Beware the Larry David Stare
In the words of Mike LaFontaine, “Wha’ happened?”
Last Monday really escalated and it ended at four in the morning with three jacked up steroid freaks known as Crown Casino bouncers escorting me from the building. In hindsight, it all probably started with the Larry David Stare. Beware the Larry David Stare. It can have far reaching and unimagined consequences. Just ask my old pal Parko who, less than an hour later, left his wallet in the back of a cab and is still yet to recover it.
It all started innocently enough though most people who say it started innocently enough usually have something to hide and I am probably no different. Regardless, it was sometime around midnight after what had been a long day of drinking and gambling and heavy action. I was in the Sports Bar deep inside the pit of ethical decay and moral impropriety that is Crown Casino, knocking around with Kirley and Elliott and Parko and an old poker buddy named Napper and a few other friends and associates when I called out to Parko for a gin and tonic.
It was a reasonable request. To all, it seems, outside of the bar boy, a pimply faced kid who looked no older than sixteen. He asked me how many drinks I had consumed. I lied and said something along the lines of five or six and though that was a complete untruth, I was still able to hold my own. The night was, of course, still young. The kid with the apron then pulled the Larry David Stare on me. He looked into my eyes. He probed deep. Micalizzi’s “The Puzzle” seemed to ring loud.
Naturally, I squinted and raised my left eyebrow and looked deep into his eyes. I contorted my face and squinted again and engaged in the stare off. How else do you respond to a Larry David Stare? I would have done the same if I was as sober as a Mormon tea manufacturer. It mattered not, however. The kid behind the bar apparently had no idea who Larry David was. More importantly, he decided that there would be no more drinks headed my way. “You, sir, are drunk and you are no longer welcome to drink at this bar”. It was a rather pompous response from a kid who likely hasn’t voted and almost certainly is more concerned with hiding his porn collection than he is about contracting an Chlamydia.
I was left with little choice. I hit the blackjack tables with an equally drunk Napper, drank discounted gin at an increased rate, found another bar in the confines of Crown known as Tangerine and proceeded to drink gin at a rate that may have finished Ernest Hemmingway. This all lasted for around four hours when Tangerine closed and your valiant author forgot about being cut off at the Sports Bar and returned, stumbling and loud.
Seemingly Kirley, always a sound influence at four in the morning, had also forgotten about his chief writer being cut off. He ordered me a gin. I gratefully accepted it before walking to another bar with Parko. Where Kirley had gotten to between the gin and the walk, well, only The Fates and probably the CCTV footage at Crown know. At any rate, as Parko and I are wandering and drinking, we notice this wide-shouldered meathead in a suit walking next to us talking into his walkie-talkie: “We need two rovers at the Sports Bar, heading north, checked shirt, beard, big glasses…”
We seemingly had a problem.
“Are you talking about me?” I asked this pigfucker. The ass-clown grunted something that seemed to indicate yes. “What is this all about?” I demanded to know, well aware that my night was done. He got all official and rattled off his list of grievances that primarily centred on me being cut off hours ago. He also, not surprisingly, had never heard of the Larry David Stare. “Well why didn’t you just ask me to leave rather than bringing in a team of muscle to get heavy on a well-connected sportswriter who is built more like Woody Allen than Woody Hayes?”
After a bit of this back-and-forth, I dropped my empty glass on the bench and walked away. Parko had a little more banter to continue on with though and security threatened to punch him in the head before reneging when Parko asked the well dressed animal molester how he was going to avoid the multitude of cameras while assaulting the shaggy haired Parkinson. It was time to call it a day, however, and it wasn’t long before I was passed out on a couch with a half-eaten quarter pounder in my hands and a college basketball replay blaring out loudly to nobody in particular.
The lesson, as always: beware the Larry David Stare. There is also something to be said about walking away before things get ugly. Perhaps this is something Brett Favre needs to consider.
The removal from Crown, the Larry David Stare and the half-eaten quarter pounder were all, of course, a result of the pancreas eating loss suffered by the Minnesota Vikings that very morning.
I had bet the Vikings pre-season to win the NFC at 9-1 and the Super Bowl at 20-1 before a ball was kicked in anger so had a vested interest in their outcome. I also have a deep and abiding affection for Brett Favre, Old Number Four, meaning that Minnesota were going to be close to my heart this year. And they were.
They went on a winning streak. Brett Favre was rejuvenated, returning to his late nineties Lambeau form. The Vikings were beasts on defence, balanced on offense and they had that necessary combination of game-breaking individual brilliance and a commitment to the team that makes success possible. Hopes were high, as they say. For Vikings fans, for myself. We had obviously repressed the deeply miserable and unsuccessful history of the Vikings franchise, a history that includes zero Lombardi Trophies yet four lost Super Bowls and Darrin Nelson and his dropped pass and Gary Anderson, wide left.
There are clearly no Vikings fans among the Sporting Gods or the Fates of Chance.
Despite their best attempts to lose the match, Minnesota were heavily favoured with a minute and change left on the clock. The Vikings could not hold the ball. They fumbled six times, losing three of them. They prevented themselves from a certain half-time lead when a screwed up run play on the Saints four yard line handed the Saints the ball. The Saints were also gifted a touchdown when Percy Harvin fumbled on a reverse to give New Orleans a 28-21 lead. Every time the Vikings would drive forward, they would carelessly drop the ball or lose it or throw it away while the Saints vaunted offense couldn’t move the ball.
By the time it got to the Vikings final drive, the match should have been over. Had Minnesota held onto the ball, they would have won by two touchdowns. Alas, they had dropped the ball and the game was tied and a wretched history was all of a sudden looming large.
Well, all football fans know how it played out now. The Vikings drove to the Saints 33 and the fringe of field goal territory for Ryan Longwell. Brad Childress then called two idiotic dive plays despite the fact the Saints had eight men in the box, offering no misdirection and no prospect of a pass and no thought of an outside run. The Vikings gained no yardage. And then in one of the most absurd happenings ever in a crunch time situation, a happening worse than Bill Buckner’s missed groundball or Benny Elias’s missed field goal, the Vikings copped a five yard penalty after a timeout for having twelve men inside the huddle. Twelve men inside the huddle. Unheard of after a time out in such a critical situation. Of course, it put the Vikings out of field goal territory, Favre then threw a pick on third down and Minnesota never saw the ball again, the Saints winning the toss in overtime before marching up the field and kicking the winning field goal.
Favre has copped the blame for the loss in many circles. Most of it is unfair. The reason Minnesota lost is because Vikings coach Brad Childress called two dumb running plays before allowing so much confusion on his sideline that twelve men went into the huddle at such a crucial time.
On one level though, that last play may have been an indication that Brett Favre’s body has had enough. He has always been a playmaker and that cross-body pass has always been a part of the Favre way but there seemed, if only for a moment, that Favre shirked running the ball when a dart for the sideline likely would have put the Vikings back in field goal range. Favre had been smashed and hit and hammered and beaten like a broken boxer by the Saints all day and Favre may have just not wanted to be hit again. Running has never been part of his game but winning has and he has always been a player willing to do whatever was necessary to win. I am not convinced Favre, on that last play, did what he believed deep down in his gut was the optimal play. He, of course, had no time and he kept the Vikings in the game and he had an outstanding year but instinctively it seemed for the first time that preservation prevailed.
So perhaps it is time for Favre to walk away before it gets ugly. I am not pushing Favre. Hell, I would love to see him go around one more time. And fuck legacies. If Favre wants to play the game then he should play the game. He just needs to be aware of his body because football is a collision sport and if his body can take no more then his body can take no more and Favre won’t want to play unless he can commit mind and body and soul to football and the Minnesota Vikings. Time waits for no man. Not even Brett Favre.
It will be tough to walk away but there will be no shame. Brett Favre will always be a champion. He will always be Old Number Four. He will always be beloved. Everyone has their time and perhaps Brett Favre’s is now.