Trego's Mountain Ear

I’m not particularly interested in football.  In my freshman year at LCHS, Calvin McRae asked me “Why aren’t you out for football?  You yellow or something?”  I gave my explanation – that I was 13, had no drivers license, and lived 20 miles from the school.  He had the power – I got two years of D’s in PE.  On the other hand, he did not get my 6’3” body out for any sports.  Coach Cal wasn’t particularly good at motivating me toward group sports.

A couple of days ago, I saw that Mercury Morris had died.  The headlines described his career with the Miami Dolphins – but I had seen Mercury Morris in only one game.  I think it was in the Fall of 67 -with nothing else to do, and admission already paid for as part of the college activities fee, I went to a football game.  (My memory errs – wikipedia assures me that the game was in the fall of 68)

The game went to West Texas, 35-20, and MSU played a dogged year of averaging 3.4 yards per carry.  Not bad – I think MSU tied as Big Sky Champions that year – but the excitement was watching Morris run past the MSU defense time and again.  As I looked at the obit, I realized that it was the one time that I watched a single great athlete on a field filled with very good athletes.

As I look at his 8-year professional career, followed by prison for cocaine possession, I guess I have to realize how lucky I was to watch him play football in his final year of college.  Life magazine described that year for him:

“He plays on the fringe of big-time college football, where the stadiums are half-deserted, the star’s scrapbook fits in his watch pocket, and cows graze just beyond the practice field…..Now in his senior year, Morris at 21 may be the most exciting running back in college football.”