I grew up playing football in Texas, the epicenter of coach worship. I even went to UT, where the mere mention of Darrell Royal is enough to bring a tear to the eye of the most hardened cowboy. But unlike a lot of people, the head coach of my high school team was someone who I neither admired nor respected. I found him to be a dense, petty tyrant who played political games with the kids on his teams. He also had a tendency to choke in the big game and frankly, played scared. He was the master of the mixed-metaphor and an expert at the malapropism. And he loved to chew us out. Loved it. Like a pedophile loves a school zone. So there was one day when he gathered the team into the weight room for some perceived transgression. This being Texas, the weight room was big and well-stocked and made a great meeting room for the whole squad. So we made our way in and took our places amongst the workout equipment. He then went into some harangue about what we were doing wrong... and how we were setting the program back... and how we were responsible for stagflation... and the boycott of the 1980 summer Olympics... You get the idea. So the culmination of this tirade was that we as a team did not have sufficient pride. In the pantheon of winning ingredients, pride is like the Formula 409 of intangible elements. It can cure anything. So in his words:
"You know what you men are missing?"
That was obviously a rhetorical question and we were "proud" enough not to answer.
"Pride! P - R - I - D. Pride!"
I turned to my buddy, "Prid? (think short i) We're missing Prid."
Whatever point he was making was lost on us as either his emotion or, my personal theory, his lack of education gave me and my teammates a good chuckle. That years team went on to disappoint in so many ways (That team was what you might generously refer to as "underachievers") but I could never get over the fact that our coach was an idiot.
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