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Joey intends to make changes to [pro football], of which mandatory liquor consumption is only the first of many.
BROCKLESBY
THE WISE FOOL
15 September 2000
22 September 2000
29 September 2000
6 October 2000
27 October 2000
3 November 2000
10 November 2000
17 November 2000
2 February 2001
16 February 2001
23 February 2001
2 March 2001
30 March 2001
30 March 2001
6 April 2001
27 April 2001
4 May 2001
It cannot be denied that the spirit of the XFL, the plucky, can-do American spirit exemplified by such beloved players as He Hate Me and Death Blow, has taken the country by storm.
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COMMENTS ON THE PASSING PARADE
Xcess of Xtreme
By Michael J. Ballway
CRUSADER FEATURES STAFF
I
t's third and long. The quarterback takes the snap and drops back deep, deep, deep ... sees an open man downfield ... releases ... and hits the smoke detector. I don't think that there are millions of dollars to be made in this, but don't tell that to Loyola's hall-sports-obsessed future league commissioner, Joey Brocklesby '03. "According to Vinnie Mac," says XFL student Joey, "our choices currently are the No-Fun League and his Xtreme League. That's not good enough. There's something missing -- the hole that I intend to plug -- which is: the Dormitory Acoustic Ceiling League. "My football league will show the game being played not the way that the television networks want it to be played, not the way that those old farts at the Canton Hupmobile dealership back in 1920 wanted it to be played, and not the way that The Rock wants it to be played. My league will show the game being played in the way that college students would play it." Aside from the thin in-bounds territory and twelve-foot, sound-reducing dome ceiling, Joey intends to make significant changes to the game, of which mandatory liquor consumption is only the first of many new rules designed to reclaim football as a participatory activity, not just a spectator sport. Joey described his vision of three-on-three inebriated arena football to me in the context of a larger discussion on the Sport That Just Won't Die. Usually, around this time of year, our conversations turn from the pigskin to the horsehide as Joey and I drop back into our usual argument over the Expos' chances of winning the N.L. East (I say, "infinitesimal"; he says, optimistically, "negligible"). But this year, February has arrived with a black football in its arms, not just a white baseball. A quick look through last week's Crusader amply demonstrates the damage that this unnatural prolonging of the football season may inflict or cause to be inflicted. January 30 -- two full days after the Super Bowl -- Physical Plant reported finding "a broken screen with a beer can inside." Even one game of football can have such far-ranging effects! Anyone on campus who owns a screen should be on the lookout for those wily, beer-can-toting football fans. They're hooligans, I tell you! And then there are the Crusader columns and articles -- no fewer than five (5) of which focus on football. Only one (1) embraces the topic of baseball, and it is not the New York vs. Boston rant that we've come to expect but rather a feature on Louis Sockalexis. The eerie undead football season managed to stifle Holy Cross' Pedro vs. Clemens argument, on a date a mere two weeks away from the reporting deadline for pitchers and catchers! Illustrious co-Editor-in-Chief Doug Frisina dedicated half of the Letters from the Editors section to summarizing the Super Bowl as "horrendous" and "unbearable," especially for fans from certain area codes. He left out a few very important numbers, however -- 216, 330 and 440. Word from E. Ninth Street is that nobody's forgiving and fewer are forgetting. The same season-that-won't-quit is running roughshod over other Holy Cross institutions as well, as the spirit of the XFL spreads to diverse quarters, combating its hated enemy - but is its hated enemy really the No-Fun League? Anti-fun, boring, stodgy, conservative, and out-of-touch -- the NFL and the Holy Cross Administration are virtually indistinguishable from each other, if you form your impression by reading this newspaper's opinion pages. Fortunately, your faithful correspondent has received word from highly-placed sources that President McFarland, recognizing this harsh reality, has commissioned for the 2001-02 academic year an "Xtreme Studies Department," which will deliver "smash-mouth" lectures and "in-your-face" seminars. Among the courses planned for next semester: XTRM 101 - Elementary Xtreme: An introduction to Xtreme as a way of life and an attitude. Designed for students with no prior exposure to Xtreme. Emphasis on the role of metal folding chairs in society, and on knowing one's role. One unit. XTRM 104 - Xtreme Lit Survey: A study of the Xtreme writer, including seminal works by The Rock, Chyna, Mick Foley, and other pop philosophers. Selections from Jesse Ventura's Ain't Got Time to Bleed may also be assigned. Readings will address themes such as the struggle between the People and the Corporation and the exigencies of life in a tag-team. One unit. XTRM 119 - Xtreme Film: This introductory course teaches the student how to heckle an action movie. "Films" are presented in melodramatic order, with conventional examples of plot-holes leading into movies that push the envelope in implausibility to the point of vulgarity. The syllabus includes American movies from the 1990s to the present, with special attention to the works of Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwartzenegger. One unit. XTRM 141 - Self-Paced Xtreme: An alternative approach to Xtreme Studies, which allows students to complete Xtreme course requirements by laying the smack-down independently with technology-based materials and virtual metal folding chairs. Two class hours weekly and laboratory practice. One unit. XTRM 213, 214 - Xtreme Mathematics: Full-year course for hard-core students majoring in Math. No more boring statistics and graphs. Students will study the irrelevancy of logic in mass media and learn bruising Calculus principles such as the Xtreme Value Theorem. Course meets five hours per week. One and one-quarter units per semester. XTRM 319 - TPCS / The Fair-Catch Rule: Students will examine the NFL "Fair-Catch" rule and debate its sociological and legal implications. Be advised that this course is reading-intensive and will involve extensive researching of XFL press releases. Students with a low tolerance for hyperbole should not take this course. Other Xtreme seminars will address the philosophical issues raised by the point-after-touchdown kick, the quarterback slide, and metal folding chairs. One unit, Jabroni. This article ran in the 23 February 2001 edition of The Crusader, on page 12 (second page of Features section). |