Harvick edging Mark Martin on the last lap in 2007, and the fabled 1976 finish when Richard Petty and David Pearson crashed each other out coming off turn four on the last lap, and Pearson had the wherewithal to keep the clutch in and the motor running and limped under the checkers to win.
This was better. And if there was a throwback sense to it, it came partly from what Hamlin said when it was done.
Brand loyalty has always been a thing in NASCAR, but now there are so many brands the loyalty part weirdly gets lost sometimes. Not yesterday. Yesterday, Hamlin was calling it a win for Team Toyota, which had never won the Daytona 500 but dominated this running, finishing 1-2-3 and taking four of the first five spots.
Just another throwback moment on a day that rang with them.
Sunday, February 21, 2016
Harmonic convergence
I'm taking the kid today.
I'm taking the kid even though, at 41, the kid is no kid anymore, and his identity is no longer indelibly tied to his father's. That will happen, 15 years after the father goes into the wall at Daytona and dies, leaving an entire American culture bereft of its Elvis. Time moves on. Someone else eventually wheels a stock car with that forward-leaning No. 3 on it. The kid grows up, becomes one of the leading voices of the sport his father once so thoroughly dominated, becomes, in the way of these things, his own man.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. is not his father. And so if he is beloved, 15 years after that black day at Daytona, it is no longer merely because he's the son of Dale Earnhardt, but because he is Dale Earnhardt Jr., whose equanimity has survived the crushing weight of expectation and come out whole on the other side.
In other words: He's a good and remarkably well-adjusted man. Despite everything.
And yet, today is as much about his old man as it is about him. It's about all those memories flooding back, 15 years along.
How gently that iconic black 3 car nosed into the wall two turns from the finish, and how cruelly deceptive that was. How frantic the track workers were when they reached the car and peered inside, he first sign that something was horribly amiss. The sight of the ambulance leaving the track at a walk, with the sirens off. And then the benediction from Darrell Waltrip that none of us realized immediately was a benediction.
"Hope Dale's OK," he said in the midst of celebrating his brother Michael's victory that day.
Which meant Waltrip already sort of knew Dale wasn't OK.
Wider America discovered something about NASCAR that day, and for days afterward those of us who'd been around it for awhile tried to explain it. NASCAR racing was more than just rednecks driving the wheels off loud, fast advertising billboards. It was more than a sport, really. It was indeed a culture -- a certain way of looking at things in a changing nation that scared that culture not because there was reason to be scared, but because it wasn't what they were used to.
NASCAR, though, made sense. Earnhardt -- blue collar, up from nothing, king of his world -- made sense. And so came the adulation, the outpouring of grief, the thousands of fans silently holding up three fingers on the third lap of every race the rest of the season.
Fifteen years along, some of them still do that. Fifteen years along, the engines will fire again today along pit road in Daytona, and spring will become real for some of us the way 65-degree days in February make it real, and here we go, here we go.
Fifteen years along, I'm taking the kid. Because you never know.
Harmonic convergence might actually be a thing.
I'm taking the kid even though, at 41, the kid is no kid anymore, and his identity is no longer indelibly tied to his father's. That will happen, 15 years after the father goes into the wall at Daytona and dies, leaving an entire American culture bereft of its Elvis. Time moves on. Someone else eventually wheels a stock car with that forward-leaning No. 3 on it. The kid grows up, becomes one of the leading voices of the sport his father once so thoroughly dominated, becomes, in the way of these things, his own man.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. is not his father. And so if he is beloved, 15 years after that black day at Daytona, it is no longer merely because he's the son of Dale Earnhardt, but because he is Dale Earnhardt Jr., whose equanimity has survived the crushing weight of expectation and come out whole on the other side.
In other words: He's a good and remarkably well-adjusted man. Despite everything.
And yet, today is as much about his old man as it is about him. It's about all those memories flooding back, 15 years along.
How gently that iconic black 3 car nosed into the wall two turns from the finish, and how cruelly deceptive that was. How frantic the track workers were when they reached the car and peered inside, he first sign that something was horribly amiss. The sight of the ambulance leaving the track at a walk, with the sirens off. And then the benediction from Darrell Waltrip that none of us realized immediately was a benediction.
"Hope Dale's OK," he said in the midst of celebrating his brother Michael's victory that day.
Which meant Waltrip already sort of knew Dale wasn't OK.
Wider America discovered something about NASCAR that day, and for days afterward those of us who'd been around it for awhile tried to explain it. NASCAR racing was more than just rednecks driving the wheels off loud, fast advertising billboards. It was more than a sport, really. It was indeed a culture -- a certain way of looking at things in a changing nation that scared that culture not because there was reason to be scared, but because it wasn't what they were used to.
NASCAR, though, made sense. Earnhardt -- blue collar, up from nothing, king of his world -- made sense. And so came the adulation, the outpouring of grief, the thousands of fans silently holding up three fingers on the third lap of every race the rest of the season.
Fifteen years along, some of them still do that. Fifteen years along, the engines will fire again today along pit road in Daytona, and spring will become real for some of us the way 65-degree days in February make it real, and here we go, here we go.
Fifteen years along, I'm taking the kid. Because you never know.
Harmonic convergence might actually be a thing.
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