The NFL Labor impasse ended last week. It was written about in all the newspapers. But it was written more eloquently on the face of Blakely Feld, who sits next to me in my Mass Media in Society Class.
Blakely, a 21-year co-ed from Alabama, fairly bounced into class that Monday afternoon, smiling broadly.
“The lock-out is over!’’ she said. “I’m so excited!’’
No doubt, NFL fans everywhere were excited when the NFL owners and players reached an agreement on a 10-year collective bargaining agreement, insuring that the 2011-12 season will proceed without delay or interruption.
Even so, few of us have what you would call a vested interest in the matter.
And that sets Blakely Feld, who will finish her undergraduate degree in Communications/Public Relations next week, apart from most of us. Blakely Feld met a boy soon after arriving at Mississippi State four years ago, an MSU football player, it turns out. They were married last year.
Her husband, Aaron Feld, is not a household name, not even on the MSU campus. You won't find his name on an All-American list or even on the All-SEC team. He was never a team captain and hardly ever was deemed important enough to be interviewed during his years at MSU.
And yet Feld is one of the few MSU players who will have a chance to join that elite group of people who can call themselves NFL players.
Feld’s opportunity relies on one simple skill: He snaps a football. Feld has snapped the ball for MSU on kicks and punts since his freshman year. That tells you one very important – you could say essential – fact. He has done his job consistently well.
And for snappers, doing their job consistently well is the critical factor. Other players can miss an assignment or make a mistake without jeopardizing their careers, provided their successes exceed their failures.
But snappers have no room for error. During a typical game, they’ll snap the ball maybe a dozen times and, if all goes as expected, hardly anyone will note their performance. But one bad snap can alter the outcome of a game. You mess up as a snapper and your job prospects cloud considerably.
When I first met Blakely and she told me about her husband, I asked her if she had read the book, “The Long Snapper.’’ She said she had heard of it, but hadn’t read it. I told her I had the book, but when I got home I realized that book was in storage at my sister’s house in Tupelo.
The book is about former LSU football player Brian Kinchen, who has spent 13 seasons in the NFL, primarily in the role of long snapper. The story begins with Kinchen back in his native Lousiana, teaching at a middle school and out of the game for three years.
In December of 2003, The New England Patriots lost their long snapper a few days before the playoffs started and called Kinchen for a tryout. The story follows Kinchen’s experience with the Patriots, from beating out another long snapper who had been called in for a tryout to the Super Bowl, where – as fate would have it – Kinchen, tormented by fears he would make a critical mistake, was called upon to make a snap on what proved to be the game-winning field goal.
“I need to read that book,’’ Blakely Feld after I told her what the book was about.
In the days after the lockout ended, Blakely gave us regular updates on her husband’s situation. There were several teams who had expressed some interest in signing her husband to a free-agent contract. She seemed equally excited about each team. Even the thought of her husband playing in frigid Buffalo seemed wonderful to her, although she did fret about her inadequate wardrobe for such a harsh climate.
Then, last Thursday, Blakely sorta levitated her way into class.
“He signed with Tampa Bay!’’ she squealed.
Blakely is s sweet girl, and it was fun to see her so excited.
Now, I have no idea how her story will turn out. The fact is that half of the players under contract today will be out of a job within a month. Tampa’s long-snapper last year was injured, so there is an opening for the job. But there are, of course, no guarantees and I am certain that Feld won’t be in the only long-snapper the Bucs will be auditioning this month. It’s not a sure thing but any means.
Of course, that is a possibility I am sure Blakely Feld is well aware of. And if she was not aware, there was no inclination on my part to point out the sobering prospects.
By the middle of the week, Blakely Feld will finish school and fly to Tampa to join her husband at training camp. How long the Felds will be there, I don’t know.
I’d like to think that her husband will get the job and have a long career. If he does, he’ll make probably in the neighborhood of $350,000 per year, which is a heckuva lot better pay than most recent graduates could even hope to make.
But he may also find that his NFL dream lasted only a few short weeks.
In either case, I think the Felds will do just fine. They are young, in love and both have college degrees. It’s probably a long shot, this NFL dream. But it’s a shot.
If it doesn’t work out, the Felds will have to find a new dream, even if the new dream seems dull by comparison to this one.
But life is like that sometimes.
Whether it is love or a career or any number of things that shape a person’s life here on earth, you have to let go of an old dream before you can dream a new one.
That’s been my experience, at least.
Bravo
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