The Shoutout Section: Football

A piece dedicated to some of the great people I've met over the years playing the game of football

I'm gonna be honest, I wanted to include this in my "Football and Me" series of posts. The problem was that by the time I had finished typing up the entire series, I realized at was at about nine entire pages worth of material with about 20 minutes worth of reading to get through it all. Now some people like my immediate family might be willing to sit and read through all of that in one sitting, but when the average human attention span is in the realm of about 30 seconds, that is asking a loooooot for the average person. In addition, having it as its own piece can help it be more focused and more fun, since it's not bogged down by all the emotional weight otherwise contained in those posts. So, without further ado, welcome to the Shoutout Section, where I brag on many of my teammates and friends I've made over the years. Please don't take it personal if I leave you names off boys, don't want this to drag for too long for this entry and my memory is in shambles from all the hits to the head I've taken over the years.

Jake Williams: FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT. Jake was a year below me from Coppell and played right guard alongside me. He was gigantic with an absolutely atrocious gut so my personal favorite way to rile him up was just an elongated "FAAAAAAAAAAAAAT", which was usually responded to in kind with a "BLAAAAAAAAAAACK" from him, which is fair when I make Wesley Snipes look like the later years of Michael Jackson in terms of skin tone

Sam Rice: Sam was our left tackle at Coppell, a year behind me as well. Easily my favorite memory of him was watching him devour over 60+ pieces of pizza from Cici's in one sitting and not puking his guts out in the bathroom later.

Sterling Luckey: Sterling was the same age as me and our Center. For only weighing about 240 pounds he was way more effective than he had any business being, like a rabid wolverine. He recently passed away, and I hope his soul is at ease.

Leighton Light: Leighton was 2 years younger than me while I played at Coppell and also played Center/Guard. One time during a crucial 3rd down he jumped offsides, and I was so f***ing mad I slapped him upside the head on the field. Still don't think I've apologized for that either, and I probably never will!

Tanner Rice: Tanner was the same grade as me at CoppelI High and played defensive end. I genuinely do not believe, from peewee all the way through high school, I won a single 1v1 rep against him. Again, this might be my shitty memory, but he is probably largely responsible for why I thought I was so garbage at football.

Solomon Thomas: SOLLYYYYYY. My freakish little orangutan brother from another mother has succeeded in a way beyond even our wildest dreams. Even through all the trials life has put in front of him, he manages to be the same big lovable goof he always was growing up. I know he still has so much more to offer in all aspects of life. He also has the sweetest mother on the planet who was my substitute teacher on multiple occasions. Hi Martha!

Brock Dagel: Me and Brock were in the same recruiting class together in 2011. It was extremely hilarious watching him try to fit into a tiny ford focus almost every day when he was about 6'7. Fun fact, he came in at 240 pounds but managed to hit 300 solely by beer consumption.

Jamison Lalk: Jamison was also in the same 2011 recruiting class with me and Brock. To this day I still cannot listen to Creed without laughing profusely because his hilarious impersonation of their lead singer's voice was incredibly spot on.

Tom Farniok: Tom was a year ahead of us and, in my opinion, one of the best offensive lineman to ever play at Iowa State, being a 4-year starter. He was a natural leader and all of his tendencies good and bad tended to rub off on us all, even as much as I initially tried to resist it. You can probably count on one hand how many people could out-drink him or have a better head of hair.

Duaron "Big Dawg" Williams: Where do I even begin to start with this motherf***er. Duaron came in the class after mine in 2012. He was horribly out of shape and during the conditioning test that Yancey McKnight makes every freshman class take, he full on face planted right before the finish line. He's also a Que Dog, which in hindsight, pretty much explains everything about him. Despite all that, I still basically treat him with my son. No way in hell I'm going to visit him down in Florida though, as he'd certainly get my ass in trouble.

Cory Morissey: Cory played defensive end and was a JUCO transfer from Iowa Western who came in my redshirt freshman year, even though he was young as hell and had no business somehow being classified a sophomore while being younger than me. Another all time great Cyclone, he's also pretty easily my closest friend outside of football from Iowa State with us almost perfectly aligning in our taste in video games. He's currently mad at me for not visiting his house in Iowa in person the past 4 years, with my current excuse being I know when I do visit he's going to pull me over (he's a cop btw) and say "ONI PONI GUACAMOLE". He is also a horrible influence who constantly tries to drag me back into my crippling World of Warcraft habits with every new expansion released. FIX THIS RICHELLE PLEASE.

WOPA: This group needs no introduction. The Walk-On Players Association was the under the hood engine that made our team go, while some of the flashier names held all the attention of the masses. They're to this day the wildest group of men I've had the pleasure of knowing to this day, both on the field and off. Mostly homegrown Iowa boys (although not all, some were even from a certain Texas high school with a mascot that doesn't exist :^) ) who were thought to be too lacking to play D1 football but consistently proved otherwise with their special teams expertise. Our adventures in South Padre Island will forever go down in legend

Sam Richardson: Sam was the QB of our class. and one of the toughest people I've ever met. Not many people can get hit by a car during game week vs Iowa and end up still playing a game a few days later. Tell Papa Richardson I said hi! I also forgot the name of that one amazing desert from when we visited Florida, DM me it foo.

Darian Cotton: To my initial surprise. DC was living proof that Iowa did in fact, have black people living in it! Sure he was a mere half breed but still that's close enough for me! Easily one of the goofiest people I have met to this day and simply did not know the meaning of sitting still, the little crack rat he is.

Kelechi Osemele: Big Cuz! So story time here, we had zero idea going into it but it turned out that my dad and his mom were longtime friends who hadn't see each other in almost 20 years since they both immigrated from Nigeria to the U.S. The last time they had met was when he had only just been born. K.O also went to Iowa State, but we were only together for one year before he graduated and went on to be drafted by the Ravens. Kelechi (known as K.O). Although as fortune would have it, shortly after his rookie contract expired and he signed at the time one of the most lucrative deals in NFL history for a guard with the Raiders, I ended up being picked up by them as an undrafted free agent. We even share the same birthday! As strong as I'd like to believe I was, having to watch him every single day throw grown ass men into the dirt with ease reminded me just how far I had to go as a player.

Rodney Hudson: Rodney is a crotchety old man from Alabama, but even despite all that, he still took more than his fair share of time out of his day to teach me, and undrafted rookie who very easily could have been gone the next day. Having a player of his caliber willing to teach me how to player center and football at a higher level was invaluable to my development as a player.

Donald Penn: As old as I made Rodney sound, Donald was the ACTUAL old man of the group in my time with Oakland. What made him so relatable to me was the fact that he also came into the league as an undrafted free agent from Utah State, and was a shining example of someone with that label could achieve in the NFL.

Gabe Jackson: The most country motherf***er on the planet. I'm convinced to this day there is not a more graceful 350 pound person on the planet. We even nicknamed certain double team combinations "Famous Dave's" in honor of his team famous gluttony.

Austin Howard: F*** you Rooster.

Denver Kirkland: Denver was a fellow UDFA and was also my roommate during our rookie year in Oakland. He takes the honor of even after 5 years of me being around Floridians at Iowa State, I STILL struggled to understand what he says sometimes. Hope you're doin well ya big hog.

Derek Carr: I do not say this lightly. DC is the most genuine, down- to-earth christian man I have ever met in my entire life. To the point following him as a leader helped me re-evaluate my own faith and how I could be a better person myself. I'll never forget walking into that Oakland locker room the first time and going out of his way to introduce himself to me when he had no real reason too. All hail the golden goose!

KJ Brent: KJ was apart of the same undrafted rookie group that I was with the Raiders back in 2016. He's by far one of the most intelligent and socially aware guys I know, despite his awful taste in basketball teams. He recently found out that he's having a girl soon, hope you like tea parties my dude. Another fun fact, I got the grand majority of my ideas for Ogre Chronicle from observing his blog, check it out! https://www.theuntamedmind.com/post/dear-football

Ryan O'Malley: O'Malley is a big fookin oirishmen who also was a part of the 2016 UDFA rookie group as a tight end. He also almost f***ing died, and the couple times he showed me his medical bills due to this, so did I. Fix this shit America jesus!

Connor Cook: Connor was a part of the 2016 Raiders draft class as a QB and him, KJ, and O'Malley were the main group of guys I hung out with on the team. He is single handedly responsible for my paranoia about the tangible reality of the QB-Center exchange essentially being having another mans hands right up in your crack.

That's all I got time for in this edition of Shoutout Section. There'll be plenty more where that came from and it won't also be exclusive to just football either! Have a good day y'all!

(JK Rooster I hope you're doing alright my dude)