The Couscous Chronicles

I am not much of a sports trash talker probably because I was never good in any one sport save maybe the occasional vintage video sports game.  Dr. J versus Larry Bird anyone?  The other reason is I always felt that one should not trash talk until victory is imminent or else suffer the fate of a loss from a sports jinx of being to brash too soon.  Such was the case at this year’s BCS game when the OSU fans decided within the first ten minutes of the game they could talk trash as though they had the game all wrapped up.The good Doctor and I had the pleasure to experience the BCS National Championship game between LSU and OSU and along with this experience we were able to observe some of the more interesting points of our fellow humans.  We scored a set of corner end zone seats in a section with about a seventy-five to twenty-five percent mix of LSU to OSU fans. The fun did not start until after OSU’s Bennie Wells scampered into the end zone and scored the first touchdown on the longest TD run in BCS history.   This enlightened all the OSU fans in the row in front of us so much so they began taunting the LSU around them.  One of the OSU fans, a dump truck driver from Columbus even stepped across the aisle to confront and rub it in the face of an LSU fan.  They almost came to blows had it not been for another LSU fan sitting behind us who stepped in prevented any further developments.  I later realized this LSU fan had the brilliance to defuse the potential situation simply as a ploy to open the door so once LSU did start winning he could turn on the OSU fan with his own trash talk.  Brilliant, it was kind of a way of saying “no, set this guy aside and save him for me”.None the less I was surprised at the outright confidence of the OSU fans given the poor showing OSU had in last years BCS game, which also began with a similar strong start.  It was too soon to begin bragging because, the mighty Bayou Bengals eventually caught their stride and began to tear into the Buckeyes to the tune of twenty four consecutive points to lead by two touchdowns at the half.The LSU turn around brought on an onslaught of trash talk revenge to the row of OSU fans and in particular there was “venom” coming from the guy sitting behind us who had earlier refereed the pending skirmish.  Apparently he had a whole group of half drunk “bayou boys” from deep in cajun country.  With each vaunted LSU play they could smell blood and first reminding the OSU fans that they heckled first and they were going to make them pay for it in the form of a rain of “that’s that speed bra (slang for brother)” and “stand up and support yo team bra” with most every exciting play through the end of the game.   The good Doctor and I traded barbs and high fives with our fellow fans, but we both resisted pouring on the trash talk.  I knew all too well it could jinx our chances at a championship.  Surely OSU would have won the game had it not been for this row of onerous OSU fans trash talking to soon and jinxing their team.Now I have been to some interesting sporting events including seeing the Yankees play in the Bronx and witnessing the Mets win the pennant at Shea in 2000, but one thing is certain and consistent folks absolutely lose their minds in cheering for their teams.So the good Doctor and I had a similar experience in the not too distant past.  We went to the SEC championship game the last time LSU won the national championship in 2003.  LSU took the Georgia Bulldogs to the “shed” in that game.  Towards the end of the game we witnessed a seventy year old Georgia Bulldog poor sport of a fan tossing ice at LSU fans several rows below him.  The guy he kept hitting was a good sport as he was a young twenty something kid who could have easily taken this old fart, but he chose to only turn around several times and throw up his hands in exclamation of “why”.  If  it had been me getting hit with the ice cubes, I would have had to taken the old man down!  Net things can go bananas in the sporting events fairly quickly.And that brings us back to the BCS game where much to the chagrin of the OSU fans they had also brought their wives and were now suffering a humiliation they could have only prayed would have not happened.  It was a repeat of last year’s BCS, an all out beat down for the Buckeyes.The crowning moment was when one of the LSU fans reached down and over two rows to offer a “pour” from his beer bottle to one of the red faced OSU fans.  He could not resist leaning over into my ear as he finished pouring his second shot to the OSU fan and said, “look at his wife, she is pissed and now she is telling him off because he accepted beer from one of us”!  Needless to say I have to give the OSU fans credit for sticking around through the end.