Kid in the Hall

Given the choice between a chocolate candy bar and a tomato, he’d opt for the healthier choice and grab the vegetable…and ask for seconds.   

Given the choice between spending the day at the circus or a two-hour trip to the museum, dinosaur bones and prehistoric cave art trump red-nosed clowns and high-flying acrobats every time. 

Given the choice between sitting on the couch to watch cartoons or going for a run, he’d rather lace up his tiny running shoes even though it would be much simpler to slip on a pair of tiny alligator bedroom slippers.

If I’ve learned one thing about my grandson Krischan, it’s that he is prone to say or do the exact opposite of what most people would expect.  You can include me in that category, even though by now I should know better.  My wife Cindy and I took Krischan to Atlanta’s brand new College Football Hall of Fame—through a special offer from the Atlanta Gator Club—and expected his tolerance level for ‘all things football’ to be somewhere in the neighborhood of four or five minutes.  As our tour was scheduled to last two hours, our apprehension about taking Krischan with us is understandable.

A little background: Krischan has been exposed to ‘all things Gator’ since the day he was born.  I won’t go into detail but let’s just say everything from his first onesie to his first stuffed gator to his first sippie cup has been orange and blue.  He’s been doing the Gator ‘chomp’ since he was two.  He can instantly recognize the Gator football team when they’re playing on TV.  And yes, he can yell ‘Go Gators!’ at the top of his lungs with the best of us.  The boy was born to bleed orange and blue.

But two solid hours of NBF (nothing but football)?  Was it too much for a boy not yet six years old?  Let’s find out, shall we?

4:00 – 4:05 p.m.                    We met our tour guide Terry LeCount, former NFL player and more importantly former Florida Gator.  Terry was the quarterback at Florida when Cindy and I were students there.  In fact Terry played quarterback in high school at Raines, one of the archrival schools in Jacksonville, Florida of Duncan U. Fletcher, the alma mater of Cindy and I.  How did my high school fare in football against Terry’s alma mater?  Let’s just say the Raines mascot was a Viking and the Fletcher mascot was a Senator: Now imagine the two of them squaring off.  Yeah, it was ugly.  Truth be known Fletcher Senior High was located at the beach and in a perfect world our school mascot would be Jeff Spicoli, the surfer dude from Fast Times at Ridgemont High (‘All I need are some tasty waves, a cool buzz and I’m fine.’).  

4:05 – 4:20 p.m.                    We listened to our special guest Danny Wuerffel, former NFL player, former Florida Gator and former Heisman Trophy Winner (1996).  Danny led the Gators to four consecutive SEC Championships (1993 – 1996) and a National Championship in his senior year.  Danny told some old war stories from his days playing for the ‘Evil Genius,’ former Florida Head Coach Steve Spurrier.  Although I’ve heard the stories before I still find myself laughing—probably because Danny’s impersonation of Spurrier is so spot-on accurate with his rat-a-tat delivery and scrunched up nose—that I can practically envision Steve himself up on the stage.  My favorite story from Danny’s repertoire (I’m paraphrasing here):

I was a freshman at Florida and pretty nervous playing in front of such a large crowd for the first time.  I called a basic pass play that allowed the receiver a multitude (I counted seven as Danny spoke) of variations in the route he would be running.  As I called the signals at the line I audibled to announce which of the routes the receiver should run.  I threw the football exactly where the receiver should have been, but the receiver turned ‘in’ when he should have turned ‘out’ and the pass was intercepted.  I was really afraid to go to the sideline because I feared what Coach would have to say; I was just hoping he realized the interception was the receiver’s mistake and not mine.  I ran up to him and said ‘sorry, coach’ and he replied back: ‘It’s not your fault, Danny.  It’s mine…for putting you out there in the first place.’

After Danny spoke we had the opportunity to meet him, but seeing how long the line was we opted for seeing a 10-minute video of what it’s like on the sideline, in the huddle and on the field of an NCAA football game.  Krischan seemed to like it because there was a fair share of Gator players throughout the film.  Afterwards we returned to stand in a still fairly long line to meet Danny.  Once we got to the head of the line Cindy got Danny’s autograph on two posters we picked up on the way in (a cartoon alligator chasing after a cartoon bulldog—perfect since the annual Florida-Georgia game was only seven days away).

Krischan did Cindy one better.  Danny picked him up, sat Krischan down next to him on the side of the stage, posed for a couple of photographs and spoke to him directly for a good 90 seconds.  Looking at the photographs later, you would have thought Krischan was sitting on a nail rather than sitting next to a former Heisman Trophy Winner.  Danny was fighting a winless battle trying to coax a ‘Go Gators!’ out of him. 

4:20 – 5:20 p.m.                    This was where Krischan’s patience was put to the test.  We were touring the actual Hall of Fame.  (When Krischan saw all of the exhibits he asked me if we were now in the ‘dinosaur moo-zeum.’)  Surprisingly there were plenty of things that appealed to him (most of it being the state-of-the-art interactive stations sprinkled throughout the hall).  One of the stations took a photo of Krischan’s face, displayed it on a screen and allowed him to paint it in orange, blue and an assortment of Gator logos.  Another allowed him to ‘measure up’ against a 6’6” Auburn football player (Krischan was a hair under 4’).  The most interesting station were large touch-screen devices suspended from the ceiling that allowed you to revisit the legends of yesterday via historic footage, interviews and testimonials.  Well, at least they looked interesting—between Cindy and I we have less technological know-how than most five-year olds so we were never able to navigate our way through the screen but we did manage to get an error message…  on a computer screen that everyone else in the Hall didn’t seem to have a problem with.  I can’t remember the wording on the error message, but it said something like this:

Remove your hand from the screen and walk away before you cause any irrevocable damage to this system.  May we suggest giving your grandson a chance?

5:20 – 5:45 p.m.                    A small artificial-turf playing field is located on the first floor of the Hall.  Krischan couldn’t wait to get to it (he could see it from both the second and third floors where we had spent the first 80 minutes).  This should be fun.    

Activity #1: Throw three footballs at three holes in a large net from a distance of 20 yards.  Translation for a five-year old:  Throw three footballs with all your might in the general direction of the man in uniform standing beside the net, using two hands if the football is too large for one hand (it most definitely was).  Krischan made three crisp two-handed floaters—with all his might--to the man in uniform who took the ball each time and slammed it into each of the three holes in the net, completing the finest and perhaps only trio of alley-oops in the history of football.

Activity #2: Run shoulder-first into a blocking sled, weave through eight tackling dummies and catch a pass while falling into a large foam cushion.  Translation for a five-year old: Do what is necessary to avoid the blocking sled, run straight through eight tackling dummies and dive into a large foam cushion while a perfectly-thrown pass floats over your head.

Activity #3: Kick a 20-yard field goal from a tee.  Translation for a five-year old: Run towards the football and do whatever is necessary to distinguish whatever you do to it from anything you might do to a soccer ball.  This one was doomed from the start.  Man in uniform (to Krischan): ‘Left-footed or right-footed?’  Krischan: (shrugs).  Man: ‘Left or right?’  Krischan: (still shrugging from the first time).  In the end it didn’t matter—left or right—because when Krischan reached the ball and made contact with his right foot (I can’t say he actually ‘kicked’ the ball, rather he ‘moved the ball with the top of his foot’) the football traveled about 10 yards along the ground.  Disappointed he didn’t ‘kick the football between the yellow poles,’ I told Krischan he made a good kick but the wind got hold of it.

Activity #4:  Cornhole, where the object is to toss a beanbag into a small circular hole cut into a wooden ramp from a distance of 10 yards.  Krischan chose me as his opponent.  We made four sets of four throws; I managed to put one into the hole in each set (‘Ooooh G-Pa, you DID it!’ said with the excitement I wish he’d shown Danny Wuerffel a little over an hour ago).  Krischan never got one of his beanbags in the hole, but he did manage to throw a beanbag sideways, backwards, straight up, three yards and 23 yards among his 16 tosses.  While my throws were a lot more consistent, Krischan’s throws were a lot more creative (and dangerous to anyone in the general vicinity of the cornhole area). 

5:45 – 6:00 p.m.                    The last stop was the gift shop.  Krischan spotted a small Florida Gator football, picked it up and asked if he could have so he could play football with his G-Pa.  The price tag was hefty—as you might expect in any moo-zeum—but you might say the odds were stacked heavily in Krischan’s favor.   My only grandson wanted a football—his first football and a Gator football, no less—to play with his G-Pa. 

My American Express had about as much of a chance as Krischan’s 20-yard field goal try. 

When Cindy and I attended the University of Florida we didn’t have very good football teams.  In fact each season ended with cries of ‘wait ‘til next year.’

Wait ‘til next year indeed.  Krischan started practicing with his small Florida Gator football today.  Next year I’ll wager he’ll be kicking the football ‘between the yellow poles.’ 

On behalf of both Krischan and I: Go Gators!