Adventures in Advent: Advent 2024, Day 16

 It's Monday and that means Monday Night Football. Unless the schedule changes drastically, the Chicago Bears are expected to head to Minneapolis to play the Minnesota Vikings (I write my Advent posts a few days in advance. So if 2 different teams are now on the schedule to play instead of Bears/Vikings, I'm sorry.)

Since there's football today I thought I'd look at an Advent calendar devoted to the pigskin. The one I selected is the NFL Funko 24 Day Countdown Calendar. Each corresponding day you open up the correct door and unearth a miniature vinyl figure of the most popular players in the league. There's a Patrick Mahommes, a Lamar Jackson and a T.J. Watt among the players to be found in this Advent. 

While you don't know which player you will receive, you do know which team that they play for. That's because each door is designed to look like a Christmas ornament with 1 of 24 different teams logos on it. You might be wondering 'aren't there 32 teams currently in the NFL?', and you'd be right. If you are a fan of the Carolina Panthers, Washington Commanders or the New England Patriots, you are out of luck. Sorry, no Bears either.

You've got to really be a fan of the league to enjoy this set. What true Steelers fan is going to want a player from divisional rivals, the Cleveland Browns? 

Don't expect custom work either. While the D.K. Metcalf figure is black, there are no distinguished features among these Funko Pops unlike their regular sized counterparts who has a ton of tattoos on both arms. 

Shazam: Thundercrack (Family Comic Friday)

The moment I found out about this graphic novel, I was ecstatic to say the least. I loved the first Shazam movie. I eagerly await (still) a chance to see the sequel. And I've learned over the years that I really am a fan of the Big Red Cheese.

Shazam: Thundercrack isn't a sequel. Nor is this 2023 graphic novel a tie-in to the new movie Shazam: Fury of the Gods. Instead, this book is a midquel, taking place in the middle of the first Shazam film. Consider this read to be a director's cut of deleted scenes with author Yehudi Mercado adding more details into Billy Batson and Freddie Freeman's exploration of Batson's new Shazam powers. 

As Billy Batson develops his Shazam powers, the teen begins to experience improvements in his physical prowess as a mortal. One day while talking his way out of getting in trouble for skipping class, Billy makes an impressive throw that catches the eye of the Fawcett high football team's Coach. Now Billy finds himself the new star quarterback with Freddie joining the cheer squad as the tiger mascot, Tawky Tawny. Unknown to Billy and his teammates, their cross town rivals have been utilizing dangerous synthetic enhancements sponsored by Dr. Sivana and that the final game of the season promises to be a blood bath!

Mercado's artwork is spot on. The renderings of the characters are more cartoony than life- like. But these are excellent caricatures of the actors. I love how this franchise keeps incorporating those fanciful elements of the Shazam family into the DC Cinematic Universe like having Tawky Tawny be the Fawcett high school mascot. (Fun Fact: Fawcett was the name of the original publisher of Shazam Family comic books) And with the enhancements of the rival football team, whose mascot are the Atoms, we get a non-Nazi inspired version of the robotic Shazam nemesis, Mister Atom, that I totally get behind!

A great book that ends with a small flaw. Seemingly, Billy's coach knows the he's secretly a super hero. Yet at the end of Shazam only Freddie and the other foster kids where Billy lives know that Batson is super powered. Maybe Fury of the Gods addresses this. Maybe I am reading too much into the coach's thanks. But it makes for a potential continuity error that I just can't get behind. 

A fun read for young readers who love the film series. Subject matter might be a little more advanced, what with the technology misused by the opposing team and it's subsequent techo-jargon. But definitely a read that captures the spirit of Shazam perfectly.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

All-Pro Sports Comics #1 (2022 Comic Book & Graphic Novel Challenge)

Even though I was born and raised in Raleigh, North Carolina, I paid very early attention to the career of one Vincent Edward Jackson.  

Oh, you don't know Vincent Edward Jackson? Well, do you know Bo- Jackson, that is!

Jackson played a trio of sports for Auburn University including baseball and football. Bo's impressive scoring of 17 touchdowns and almost 1,800 yards during his senior year earned the Tiger the Heisman Trophy and Walter Camp Award in 1985. While Bo's future looked paved in goal with teams such as the New York Yankees and Tampa Bay Buccaneers putting early bids on the multi-sport star. Ultimately, Bo went on to play with the Kansas City Royals and Los Angeles Raiders while securing several lucrative endorsement deals including Nike and a live-action cartoon series with NBC. 

But early on as a child, Bo Jackson almost ended up behind bars. The 8th of 10 children, Jackson's family were literally dirt poor in rural Alabama. They lived in a 3 room shack that did not have indoor plumbing. Often targeted for his stutter, Jackson developed a violent temper. The angeralso earned him a nickname- 'Bo-hog', later shortened to just BO.

A violent incident of animal cruelty put Bo at an impasse- clean up his act or got to juvenile detention. For the sake of his mother, Bo chose to put his aggression into school sports. Bo become a 3-sport star and was heavily recruited by many SEC schools. Jackson selected Auburn due to it's proximity to his family and the rest was history.

Some of that history includes Bo running a touchdown for a then record of 92 and 93 yards, breaking baseball bats over his knee when he struck out, hitting a home run in 4 consecutive at bats, and becoming the first player in MLB all-star history to hit a homer and to steal a base in a game. He was the MVP for that 1989 game. 

The Bo Jackson train came to a screeching halt in a January 1991 NFL play-off game against the Cincinnati Bengals. A rough tackle resulted in Bo dislocating his hip. Somehow upon being taken off the field, the hip popped back into place and the damage was done. Blood vessels damaged, Jackson was soon diagnosed with avascular necrosis which killed all of the cartilage within Bo's hip socket. 

Bo would never play football again. After taking 1992 off to get a total hip replacement, Bo returned to baseball with the Chicago White Sox and the California Angels. While Bo did have some impressive numbers, chronic pain kept him from ever playing more than half a season's worth of game. By 1994, Bo Jackson hung up his cleats for good. 

This issue of All-Pro Sports Comics was published in 1991 just as Bo's career ending injury had experts wondering 'what if?' Published by Burke Publishing, this issue was to usher forth a vast line of comics based on current and all-time great superstars of all areas of sports. Ultimately, only 5 issues were published. Joe Montana, Wayne Gretzky, Larry Bird and Evander Hollyfield were featured in these unauthorized biographies. Sadly, Burke Publishing folded sometime in 1992 before the release of the much promised issue to feature 'Steffi Graf Graf and the Babes of Tennis!' All-Star Sports Comics would be Burke's only comic book publication.

There is supposed to be a variant cover to this issue. Bo in his Royals uniform is the lesser known version. Despite the rarity of the KC Royals cover, I haven't seen a very big difference in the prices of the 2 comics. Though, I've run across the Raiders issue on several occasions in bargain bins throughout the North Carolina comic convention circuit. 

Bo Jackson will never be a part of Canton or Cooperstown. His career was too short and he never played for a championship team. But those short several years that Bo did play were exciting. If anything, Bo will forever be enshrined in my personal hall of fame. He was an amazing specimen who unfortunately became a victim of a career ending injury.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars. 

Completing this review completes Task #37 (About Sports) of the 2022 Comic Book and Graphic Novel Reading Challenge.

1977: A Madman Turns 40: 2017- Day 83

 Today in Madman history, we go to the grid iron. It was 40 years ago today that the NFL changed the official schedule from 14 games to 16. 

    The move was made for a couple of reasons.

1) The most obvious reason was money. Thanks to the Super Bowl, football was quickly becoming the number one spectator sport in America. Now in '77, baseball was still king. But Football was putting up impressive numbers against the NBA and the NFL. So more games meant more ticket sales, more televised events and of course more money.

Commissioner Pete Rozelle,
the brains behind many NFL innovations including the 16-games schedule.

2) There were more teams. Thus in order to ensure more teams got a chance to go to the play-offs, more games were added. This also added more games to the play-off schedule and thus once again- MORE MONEY!

3) The move helped the Seattle Sea-hawks and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to have a permanent division. Thus it made it even across the board for all teams to play the same number of opponents every year. Of the 3 moves- this was the least permanent actually, as when more teams in the 90s were added to the league a new schedule system had to be adopted.

16 games in a season now put football starting into early August.

   I think it's interesting that 40 years after this expansion of games to the schedule that the NFL is once again talking about adding more games to the schedule. The league wants to go to 18 games but the player's union, concerned about injury, will only agree to it if the league removes 2 exhibition games. I don't think that the NFL is going to allow for an even swap of games but eventually, I think the season is going to expand to 18 games with the loss of only 1 exhibition game. 

    Honestly, I don't think 4 exhibition games are needed. None of the really good players play in the fourth game and the exhibition season has become a bit of a joke with it becoming a sort of phantom zone where players facing a suspension still get to play. I'm sorry but if you are banned from the first 4 games of the regular season, that punishment should also include pre-season as well. Injury and conditioning aside, a punishment is supposed to hurt not reward and allowing someone to play prior to getting sent to the bench really doesn't reinforce a need to correct a bad behavior.

I had to add this- it's the Steelers!!!

    Okay- maybe it's the teaching part of me that's taken over but I feel that this is a change to needs to happen if you don't want anymore Ray Allen/ Le'Veon Bell/ Tom Brady situations anymore.
  
     Well, that's my look at good ole 1977. Come back tomorrow. Who knows where I'll turn up next!

1977: A Madman Turns 40: 2017- Day 80

  
  Yesterday, Duke lost in the NCAA Tournament to South Carolina. But there was an even bigger loss to the Duke program as it was sportscaster Bob Harris' last stint as the play-by-play announcer.

    This was Mr. Harris' last season and though he got started in 1976 calling Duke football games on the radio, if you do the math, this season's 2016-2017 basketball season was #40! That means as long as I have been alive, nobody else has ever called a Duke football or basketball game for Duke Sports Radio. So of course, I've got to pay some tribute to the man known as the 'Voice of the Blue Devils.' 

     My mother was an NC State fan. My father loved UNC. Being an individual, I went my own way and choose Duke. In middle school and high school, I wanted to go to Duke so bad. I loved watching Laettner, Hurley, Davis, and the Hills (no relation) destroy the competition! Lead by the one and only Coach K, the Duke Blue Devils were back-to-back Final Four Champs! It was a great time to be a Duke fan.

     Back in the 90s, you didn't get to see every Duke game on TV like you can now. You only had ESPN, ABC, NBC, and CBS. So unless you got lucky and Duke was selected as the game of the week, the only way to regularly catch a Duke game was on the radio. So I spent many a day and night listening to Mr. Bob Harris call those Duke games on AM radio. 

      At the same time I was listening to Harris call the games on the radio, my future wife and future in-laws were doing the same as I and listening to the games being called by Bob. Janni was a Duke grad, an original Cameron Crazie, and she works for the Duke hospital system where she is the system's reigning Social Worker of the Year! 

   Though I never got to go to Duke, I now work there too in the University's dining system as a chef manager. So Duke's a very big deal in our home and Bob Harris' retirement is a very bittersweet thing.

Check on the video at 1:25 for the

Ultimate NCAA baskestball play of all-time.

    Before I go, let's look at the achievements of Bob Harris' career and the amazing things he had the privilege to call on the Duke Radio Network:

Member North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame

3 time North Carolina Sportscaster of the Year

                                     Recipient of the Order of the Long Leaf Pine Award, 2016

(North Carolina's highest civilian honor)

Called 456 consecutive Duke football games 

& 1,358+ Duke basketball games 

1 Duke Football Bowl Win (Pinstripe Bowl, 2015)

41 ACC men's basketball tournament games

16 ACC Championships

13 Final Four appearances

11 national championship games

and 5 NCAA Champion titles.

Best of Luck Bob- We'll miss you!

1977: A Madman Turns 40: 2017- Day 8

   I don't really get into much on my blog, but friends and family know that I am a devoted fan of the Pittsburgh Steelers. I'm such a fan that in the town I live in Hillsborough, NC, I am known by residents as Mr. Steeler. Since the Steelers are playing in the Wild Card today, I thought this would be the perfect chance to reflect on what the Steelers were like the year I was born- good ole 1977!
  

1977 Team Photo taken from the old Three Rivers Stadium.

  1977 wasn't the best year for the team. 3 years of winning two straight Super Bowls and a trip to the AFC Championship had taken a toll. The guys were exhausted and injuries mounted. Though they won their division and did make it to the playoffs, they were trounced by the Denver Broncos.

At this stage of both QBs careers, both had/have
only won 2 Lombardi trophies. I hope Big Ben (right)
can add a third before he retires.

    The team MVP that year was quarterback Terry Bradshaw. The feisty Cajun played 14 games, throwing 17 touchdowns for over 2,500 yards. At this time, Bradshaw had lead the team to 2 Super Bowls and would end his career as the first quarterback with 4 Super Bowl rings.

Antonio Brown's (right) stint on Dancing With The Stars,
seems to have helped him become the premier wide-receiver in the NFL today.

     One of Terry Bradshaw's favorite targets was wide receiver, Lynn Swann (or Swannie as announcer Howard Cosell would refer to him.) In '77, Swann caught 7 passes from Bradshaw for touchdowns and accounted for almost 800 of QB-12's passing yards. Swann was poetry in motion and so very light on his feet. He would credit his love of dance and ballet as attributing to his prowess on the field.

  In 1977, another offensive weapon for the Steelers was running back Franco Harris. Franco is my all-time favorite Steeler. His miraculous catch in a 1972 playoff game (The Immaculate Reception) is credited as the spark to Pittsburgh becoming one of the most dominate teams in the modern era of football. This year was a good one for Harris as his ran for over 1,700 yards and 14 touchdowns!

Despite a 3-game suspension for drug policy violations,
Le'Veon Bell (right) racked up over 1,700 total yards of offense this season.

    If I'm going to talk about the Steelers in 1977, I have to mention the team's defense. Honestly, while the offense was good, their defense was better. The 4 men that made up the Steel Curtain of the front defensive line were the best in NFL history. Greene, Greenwood, Holmes, and White. But my favorite defense-man on the Steelers in the 70s was Jack Lambert. 

The legacy of Ol' #58 lives on
with my Steelcat, Lambert J!

     Lambert was a line-backer who many believe was the last piece of the puzzle needed for the Steelers to become 4x Super Bowl Champs. Having played for Kent State, which practice field was a gravel parking lot (in which Lambert recalls picking stones out of his arms in the locker room afterwards) #58 was a mean son-of-a-gun on the field. He ate quarterbacks for breakfast, lunch, and dinner! Unfortunately, in 1977, sacks weren't recorded by the NFL but I am sure Lambert had quite a few under his belt that year.

    And there you have a look at the Steelers in the year this Madman was born. I love the team we have now. I just wish we'd get a really decent back-up quarterback (Big Ben not gonna be around forever folks.) Hopefully, 2017 will find the team reaping more success than in the year I was born. I may be stuck in the 70s but this is one time that I hope something I love from that era does better than they did in my favorite year of 1977.
   

Down. Set. Fight!

   

10 years ago an up and coming football running back named Chuck Fairlane went bonkers and beat the crap out of the opposing team's mascot. It resulted in his being banned from sports. It also ended a major sports betting ring to boot.

 A decade later, the legacy of that game continues as Fairlane's name is now synonymous with pop culture as it's become common place for victorious teams to pummel their losing opponents mascot in a practice called 'Fairlaning." Lately, the mascots have been fighting back attacking seemingly random celebrities and sports heroes.

     Now a high school football coach in rural South Carolina,  Chuck hoped to slip away into obscurity. But when a man in a giant elephant suit interrupts Coach's football tryouts, Chuck unwillingly returns to the limelight as well as the watchful eye of the FBI. Someone is training professional mascots to become fighters and has created an ultimate fighting championship for giant muppets. The prize: the chance to take down the creator of Fairlaning once and for all.

   The art of this story implied that it would be an all-ages romp. But the language and violence level is anything but. The premise of revolting professional sports mascots is pretty absurd so artist Scott Kowalchuk's sweeping inks is fitting. But once again this book is NOT for kids.

      This 2014 romp is like an Elmore Leonard novel on steroids. With angry jocks, even angrier mascots and a host of questionable scumbags and bookies, it's the NFL-equivalent of 'Get Shorty.' With an array of costumed villains with a penchant for destruction and vice on par with the classic 1970s film 'The Warriors', I could see Tarantino making this into a movie someday. It was a good read. But I cannot stress enough, this is not a book for those under 13 at the least.

 Worth Consuming

  Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

NFL Superpro #1

Well folks, today is the beginning of football. I’m ready to cheer on my Steelers. In preparation to the kick-off of the 2014 season, I decided to ready what many consider the worst comic book of all-time. That’s right- I read NFL Superpro #1!

  The book was published in 1991 and was collaboration between the NFL and Marvel Comics. The book stars Phil Grayfield, a retired football player whose career was ended due to injury. He’s now a sports reporter and during an interview with a sports collector, he’s knocked unconscious and trapped in a burning room filling with practice films. The chemicals melt and give Grayfield super powers. Along with an experimental football player’s uniform, the ex-athlete fights crime while simultaneously committing copyright infringement.

This being the first issue, I thought it would be the ‘origin’ issue. Alas, that all happened in the NFL Superpro Super Bowl Special, which I also own but was saving to read during next year’s Super Bowl. Thankfully, Marvel did devote a whopping 4 panels in explaining how Grayfield became Superpro.

Now I’m about to commit some comic book heresy- issue #1 wasn’t that bad! Yes- the premise is corny. If burning celluloid would give you super powers, I’d set a movie theatre on fire right now and breathe deep. Also, if your running around in an experimental football uniform that bears the NFL logo and you were the Commissioner of said league would you not A) sue the guy for wearing unofficially licensed material and B) figure out who had said uniform and trace back how it ended up in this vigilante heroes hands? It’s not one of the most well thought out premises, I’ll give you that.

However, if you look at this as an un-official 'Marvel Team-Up' between Superpro and guest hero, Spider-man; the book isn’t terrible. True, the two heroes never officially meet but in terms of Marvel Team-Up’s reputation of introducing new heroes to fans in hopes of garnishing a fan base, Superpro was better than some of the crap I’ve read in the pages of MTU. (Speaking of Team-Up, apparently Robert Kirkman wanted to bring Superpro back for a story but couldn’t due to copyright and the best he could do was have Stilt-Man brag about beating Superpro up once. Okay, if Stilt-Man can defeat you, maybe you should hang it up.)

The art was okay for 1991 standards. It was gritty and a little sexy. There are some pretty cool fight scenes. The dialogue stunk, unless it was Peter Parker/ Spider-man. Those parts were pretty good. I would say instead of treating this book as garbage, look at it as a B-movie. It’s so bad, it’s good.

Instead of considering Superpro the worst comic of all-time, I see this as the Plan 9 from Outer Space of comic books. I paid 50 cents for this in a bargain bin and I am sure some folks would say I paid too much. However, if I find the other 11 issues in this series in a dollar box, I’d snatch them up. They’re always good for a laugh.

Rating: 5 out of 10 stars

"Dan Rooney: My 75 Years With the Pittsburgh Steelers and the NFL"

WORTH CONSUMING!

I’ve been a Steelers fan since I don’t know when. I’ve got family from Pittsburgh, I’ve always loved that the helmet only has a logo on one side, and one of the first sentences I remember ever reading was “One for the Thumb.” Well, it took a while to get the thumb, but I’ve been a member of Steelers Nation my whole life, and I don’t expect to change!

 If you are a fan of the Steelers, this book is required reading! If you are a football historian, this book needs to be on your reading list, as the Steelers are one of the original NFL founding teams. If you are from Dallas, I pity you.

 A great, fun, and fast read. (I wish it was longer!)