Monday, October 17, 2005
Football Weirdness
First the bus driving. I was driving again today and I am getting more comfortable behind the wheel. I was actually driving at the speed limit today. There were a lot of railway crossings and that is always a pain, but I am getting better at it. It is kind of funny but one part of our training is to tell them everything you are doing. After you get your licence though we don't do that kind of thing while we drive the kids around. A well, learn what I'm supposed to, to do the job right. I drive again tomorrow, but then I take a break on Wednesday before I get behind the wheel again on Thursday. There is no driving training on Fridays.
The weekend went alright, but I find that the more things I have to do on a Sunday the harder it gets for me to ask for help or volunteers to do various things on Sundays. I wrote a skit for Sunday, I preached, I taught the boys class, I planned the service for Sunday and so I was to contact those involved and recruit people to be in the skit. People were not called with a lot of time and I feel disappointed because I did not get things done quickly enough. Well this Sunday I have less responsibilities so hopefully I can do those well.
Football Report:
It was the last game of the regular season, playoffs start next week. We were already securely in second with no hope of catching first. The only thing to be decided was third and fourth and that was done before we even played. The game was not important except that this was the team that we should face in the finals (if we play as we should) so we wanted to beat them to remind ourselves we could.
While we are waiting for the ref to show up (he never did), our quarterback arrives with my friend who I asked to pick him up (it has been hard for me to get there every week so there are three of us who have given him a ride to games). My friends comes up to me and says, "I just want to warn you, XXXXXXX is drunk." Our quarterback shows up to play drunk!!! He claims to care so much of the game that he criticizes others harsher than he should, but he shows up drunk. He doesn't seem to realize what a difference it makes to his game. I don't know why, but we let him start the game at quarterback, he fumbled a number of snaps (one was terrible but the rest were workable - I was not centre) and made some wrong reads so we did not really put together much in the way of drives. He did run for a first down once, but that was the exception, he was not able to play like he can normally.
We pulled him (which he did not like) and told my friend, who gave our quarterback a ride to the game, that he would be trying his arm at the job. He had previous experience at quarterback, but he did not do well. He faced the best rusher and probably the only guy on that team that could match him for speed. We wanted to try a couple of other guys at the job, and part of me wanted to give it a try again. The first guy we tried is one of our younger players, and he had the arm, he has some speed, but he could not see the field very well nor could he call the play himself. He tried a couple of series, but there was one more guy to try before we were done so we pulled him to try our final player.
While he was warming up on the sidelines, I asked if he could call plays in the huddle or if he needed help (because I wanted to know if I had to think up plays - it is hard to do on the spot). He told me he could handle it but he did not sound confident at first. We got in the huddle and he threw a couple of completions that looked good. Then he threw a pass to a guy who suddenly found himself wide open, the defender had left his coverage to stop the quarterback from running. The receiver was suddenly open deep and he had another level of speed he could run when he has a chance to find it. A touchdown! Our first of the game. One the sidelines we (there are 5 guys who play only offense this day - we have a lot of players out this day) are talking and this new quarterback admits that he was the back quarterback at the University of Calgary. He played quarterback! He knew what he was doing and knew what we were failing to do all along! Well guess who is starting our next game at quarterback.
Part of the reason for this new quarterback getting the job next week is because of the way that our previous starter reacted to being pulled. First I told him he would play receiver so we could try some others. He flipped out, he swore at us he criticized us extensively especially other players individually, he threatened us and promised to find himself another team because he has never been pulled before. With his reaction he was told he was benched, we don't need such an attitude there on the field. He still continued to do the same as he had, out of control anger and threats. After some time he came up to me quietly later and asked if he was going to play today or if he should just go home. With the way that he was acting, and the fact that he was drunk, I told him to just go home. He left with the promise that he would not play for us again and that we could go back to the 2 win season we had before he came. I wish I had the receivers that he had when I played quarterback.
Well we have a solid quarterback for this year but we are left wondering about next year. Who will play for us? Will the team exist? The biggest question is probably if there will be a league next year, but that is a different issue. A lot happened for a game that meant nothing to us.
The weekend went alright, but I find that the more things I have to do on a Sunday the harder it gets for me to ask for help or volunteers to do various things on Sundays. I wrote a skit for Sunday, I preached, I taught the boys class, I planned the service for Sunday and so I was to contact those involved and recruit people to be in the skit. People were not called with a lot of time and I feel disappointed because I did not get things done quickly enough. Well this Sunday I have less responsibilities so hopefully I can do those well.
Football Report:
It was the last game of the regular season, playoffs start next week. We were already securely in second with no hope of catching first. The only thing to be decided was third and fourth and that was done before we even played. The game was not important except that this was the team that we should face in the finals (if we play as we should) so we wanted to beat them to remind ourselves we could.
While we are waiting for the ref to show up (he never did), our quarterback arrives with my friend who I asked to pick him up (it has been hard for me to get there every week so there are three of us who have given him a ride to games). My friends comes up to me and says, "I just want to warn you, XXXXXXX is drunk." Our quarterback shows up to play drunk!!! He claims to care so much of the game that he criticizes others harsher than he should, but he shows up drunk. He doesn't seem to realize what a difference it makes to his game. I don't know why, but we let him start the game at quarterback, he fumbled a number of snaps (one was terrible but the rest were workable - I was not centre) and made some wrong reads so we did not really put together much in the way of drives. He did run for a first down once, but that was the exception, he was not able to play like he can normally.
We pulled him (which he did not like) and told my friend, who gave our quarterback a ride to the game, that he would be trying his arm at the job. He had previous experience at quarterback, but he did not do well. He faced the best rusher and probably the only guy on that team that could match him for speed. We wanted to try a couple of other guys at the job, and part of me wanted to give it a try again. The first guy we tried is one of our younger players, and he had the arm, he has some speed, but he could not see the field very well nor could he call the play himself. He tried a couple of series, but there was one more guy to try before we were done so we pulled him to try our final player.
While he was warming up on the sidelines, I asked if he could call plays in the huddle or if he needed help (because I wanted to know if I had to think up plays - it is hard to do on the spot). He told me he could handle it but he did not sound confident at first. We got in the huddle and he threw a couple of completions that looked good. Then he threw a pass to a guy who suddenly found himself wide open, the defender had left his coverage to stop the quarterback from running. The receiver was suddenly open deep and he had another level of speed he could run when he has a chance to find it. A touchdown! Our first of the game. One the sidelines we (there are 5 guys who play only offense this day - we have a lot of players out this day) are talking and this new quarterback admits that he was the back quarterback at the University of Calgary. He played quarterback! He knew what he was doing and knew what we were failing to do all along! Well guess who is starting our next game at quarterback.
Part of the reason for this new quarterback getting the job next week is because of the way that our previous starter reacted to being pulled. First I told him he would play receiver so we could try some others. He flipped out, he swore at us he criticized us extensively especially other players individually, he threatened us and promised to find himself another team because he has never been pulled before. With his reaction he was told he was benched, we don't need such an attitude there on the field. He still continued to do the same as he had, out of control anger and threats. After some time he came up to me quietly later and asked if he was going to play today or if he should just go home. With the way that he was acting, and the fact that he was drunk, I told him to just go home. He left with the promise that he would not play for us again and that we could go back to the 2 win season we had before he came. I wish I had the receivers that he had when I played quarterback.
Well we have a solid quarterback for this year but we are left wondering about next year. Who will play for us? Will the team exist? The biggest question is probably if there will be a league next year, but that is a different issue. A lot happened for a game that meant nothing to us.
// posted by Eric @ 9:44 PM 
