Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, August 8, 1994 TAG: 9409020009
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
It's kind of like a Greek tragedy. Talk about hurt. There's Art Monk wearing a New York Jets uniform. Namath people. Green uniforms. Relatively tasteless.
This is the same team that gave us Mark Gastineau, a very big crazy person who made television commercials with his mother. Ran around with this leggy blonde whose names escapes me, which is unusual.
Art in the green of the Jets. It's like Slingin' Sammy Baugh leaving Dee Cee and going to the Windy City years ago, before most of you were born.
It's like Riggo going to Dallas. Or Sonny Jurgensen throwing - or as Sonny would say "tho-in'" - the ball for the Giants.
Thirty years ago, the Redskins didn't win much. I was always relieved on Sunday when the team made it out of the locker room.
Even so, Eddie LeBaron was interesting. He was a very small quarterback who ran roughly 100 miles every Sunday avoiding the pass rush - which was not really a pass rush as we know it today.
But then people like Riggo, who ran 43 yards for a touchdown against Miami in the 1982 Super Bowl, made us think of ourselves as winners.
I'll never forget that night. I became highly excited and, as I recall it, fell into the cheese dip just as Riggo crossed the goal line.
There was Joe Theismann, another of the winners, even if he did get on your nerves a little. One awful night, Joe's leg was broken in a game against the Giants. Joe was all right, but there are people who will tell you that it might have been better for all of us if Lawrence Taylor had broken Joe's tongue that night.
Billy Kilmer, Kenny Houston, Gary Clark. All gone - no more to stir our hearts with valorous deeds. All gone. I had just gotten used to saying Moe Elewonibi, and now he is gone, too.
The Redskins finally got their new quarterback into camp. I understand it's just idle rumor that they gave him a share in the Washington Monument to sign. God knows he could buy the Washington Monument if he wanted to. All is mammon these days, boys.
I don't know what to do about a team that no longer has heroes. Maybe I'll become a Giants fan, except I don't know anybody on that team, either.
In the meantime, I'll give you a very good price on this really great rubber hog nose this Dallas fan gave me.
by CNB