I get the feeling that Tech fans are not exactly snapping up the Insight tickets by the thousands, a development that coupled with last year�s modest attendance at the Nut Bowl is making our reputation as a very good traveling fan base as distant a memory as a season ending with a top five ranking. Oh, well, when you scan the ACC�s bowl roster, you see destinations like Atlanta and Orlando in addition to mainstays such as Jacksonville and the bowl in Charlotte we never seem to quite get to. Maybe things will perk up next year.

Once again our somewhat less than convenient bowl destination is a product of our soon-to-be-ending Big East membership, a conference whose decided lack of teams with large fan bases makes it very difficult to con bowls into accepting teams from the league. Thus we end up with East Coast teams playing in places like Phoenix and San Francisco. Tech is also finding that once again our bowl is being played in a baseball park. After observing the rather ridiculous field configuration for last year�s Nut Bowl, I would have thought the first lesson learned was that Pac Bell is no place to play football, but they are again staging the game in the same venue. Perhaps BankOne will provide better sight lines than one in which there were no seats along one sideline. It would also seem that a more modest and obtainable goal for next year�s Tech team would be participation in a bowl game that is actually played in a football stadium. It would be a step in the right direction.

Among the tens of thousands of Tech fans not attending the Insight will be me. The Tech program may be stretching its consecutive bowl streak to eleven, but mine is coming to an end. This has nothing to do with Tech�s November swoon, since that has never stopped me before. My non-attendance also has nothing to do with the distance to Phoenix, since I journeyed to San Francisco last year. Rather, it is a result of the stubborn refusal of that irritant known as my thyroid to function in a normal manner and the wishes of the quack charged with treating it to have me consume some vile concoction in the hopes that the recalcitrant gland will find it such a distasteful procedure that it will not desire to repeat the process. I know I won�t, and hopefully my thyroid will come to the same conclusion.

I have a disinclination to introduce chemicals into my body, at least since I was a Tech student, especially ones labeled �Radioactive Iodine,� much preferring the consumption of natural produce such as smoke from burning Dominican tobacco leaves, or the liquids that come from fermentation and various combinations of malt, barley, hops, rye, wheat, oats, corn, potatoes, juniper berries and the blue agave plant. I learned very early in life that the phrase, "take your medicine, it�s good for you," does not precede a pleasant experience, but this does appear to be necessary. The quack assures me that he will tolerate the procedure very well and I shouldn�t fare too badly, either. But, while he will experience no side effects whatsoever and be in fine enough fettle to leave immediately following it to hop a plane and spend the holidays in Aruba, the possibility exists, remote though it might be, that I may experience some minor ones, and five thousand feet above the southern United States would not be the best place for them to kick in.

I had considered ignoring his recommendation and going anyway, because, after all, what does a Duke graduate know about going to bowl games? But I finally decided to follow the quack�s advice, for once. This had better go well, because my buddy the Hoo Lawyer has promised, should it not, to sue for every last Mercedes and country club membership in the quack�s possession, which would have the added benefit of getting the Hoo Lawyer to apply himself to something other than the consumption of gin and cackling about the results of The Game. The Hoo Lawyer promises to get right on the case, if necessary, just as soon as he returns from what is becoming his annual holiday spent in the resort town of Charlotte. Hmm, Charlotte or Aruba? Maybe there is something to having lousy football after all.

So, I will not be in Phoenix, seeing for myself whether Tech�s incumbent Offensive Coordinator can put to good use his apparent recent discovery that passing the ball to the tailback is not prohibited by rule. Bryan will have to get by without the benefit of my expressing loud dissatisfaction with the play-calling from the stands, although I don�t imagine my whispering it at the television will have any less of an effect. I will not be there in person to see whether the defensive coaches have been successful in convincing some of their charges that football is a game of quarters rather than thirds. The team and staff will have to muddle through without me.

I will miss one of what I consider one of the highlights of any bowl trip, the opportunity to meet opposing fans, such as the Air Force officer and alumnus who last year took so enthusiastically to the concept and practice of my tailgate group�s Communion ritual. He later modified it to include doing a shot of brown liquor every time an Iraqi target was obliterated, which means he has consumed a bunch of the stuff, even more than he did in my company along Fisherman�s Wharf. This gentleman had a much busier off-season than I, and his last e-mail dealt with the character of an enemy who would willingly place himself six feet in the ground, exactly where we wanted him. Had he adopted this obliging attitude a year ago, he could have saved the United States military a great deal of trouble.

I must confess to knowing next to nothing about the Cal football program. I do not recall offhand ever once watching a Cal game on television, and the only bit of film that sticks out in my mind tells me only that the Marching Virginians might need to bone up on their tackling technique. The Golden Bears seem to get to a bowl game with a frequency somewhere between a Whig being elected to the White House and Tech passing to the tight end, indicating this game might be a pretty big deal to them. It is interesting perusing some of the Left Coast media and gleaning an awareness of how they are approaching the contest with Tech. It brings to mind how we felt when, as an upstart program we went up against some of the so-called bigger names such as Texas, Nebraska, Alabama and Florida State. The shoe seems to be on the other foot, and our opponent is now the one looking to validate itself against a more prominent program. That�s what eleven years of success gets you. My guess is Tech will defeat Cal, mainly because I feel Tech will win in most every football game they play these days. That�s also what eleven years of success will get you, along with spoiled rotten.

TechSideline Pass Home