Looking for my next 50 cents

KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Let’s say you had the pleasure of being handed a million dollars.  That million is yours, but it comes with a catch:  you aren’t allowed to use more than fifty cents of it every year.

My million dollars is witnessing sporting events of all sorts – high school, college, and professional – drilling through press conferences and media days, breaking news surrounding a controversial player or team, or maybe even placing the occasional call to a police department or the NCAA. 

All of it is my treasure. 

The catch to my million dollars, of course, is trading in a skill I learned long before I learned to write – I am not allowed to cheer. 

Allegiances to teams, years in the making, were boxed up the day I graduated from Washburn University – put away with my pennants, crazy college pictures, and my personal feelings.

Okay, that’s not entirely true.  I steal my cheering moments at home, at a local bar with friends when I’m not covering an event or even attending games as a fan every so often. I mean, even we media types have to remember our humanity once in awhile.  And, I’ll be honest; sports are a heck of a lot more fun with sizzling bratwursts and a responsible tailgating beer or three.

That said, I work most of the time.  I step inside the press box or sit on press row, places where fun is the enemy and egos and politics hang thick like Darryl Jenks’ slick Soul Glo locks.   

No cheering isn’t a suggestion, it is a rule, the rule, and regular, monotone, loudspeaker announcements dutifully remind the assembled media of this. 

Sometimes, however, and maybe this is why I love athletics as much as I do, a play or a performance sneaks up and transcends any silly no-cheer rule.  The regular dour faces give way to smiles and excited chatter. For a few moments, as Nike said, we’re all witness.

Those instances are my fifty cents, and, secretly, I live to spend those two quarters each and every time they are dropped into my hand because they don’t happen nearly enough.

That’s what happened in the Dev Nelson press box at Bill Snyder Family Stadium last Saturday.

Texas A&M visiting Kansas State didn’t sound like much of a matchup before the game, and truthfully, it still doesn’t looking back.

The Wildcats entered the game season on the brink, having been drubbed the week before by Texas Tech.  The Aggies brought the nation’s fourth-ranked offense to Manhattan.  Nobody wearing a press credential was terribly excited to see how the two teams mixed.

That was before A&M fumbled, and the Wildcats scored on a Daniel Thomas run just two minutes into the game.

“Cute,” some in the press box said.

After Josh Cherry added a short field goal and Thomas found the end zone a second time in the first quarter, some were mildly amused while others probably found the Wildcats’ early offense as gimmicky as they found K-State’s traditional Harley Day.

Just getting started, Thomas notched his third and fourth touchdowns of the first half, and an Aggie turnover set up Grant Gregory’s 16-yard strike to Collin Klein with 10 seconds remaining in the half. 

38-0, and the press box was abuzz.  Old men were giddy.  Gary Coleman gallantly rode through the room on a tricycle, handing out sugar cookies and balloon likenesses of a golf-cover Willie.

Alright, so Gary wasn’t there (sadly, neither were the balloons), but for the first time this year, the media was shocked into allowing itself a little bit of fun while covering Kansas State football.

A young man sitting next to me, a former Division II football player and good guy, was felled by the moment, reduced to repeating “Are you KIDDING me?” about as many times as the Wildcats scored in the first half.

Of course, head coach Bill Snyder’s team did nothing to quash the moment, scoring two touchdowns in the first 1:10 of the second half and blowing out any chance of a Texas A&M comeback.

I don’t remember the last time a game so powerfully reduced a press box’s inhabitants to what the media normally so masterfully attempts (and succeeds) to avoid – being fans, regardless of the teams in front of them, with a responsibility to truthfully report what happened on the court or field.

Walking out of the Vanier Complex after completing postgame interviews, I asked some of those around me if they had ever experienced a work environment like that one.  The closest anyone could muster was the 2003 Big 12 Championship at Arrowhead Stadium, which makes sense.

That game’s turnout was 100-times more unexpected than last Saturday’s, but I could see the similarities.  Ironically, I attended that game as a fan – having not yet become part of the media.

Moving forward, it is very hard to tell what the rest of K-State’s football season has in store.  In my preseason picks, I did not pick the Wildcats to win another game after defeating Texas A&M.

It would be easy to get wrapped up in last week’s result, but as I said the Wildcats were abnormally bad at Tech, I think they were abnormally good against A&M. Where the team ultimately settles between the two performances is anyone’s guess.

What the team’s latest performance does, however, is move some of those games I thought might be “unwinnable” to “interesting,” and those “interesting” matchups to “why couldn’t they?” – including this week against Colorado.

The season will play out as it will, and as a fan of the game of football, I hope those contests I cover have me begging to spend next year’s 50 cents.  It’s all I ask.

Heck, even if it next comes while covering a Division II basketball non-conference game someday, for those positive life/work experiences like last Saturday’s, I would gladly pay a whole lot more.


Send your comments to curtiskitchen@810whb.com.