NEW YORK - Joel Carey is your average, bandwagon sports fan in the Northeast. He sits on his hands every week of the fall at Giants Stadium, and last week traded in his Navy Blue Jeter jersey for a Royal Blue Reyes. A Pace graduate, Joel has never had a Division I-A college football team to call his own. Not to worry, though. For most of his adult life, he has followed the Miami Hurricanes. However, recently that fact has begun to change, causing a dangerous existential crisis that threatens the core of Carey’s very being.
“I sensed the beginning of the end a few years ago, during that Ohio State game” Carey waxes longingly. Riding the wave of an unprecedented winning streak, the favored Canes fell in overtime to the Buckeyes in one of the most hyped games in some time.
“You could tell, we just weren’t Miami anymore. Coker wasn’t getting it done. Going 29-8 in three years? That’s completely unacceptable. It’s just not the Miami I grew up with, in my thirties. Two or three losses a season might as well be lowering themselves to Criminole or Hokie territory. And unlike with pro football, having that kind of complete disaster of a season doesn’t even get you the number one overall draft pick!”
2006 was the last straw for Carey, albeit not for reasons you might expect.
“The arrests? That’s nothing, in fact I live for that stuff. I remember when I ran into Willie Williams after a game at the Orange Bowl a few years ago and he stole my wallet. I was just beaming, I didn’t wash that pair of pants for weeks.”
Last season, the offense continued to sputter, and recruiting continued to suffer under the new academic restrictions imposed by Miami chancellor Donna Shalala.
“No, it was the losing that turned me off for good. And I don’t have the patience for Randy Shannon to start recruiting thugs who can play again. I’m through with these losers.”
Does Joel have any plans for the future? He reports considering pledging allegiance to USC, but has some misgivings.
“My buddy Bill told me that his uncle plays golf with Pete Carroll’s chauffeur. He’s totally leaving for the NFL this year. Living in LA is giving him skin cancer and all kinds of sexually transmitted infections.”
No, that certainly won’t do at all. Like every other ignorant bandwagon college football fan in America, Carey has decided to hitch his wagon to Charlie Weis’s considerable backside.
“Notre Dame, yeah. That’s the ticket. They have all the tradition in the world. Twenty seven national championships, that’s one more than Alabama! Yeah, I can feel it now, telling my stupid friends that cheer for Michigans to ‘Kiss the Rings’, that’s going to be awesome! How can you go wrong with Jimmy Clausen leading the offense? Forget Miami. I’m now Irish till I die, until that Baylor program gets off the ground anyway.”
