8602120931
DETROIT FREE PRESS
860924
Wednesday, September 24, 1986
METRO FINAL
1D
MITCH ALBOM
Copyright (c) 1986, Detroit Free Press
SOMETHING TO BRING TEARS TO THE EYES OF LIONS FANS
Because I work for a Detroit newspaper, I tend to focus this column on
Detroit sports. And in the fall, that means football.
Only lately Detroit football has been depressing. Especially the Lions'
games on Sunday afternoons. Those can be hazardous to your health.
So I went looking for another football team, one that had it even worse.
That way we could listen to its terrible misfortunes and how much its fans
suffered, and soon we'd feel much better. Well, I found the team. In South
Carolina. A high school team that lost a big game last Friday because of
something even Darryl Rogers would have to blink at.
Tear gas.
Now there are lots of ways to lose in football. The Lions have mastered
most of them. Fumbles. Interceptions. But even the Lions have never heard of
defeat by tear gas. I hope.
Anyhow, I called the high school, Gaffney High, in Gaffney, S.C., to get
more details. What I got was the football coach, whose accent was thick and
whose name, according to the school operator, was A.L. Curtis.
What does the A.L. stand for, I asked.
"Just Al," he said.
Al?
"Al would be fine."
Not A.L., then? Just Al?
"Or A.L., if you want. Either way is fine."
Wait. A.L. doesn't stand for anything, then?
"Just Al."
Off to a flying start.
'He was just some nut' What about this football game, Al?
"Well, sir, we had a real good game goin.' The other team (Greenwood
High) was winnin,' 9-7, but we got a punt and drove down to their 15-yard
line. We were fixin' to run a play, when someone set off a tear gas bomb in
the stands.
"At first I thought it was a smoke bomb. Then people started runnin' out
of the stands. A number of 'em went down. Then the smell came down to the
field, and the players ran off, too.
"We all ran over to the practice field behind the stands. We waited about
an hour for the air to clear. A couple of the players' eyes were burning and a
couple got sick, you know, in their stomach. But most of 'em were OK."
How much time was left in the game?
"Fifty-seven seconds."
So you eventually finished it?
"No. They called it off and we went home."
With you losing, 9-7.
"Yessir."
Has anything like this ever happened before?
"No, sir. Firecrackers, but never tear gas."
Al -- or A.L. -- I never did get that straight -- went on to explain that
the police had caught the alleged gasser Monday. He was a 23-year-old Gaffney
High School dropout who reportedly was in the army -- thus explaining his
access to tear gas. Nobody knows why he set the bomb off.
"He was just some nut," said the coach. "He couldn't have been interested
in Gaffney football."
Why do you say that?
"If he was, he wouldn't have gassed us. Heck, we were about to score."
Too much effort for 57 seconds At first it looked as if Gaffney would
just have to rub its eyes and swallow defeat. But Monday, the state high
school board ruled that the two teams should play out the last 57 seconds
next Monday at a neutral field. No spectators will be allowed. Just the two
teams. For 57 seconds.
Al -- or A.L. -- admitted it was a lot of effort, considering the two
schools are about 140 miles apart. But he said his team might throw a few
passes, and the affair would actually take "more like six or eight minutes."
I was going to ask him what difference that made, but, heck, why bother?
I wished him luck and hung up.
A few minutes later, my phone rang. It was the principal of the other
school, Greenwood High.
"We don't wanna play that game," he said.
Why not?
"It's too much trouble to take two buses out there for just 57 seconds. We
gotta be preparin' for our next game. We should let that one be."
But, wait. You were winning when it ended.
He laughed. "Well," he said, "that's right."
So what will you do?
"I'm gonna appeal that decision."
So that you don't have to play?
"That's right."
And that's where it stands. This Monday, in the great state of South
Carolina, two football teams will dress, take buses to an empty field, play 57
seconds, and go home. Or else they won't, and the team that probably should
have won will lose.
Because of tear gas.
Now honestly, Detroit, what have we got to complain about?
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