A few days ago I ripped into that California redneck George Allen for all his football talk, stating that he hadn't played past high school. I was wrong. He was on the team at UCLA, and he even had a football scholarship there. That's actually pretty impressive. Now, he didn't play there, and when he transferred to UVA he was mainly in charge of carrying the jock of the team's starting QB (who happened to be black) -- and the team averaged about 3 wins a year during his stay. Still, he was on the team and thus is not overstating his football background as much as I said he was.
Found this out in a Salon article in which we learn - shock of shocks - some of his teammates remember him being quite fond of the "n" word, although Allen says he's never ever used that word. I can't wait for his next tearful apology on CNN.
By the way, did any of y'all catch that? He got all blubbery about how he's seen the light and will spend the rest of his life fighting racism. Kinda made me think of when OJ vowed to devote his life to finding his wife's killer. Apparently he's got a hot tip that the killer spends a lot of time on golf courses. I bet that's where Allen goes to fight racism, too.
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Ican only hope his future racial outreach efforts are as sensitive and finely-attuned as his past work:
Shelton said he also remembers a disturbing deer hunting trip with Allen on land that was owned by the family of Billy Lanahan, a wide receiver on the team. After they had killed a deer, Shelton said he remembers Allen asking Lanahan where the local black residents lived. Shelton said Allen then drove the three of them to that neighborhood with the severed head of the deer. "He proceeded to take the doe's head and stuff it into a mailbox," Shelton said.
He was on the team at UCLA, and he even had a football scholarship there. That's actually pretty impressive.
When you keep in mind that his father was the head coach of the Rams at the time and undoubtedly pulled some strings to get him on the team it's a bit less impressive. And annoying that he took a scholarship when he could clearly afford tuition...
His father was fired as head coach after the 1970 season and became head coach of the Redskins. Coincidentally Felix transferred from UCLA to UVA and found a spot on the team waiting for him there.
Reading George H. Allen's wikipedia bio one comes to the conclusion that he was pretty much of a football badass: as personnel director for the Bears he drafted Ditka, Butkus and Sayers; as defensive coach for the Bears helped dethrone the Packers and won a championship; won Coach of the Year with the Rams; third all-time in winning percentage behind Lombardi and Madden; never coached a team to a losing record; first guy to ever hire a special teams coach. Badass.
So it's easy to see why a phone call from George "Badass" Allen would get his kid a spot on the bench.
Pussy Felix obviously wasn't actually good enough to make a team on his own and had to follow daddy around the country to be waterboy for the real players.
I have the same suspicions, Mr. F. UCLA was probably thinking more about future money donations the program from the Allen family than they were about Felix's on-field contributions. Same with UVA.
You'll also notice that Felix's bios always say he was "a quarterback". Not that he was a starting qb.
That deer's head thing is truly sick. Does anyone know of this is a common thing for racists to do? I thought it only happened in the Godfather.
OM, be sure to drop by KSK. Plenty of material from this weekend...
Excellent material, Mr. F. The China post alone was well worth the trip.
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