Vann McElroy
(by Ed Agner)
I have a love/hate thing for pro
football. Actually, I love pro football in theory - in July - but
the NFL works so hard to flaunt its hypocrisy by creating false parity
and messing around with strange new policies to artificially stimulate
things one way or other and...creating...tuck...rules...and...HATE...RISING.
Can't work blue. Move on.
Ahem. But I honestly do believe pro football is truly a beautiful
sport and the NFL style of play is beyond repraoch - which is a big
reason why their competitors always fail. But then the suits
always try to meddle with this and that and the other just to show how
clueless they all are and I always turn back to hating the sport over
and over again - unless, by small chance, my beloved Raiders somehow
don't completely suck, but I know even that will make me hate the NFL
even more in the end - DIE TOM BRADY! Oops.
Ahem. Now that I think of it, I have no idea how I even developed
a love for football growing up in Ohio around insufferably,
self-righteously priggish Ohio State fans and...well...there's the
Browns...and the Bengals. Man, I've seen some bad football.
Thank God I became a Raider fan young. So for my forgotten player of the
moment, I know I shouldn't do all baseball since I really do love
football. But I'm having a hard time thinking of any players
except the greats and of course no one forgets them. I just can't
think of any football scrubs at all since, rather than having any real
feelings for most individual players, my direct football love/hate goes
to entire organizations/cities - with the exception of Brady, Bradshaw
and Elway, of course.
Anyhoo, Vann McElroy comes to me from out of the blue and
that's just dandy to me. I liked Vann well enough - tough little
scrappy OK-at-best Safety for the Raiders back in the L.A. years,
serving in between the JACK FRICKIN' TATUM and broken-down Ronnie Lott
eras. Hmm, he was a Pro Bowler in '82 and '83 and finished with
31 picks a TD and one Sack - Thank you Total Football II. I
wasn't even aware that he finished up with Seattle. I thought all
old Raiders from that time period were supposed to finish with
Houston. Oh right, Bum Phillips was done as a coach by
then. Oh well.
I recall McElroy seemed almost too small to be playing Safety - and
considering how the L.A. years went - other than the GLORIOUS SUPER
BOWL XVII victory over the Redskins - he probably was. I also
recalled that he really tried to kill people over the middle a la
Ronnie Lott but...well...was too slow...and small...and white to be
effective. But otherwise, Vann was a nice little player - had
quite the nifty feathered mullet and splendid John Oates
mustache. God, it's almost like I'm describing Jason Sehorn here.
But mostly I recall that McElroy looked like the type of guy who
married the Homecoming Queen who gave him bratty children and turned
fat causing him to have a world of hate and a huge beer belly after
retirement because of it. Which is funny since I Googled McElroy
and he's now a minister in Texas and looks like Rich Gannon. Ahh, football! You never fail to
mess with my head!