Bob Dinsdale and former NFL running back Ricky Watson sat in the booth and called the game for the audience at home. Bob said “First and ten on the Wolves thirty four after a first down on an offside penalty. This offense needed that, it needs something. They have been in a rut for the last three games, and their have been calls for Crenshaw’s head and have his backup come in.” Ricky said “Being down six to one of the lowest scoring teams in the league, and those two INT’s in the second quarter have this crowd up in arms, and coach Hicks at wits end. He needs to do something big. Crenshaw is capable of it, but he just hasn’t done it. When he’s hot he’s hot, when he’s not he’s ice cold, and he’s been ice cold of late.”
“BRASH SEVENTEEN BRAVO! BRASH SEVENTEEN BRAVO! SET!” Andy Crenshaw, third year quarterback in the league waited and looked over his line, watched the defense, saw they were gonna send in the corners, and he knew he was gonna have to get a quick release. They had called B17B, a play that had an extra man back to handle an extra rusher on his blind side. Andy barked out “Hut.. HUT!” waiting a moment between huts to try to draw the defense offsides.
Didn’t work.
The crowd buzzed, there was something in the air, and it wasn’t just the smell of beer and brats. The usual loudmouth drunks made the usual noise. They barked out the normal stadium fare for a football game. Screamed comments like “You SUUUUUUCK CRENSHAW!” “LET’S GO WOLVES!” “ARRRRARRR ARRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” ” WE WANT MORGAN!” rang out from those few, as the rest were busy actually watching the game to bark out anything as play was about to begin. They knew there would be plenty to bark about later.
Andy took three steps back and the pocket was already collapsing around him by the time he got that far. He could hear and smell Rasheed breathing down his neck, and saw his giant hands reaching for him past the rookie OL on his right, Bobbie…something. Andy’s eyes darted across the field trying to figure out where his guys were, seeing if they were in the right place.
“The pocket collapses around Crenshaw…” “Here comes Wallace down the middle”
Andy was pissed that he’d been picked twice already this game and wasn’t gonna give them a third because he rushed anything. Fuck that, he thought, as he rolled left, against the grain and away from R-Dawg, who overshot Andy and rolled right with the help of the rookie O lineman. Then he saw the corner coming in at him.
He almost laughed. He could see the kid was coming in too damn fast and was going to end up behind him no matter what happened. Andy ducked and tucked as he came in, and felt the kids arms fly over him as he sailed past. Luck and pushing too hard in the wrong direction put two defenders behind him. He knew he would have at least a second to get a glimpse down the field and see his receivers. He expected to have at least one lineman in his face where he was.
“Ellis FLIES past Crenshaw, who escapes left, the field is WIDE open in front of him…”
He was shocked to see no one in front of him and twenty yards of space directly in front of him, and an open receiver was the closest man in front of him. “RAY!” And threw the ball directly at his numbers. Or tried to. As Andy threw the ball his arm was hit by R-dawg and sent the ball flying closer to the sidelines than Andy wanted.
The RAY he was throwing to was his Tight end, Ray Pearson, a fifteen year vet and one of the few NFL’ers who was playing in this splinter league, since he found no NFL team willing to sign him. Ray was not normally in his NFL tenure a catching tight end, he was normally a blocker, but he found a niche here in the IFL as a pass catcher.
Andy didn’t see what happened next. R-dawg and D-lineman Marcus Gillespie both landed on him. All he saw for the next few seconds was R-dawgs hands on his facemask and Marcus’ fat ass.
The ball was coming in wide right and head high on release, which meant it would be a little short, and Ray corrected for all three. He ran up to the ball and while he was he heard the footsteps of someone coming in on him. He knew who it was gonna be. Doug Collins. Doug was 6 inches shorter and fifty pounds lighter than Ray. Ray waited for the right moment, stuck out his left hand and straight armed Doug. Doug hit his hand and then the deck. And caught the ball one handed.
“Pearson with an amazing one handed catch and stiffarm, he turns upfield at midfield…”
Pearson turned and ran, hearing more footsteps as he did. I was faster 10 years ago, he thought, five years ago I’d have broken free here. But after an additional five yards the defense caught up with him and he was hit by two defenders simultaneously. They grunted as they collided with him, as did he, safety Greg Lindsay hit em high from his right and D’Sean Bowers caught his feet. The three thudded and skidded a few extra yards and came to a halt at the Bulls 42.
Ray jumped up and raised his head high and howled and the crowd howled with him.
“And gets double teamed and taken down at the 42, a twenty four yard gain! First down Wolves! Ricky said “A nice play that shows the vision of Crenshaw to get the ball to the open man. A spectacular job of holding off that deep penetration into the backfield by Gillespie and Wallace by rookie Rob Brinkman, from my alma mater, Mississippi State…
Crenshaw got up with a grunt, rolling away from the two bull rushers. R-Dawg got up with a jump, then helped his teammate Gillespie up “Almost got him, Gill. Almsot got him. We’ll get’em next time.” Then he turned to Crenshaw and said “Next time, white bread!” While pointing in his face. Crenshaw grabbed his hand and said “You ain’t getting me next play. Next play is a running play, R!” And Crenshaw pointed down the field with two fingers and said.”First down”
“Oh shit! It’s like that, is it? And Rasheed pushed Crenshaw, who was rocked by the shot but not too badly. Crenshaw pushed back, and in a matter of three seconds all the players from both teams that were on the field swarmed the area and everyone was pushing and shoving.
The crowd ate it up.
“GIVE’EM HELL ANDY!” “YOU SUCK R-DAWG!” “BOOOOOOOOO” After a few seconds of pushing and shoving, since no one really wanted to fight, even if no one wanted to back down either, R-Dawg separated from the scrum. When he did he raised his arms triumphantly like he had won the game right there in that scrum. The crowd immediately responded with the vowel heavy “AAAAAAAAAAAASSSSHOOOOOOOOOOOLE” chant. To which R-dawg nodded as he walked to the 42 yard line and got ready for the next play, while nodding his approval of the chant from the crowd.
No flags were thrown, as nothing actually happened worth mentioning.
“Oh these guys are angry at each other, right Ricky?” Ricky responded “Absolutely, you can see the anger and intensity on the players faces. We’ll see how it plays out after these messages.” The tv dutifully showed qb Crenshaw and Rasheed Wallace jawing at each other and finger pointing and the orchestral brass played them out with ‘drunken sailor’ as the score Bulls 13, Wolves 7, showed on the bottom third of the screen and then went to commercial.
“Yeah! You keep calling me asshole. And keep coming to the games and paying to do it. I’ll take yo money. I don give a fuck!” and smiled. His teammates showed up after a few seconds. “I love Chattanooga. They HATE us here!” he said as his teammates showed up, along with a few other trainers with water bottles to get guys who wanted to have a drink a drink during the break.
The crowd simmered down, and went to buy more beer and ribs and brats.
Andy hi-fived a few teammates and said “Good blocking….Brinkman!” To the lineman whose last name he had forgotten, after looking on the back of his jersey. Andy said “Listen, I just told Wallace that we’re gonna run, just to be a dick at him. Who wants to bet me a buck that Hicks calls for a run up the gut on first and ten?”
He got no takers. Hicks always ran it up the gut on first down, and everyone knew it, and despite that fact he still did it. Andy shook his head and said “I’m gonna audible a pass play. Fuck this crap. No matter what I call out, we are running Akron seventy one charlie, got it?” The guys all nodded their heads. “Earl? Philly? You guys with us? No matter what you hear, Akron seventy one Charlie. Got it?” The two men nodded and Andy said “Earl, you’re the primary target on this one. Get open on the outside. We can score on these guys here if we strike fast. You got this?”
Earl Carpenter jumped up and down to loosen up and said “Hells ya, I got this shit! Ay ess charlie, fifteen yard out right seam no matter what the fuck you say! Got it!”
“Stop jumping Earl, every time you jump up and down they know the ball is coming to you. Cut the shit!” Earl stared at him for a second, then nodded and said “Ay ess charlie. Ay ess charlie.” to himself as he walked around.
Andy thought to himself Dummer’n a post but fast a fuck. So long as he catches it, I don’t care if he twerks his way to the end zone…. then thought about that and canceled that thought. Brinkman looked at him and said “You sure about this, Andy? Coach is gonna be pissed for you doing this to his playbook.” Brinkman made air quotes when he said playbook.
As he did the play call came in over his headset. Blue forty two butcher. A run up the gut. Crenshaw shook his head
Crenshaw patted Brinkman on the shoulder and almost smiled when he said “Let’em bitch. I came here to win. The dry spell of the last few weeks is on his head. I’ll be god damned if we run the ball here on first down. They’re waiting for it. They know it’s coming. Let’s fuck’em up and do something they don’t expect. I’ll take the hit from him on this. You worry about Rasheed, I’ll handle coach, k?”
Rob said “I’ll handle that dirty bastard Wallace. He plays dirty as fuck. He got to you early because of it. He won’t get through again. I got him figured out.” Crenshaw was surprised at the confidence the kid was showing by saying that, and since he didn’t want to step on it by pointing out that Wallace was faster than he was with or without the meth and the roids, he just patted his shoulder and said “Kick his ass, Rob. Kick his ass.”
The whistle blew as the commercial break came to an end. Both sides huddled up.
“Welcome back everybody. Well, Ricky. First and ten from the Bulls 42. With the offense sputtering like it has been lately, what would you do if you were Crenshaw? Ricky smiled his best smile for the cameras, His bright white teeth flashing and his boldly colored suit glaring for the cameras. He said “Bob, they need to establish the run to open up the passing lanes. They haven’t been doing a good job of that, which is why Crenshaw has been having issues out there these last few weeks. The O line simply has not been doing the job of opening up the holes for Stevie Gordon to penetrate the defense properly. They need to run here and show the defense who’s the boss, dominate them on the ground so they can open up the air assault.”
Stevie was not happy with the play calling from Andy. He had run for a total of twenty eight yards on eleven carries, abysmal numbers, and he felt like it was more the fault of his offensive line. He said ‘ Dammit Andy! Coach is calling for a run! Let me run! I can handle the rock! Gimme the damn ball!”
His O line didn’t think so. They thought Stevie was slow and after three games of almost no production, washed up. If he wasn’t he would not have been cut by the Dolphins to make room for a draft pick last year, then come here and run an average of 1.9 yards per carry.
Andy glared at him and said while crouched in the huddle and said “Coach always calls a run here. I’m changing things up. Akron seventy one charlie on three, no matter what you hear. Line up for the run play, they’re identical. Let’s do this! Remember, on three… onetwothree
“LET’S DO THIS!”
Ray walked up to Stevie who was walking to his position and said ‘Miss this block and yo ass is mine, old man.” Then smiled a wicked grin at Stevie as he lined up just ahead of him just to the right and behind Andy. Andy stood behind his center and looked over his defense and noted the line was stacked and ready for the run. He nodded at seeing eight in the box, approving of it. He was gonna have to get rid of the rock quick, but if Earl hit his marks correctly, he would only have to be back there for about 2 seconds before he released the ball.
Stevie wasted a half second to stare at Rays back as he assumed his position. Andy looked around and barked out “BLUE FORTY TWO BUTCHER! BLUE FORTY TWO BUTCHER! As Andy barked this out, several defensive players pointed at their men and players started calling out “WATCHA RUN! WATCHA RUN! Andy stayed stone faced and said SET! ….HUT…HUT HUT!
Barry Berg snapped the ball perfectly to Andy who again was going for a very short drop, and faked the handoff to Stevie. Ray hit the hole hard and pushed to his right, towards Brinkman, playing like he was opening up a hole for Stevie. He did his job expertly, and Stevie ran headlong into the line right behind him, straight into the arms of Marcus Gillespie, who grabbed him and picked him up and started to push him back before Berg and Brinkman began to push back and brought his momentum to a halt.
Crenshaw had exactly a half inch of space to work with, and that was as much as he needed. After the fake handoff, he double pumped and then threw the ball to a spot, like he had done in practice a thousand times before.
“The handoff, and Gordon gets thrown for a lo…wait a second. That’s a fake! Crenshaw pump fakes! He throws it down the right side to Carpenter at the Twenty! And the crowd is going wild! Fifteen…”
Everyone had been expecting a run play. Both d-backs and one safety were playing zone, and Collins shadowed Earl, keeping a few yards between him and Earl as a precaution. It caught him completely by surprise when the ball flew out from the pile of humanity that was the crash of offensive and defensive lines and went over his head. Doug barked out “FUCK!”
Earl looked back and saw the ball was thrown a little further than the fifteen yard out he was told to expect. But he knew Andy, and expected that. If it was a short dump pass, Crenshaw could hit you in the numbers every time. The bomb, that 60+ yard deep ball, he was perfect with that too. It was those blind throws over the lineman’s head, those lobs that Crenshaw occasionally had issues with. He sucked that way.
“Ten…”
It helped that Earl Carpenter was six foot five and had an eighty inch reach. Collins was one of the fastest runners in the IFL, and caught up to Earl as the ball was hitting his outstretched left hand. He squeezed the ball and kept running as Doug tried to tackle him and got caught up with Earls legs and Doug sprawled forward. Earl momentum and his speed were both carrying him forward, and getting caught up in Doug’s legs had him falling forward. He fought with all his might to stay upright. He could see the endzone in his sights. He wanted that touchdown so much he could taste it.
“Five…He’s falling, tripping…”
Crenshaw was in the pocket as it collapsed, and eventually everyone met at the quarterback. R-dawg came in hard just after the ball was released and hit Andy hard with a helmet to his head. Andy immediately saw stars and hit the ground. He stayed down for half a second with several players down on the ground around him and Brinkman fell on top of him, along with R-dawg, who was still wrestling madly with Brinkman as the two fell a half second later.
Several flags flew, from the head ref, the back judge and the field judge who was out of position but saw the illegal hit Wallace laid on Crenshaw.
“TOUCHDOWN WOLVES ON A PERFECT FORTY TWO YARD STRIKE FROM CRENSHAW TO CARPENTER! And it’s tied at thirteen with the extra point to follow! Ricky said “You gotta give it up for this kid Crenshaw! This play screamed run but he audibled out, and you have to give it up to him and Stevie Gordon for a perfect fake that had even the Camera crew baffled as to what was going on! A great football play!
The crowd exploded in a frenzy of excitement, and the old Wolves war howl was heard echoing for miles from the stadium. “ARRRARRRAROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! ARRRARRRAROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
Earl Carpenter fell into the end zone then got up, followed by several other players, other wide receivers first, and he like always when he scored, threw the ball up into the cheap seats as far as he could, then got mobbed by his teammates, and the teams mascot, a nineteen year old girl who wasn’t quite good enough to make the cheerleading squad when she tried out for it in Philadelphia the year prior.
Crenshaw shook his head and it took him a second to get a grip on what was happening. When his vision cleared the first thing he saw was Rasheed Wallace’s face. R-Dawg was standing over him, looking angry as hell. Andy said “Helluva run play, right R?” and smiled and added “Roll Tide.”
Rasheed Wallace, R-dawg to the public, was about to explode at Crenshaw. But that Roll tide stopped him. Crenshaw was reminding him of the three years they played together at Alabama. R said “Roll Tide. I’ll get yo ass next series… brother.” Then turned around and said “WHAT! D’YOU SEE HIM!” Wallace pointed at Brinkman, with one hand while gesticulating wildly with the other. He continued “HE WAS GRABBIN..HE WAS GRABBIN… OH That’s a bunch of SHII…” Gillepsie grabbed him and stood between him and the officials and said “Don’t get tossed, Dawg. Don’t do it.” As both sides special teams came out onto the field for the extra point and the Offense and Defense walked off the field.
Coach Hicks was looking at Crenshaw with a mix of disbelief, happiness and concern, and managed to not convey any of those emotions. When Crenshaw got to the sidelines, Coach pull his headphones off and said “Good play call, but don’t do that shit again or I’ll bench you… next week. Just remember, I call the plays here son.” Hicks shook his head and smiled and smacked the kids ass and said “GOOD PLAY FELLAS! NOW HOLD’EM HERE! GET READY DEFENSE! THEY’RE GONNA COME OUT FIRING!” And walked towards the defensive players on the sidelines, along with the defensive coordinator Greg Schmidt.
Crenshaw saw Carpenter coming his way and said “Great play, E! You kick ass! Thank you brother!” Carpenter said “No thank you. Putting it a few yards ahead of me was what made that a touchdown.” Crenshaw looked at him and said “I wasn’t dead on?” And held the incredulous look for half a second before breaking out into a big smile. Both men laughed hard.
The crowd roared as the Extra point flew through the uprights, giving them the lead with eight minutes left to go in the third quarter.
Write Island 