16/09/2018 19:38:01 ¶ ●

## 134 - Fall Football Preview

There is no I in “team”.
This has been a partial list of letters not found in the word “team”.
Welcome to Night Vale.

The Night Vale High School Scorpions kick-off the varsity football season this Friday against last year’s district champion, Red Mesa. Following the announcement this summer that Scorpions’ head coach, Nazr al-Mujaheed, would be taking a sabbatical to deal with personal matters, Night Vale promoted defensive coordinator Lutrice Beaumont to head coach. She has ten years coaching experience and was a former line backer for the Scorpions during their heyday as four time state champs in the late 1990’s. This is a historical hire for the high school football program, as Lutrice Beaumont is the first Gemini to become head coach. Beaumont called a press conference this morning to talk about her team and her coaching staff’s expectations for this season. “After only one win last year,” Beaumont explained, “we wanted to change our approach entirely. Instead of a plotting, run-focused offensive, we want our starting quarterback, sophomore Junius Duncan, to really throw that ball around, just chuck that leather (wad) any direction he wants.”

Beaumont’s team motto for 2018 is “we will win, all the time, right now”. Junius Duncan has a small frame at only 5’4’’ and 120 pounds. But he has eight legs and can leap up to 20 times his own height. He has struggled with his accuracy in training camp, as he has zero arms. And the spiny tips of his front legs cause the ball to stick and sometimes deflate.

Senior running back Prince Reynolds, who led the district in rushing last year, returns in full health. Coach Beaumont said Reynolds has been working on his upper body strength in the off-season by installing hydraulic joints on each shoulder. We’ll have more on the upcoming Scorpion football season in a moment.
But first, a look at traffic.

Lisa Farmer does not like her job. She does not hate it, either. To Lisa, a job is a paid dare to sit in a chair for 10 hours every weekday for 40 years, for a little over a million dollars, paid out in bi-weekly installments. She commutes 35 minutes each way to her office. During this time, she thinks about the divorce papers her attorney gave her, but that she’s never filled out. She thinks about her husband’s lack of motivation. She thinks about having children. Not whether to have them, but the actual process of birth. She sometimes offers up an involuntary laugh, a reflex response to the forced laughter of the FM drivetime talk show. She forgets all of this when she arrives at home or work. Time pours from her like water from a broken pipe. All this time, lost to unmemorable travel. She measures her life in traffic jams, a mathematical equation that proves nothing. Commutes are the limbo of the weekday. Everything is stasis. Expect delays.
This has been traffic.

In her opening press conference, Night Vale Scorpions’ head coach Lutrice Beaumont said there were some rule changes this season that will affect her team’s approach. First, helmet to helmet hits, normally assigned a personal foul penalty, will now be subject to game (ejections) and possible suspensions. Officials are also cracking down on end zone celebrations. Many fans felt the elaborate displays of joy exhibited by players last season were not in the spirit of good sportsmanship. The most egregious example was when Cactus Park’s Jamille Whiteside scored the game-winning touchdown against Pine Cliff. He and the rest of his team mates then performed in the end zone the entirety of the Tony-winning musical sensation “Wicked”. District head of officiating, Jake Camp, announced: “I’m tired of selfish kids making a team sport all about them. In my day, when we scored, we would calmly hand the ball to the ref and jog back to the sideline head down. Maybe.” He continued: “Maybe, uh, a more religious kid might offer a quick prayer to the Brown Stone Spire, an unobtrusive gesture of kneeling, cutting your finger open, drawing a nine-pointed star with your blood, as your team mates danced about shirtless and chanting something in ancient Akkadian or Greek, but nothing ostentatious like what kids these days do. Did you see that one kid who did a backflip? [angrily] A backflip! This is football, not Cirque du Soleil, son!” Camp shouted. He added that millennials are killing everything good in the world.

One reporter reported that current high schoolers are not even part of the millennial generation. Another reporter pointed out that Camp is 33 years old, which makes him a millennial. Camp paused and said, “You wanna be like that? Fine!” Camp then begun to grunt and strain, his face darkened to a deep violet, as long white hair gushed from the top of his head and out of his chin. His posture weakened, his back now hunched. Wrinkles formed around his eyes and lips, and his skin loosened. He then said hoarsely: “I’m 93 now. So you know where you can put that millennial comment of yours!” The reporter assumed Camp meant the sport section of the newspaper, so that’s where the reporter put it.

In the middle of Beaumont’s press conference, assistant coach Christopher Tisdale whispered into her ear and she frowned. When asked to elaborate, she said she’d just received word that another new rule is that all players must have two or fewer legs. Which prohibits her starting quarterback, Junius Duncan from taking the field. Upset by this sudden change, Beaumont cited the Golden Retriever who was allowed to play basketball for Cactus Park back in 1997. They named the dog Airbud, because the dog was the former CEO of an airline. Admittedly, the dog was terrible at basketball. He ran in circles and barked at the coach for treats, while opposing teams took huge advantage of the five-on-four mismatch. But according to Beaumont, a precedent was set for multi-legged players.

Oh, this is terrible news. Junius must be devastated. Beaumont’s press conference is still going on. We’ll get back to it soon.

But for now, when the first bolt of lightning struck the sea, and the first apex of rock crested the tumultuous oceans, the elders among the stars brought life onto the Earth. These children of stardust became humans, became authorities of their tiny planet. They created science and art, and they worshipped their galactic forbearers. But their hubris grew in them like a cancer, and they abandoned the benevolence of their creators. The vigilant determination of life leads only – to death. An ironic ouroboros to be laughed at by the elders of the cosmos.
Diet Pepsi. Humans are a knock-knock joke of the gods.

Let’s take a look now at Night Vale High School’s district rivals this season, starting with last year’s champs, the Red Mesa Ant Carpenters. Red Mesa returns their starting quarterback, senior Salman Talib, who leads a dynamic passing offence anchored by junior wide receiver, Trung Pham. Pham’s quick feet, 6’5’’ frame, and nearly 20-inch antlers allow him to break free from smaller defenders. The Pine Cliff Lizard Monitors return with the league’s top offence. Everyone in Pine Cliff is a ghost, making them quite elusive, but the flip side of that is that their defence is terrible. In terms of total tackles made last season, they finished dead last. Pun not intended. But pun certainly embraced, because it’s not bad. Oh… Aha? A-ha. I’m getting word from my producer Ian that is in fact a bad pun, in bad taste. Ian’s grandmother was part of the Great Cataclysm of 2008, which turned all of Pine Cliff into ghosts. He says it’s no laughing matter to those living in Pine Cliff. To-to those residing in Pine Cliff, so. I’ll go back to the part where I said pun not intended.

One team to watch out for this year is the Cactus Park Shark Nurses, who have a strong defence but who have struggled with turnovers. The Shark Nurses’ senior running back Patrick Lyle had 20 fumbles last year, but said he focused on his ball carrying technique in the off season. Coachers worked with Lyle to carry the ball high and tight against his shoulder pads, instead of in his cargo shorts’ pockets.

Desert Bluffs, which has not had a team nor a high school for the past three seasons, has reincorporated in some desert otherworld and will be returning to district to play this year. League officials are concerned about the capriciousness of gateways between our reality and theirs, which could lead to visiting teams becoming lost in either a time loop or disappearing altogether. Theoretical physicist Cedric Drummond from Desert Bluffs Junior College said: “If you only focus on the bad, you’ll never see the good!” Not much is known about this Vultures team other than they’re probably – terrible.

Finally, there’s another new district rival this season, the Whispering Forest High School Wood Dogs. Whispering Forest High opened in 2016 after the forest incorporated as an independent township. No humans live in the Whispering Forest, only trees. Really polite trees, always with a quiet compliment. But if you accept one of their compliments, you too become a tree in their forest. Fun fact: Whispering Forest is the fastest growing town here in the desert. Urban planning experts think that the positivity emanating from the Whispering Forest has been a real draw for people seeking new homes. They’re unable to determine why a need for positivity suddenly became a factor in like 2016, but there it is. The Wood Dogs are sure to be the largest and toughest opponent in Night Vale’s district, but also the slowest, as they are literally trees. Their real strength won’t be in their ability to score or sack the quarterback, but to recruit entire opposing teams to their side before the game ends.

That’s a look at Night Vale High’s rivals this year. Coming up, we’ll check in with coach Beaumont and her team strategy for 2018.
But first, a public service announcement.

Friends of the Night Vale Public Library announced the annual used book sale is this Saturday afternoon from 10 to 5. Librarians will hang books from invisible twine attached to blade-based traps, inside a complex cornfield labyrinth. According to the press release, which appears to be written by a detached human finger dipped in its own blood, these are… [clears throat] great books by great authors like Georg Saunders, Mohsin Hamid, and Celeste Ng. Books you really should read. Books you’ll want to reach out and grab, without noticing that the earth below you is lightly covered in branches hiding a spike-filled pit. So come down to the library for the used book sale. No need to shower beforehand, your natural scent makes you easier to track. This has been a public service announcement.

Coach Beaumont has finally completed her pre-season press conference, and she finished it off with quite a statement. When asked what the overall strategy for this year would be, Beaumont said: “Surpriiise!” But she said it just like that, with her eyes wide and arms raised and there was a looong silence as the reporters waited for what was to happen next. The energy faded as Beaumont slowly lowered her hands, a lone cough came from the back of the room. Beaumont then continued: “Oh, our strategy is surprise. We don’t want our opponents to have any time to prepare for us, so we scheduled every single game simultaneously. All five division rivals will play us at once,” she said. “We kick off in like five minutes. I should go. As the leader of this team, I can’t be late for the national anthem, the pledge of allegiance, the eldritch chant of national unity, the Secret Police helicopter flyover, and the pre-game bloodstone bacchanal dance.” Now the reporters frantically shouted the rest of their questions. “Are you going to protest your quarterback’s disqualification?” “How will you compete against five teams at once?” “How many balls will be used?” “Where do we go when we die” and “What is football? Are you a football?” But Beaumont had already left.

I’m getting word that the game has kicked off at the Night Vale High School. Now I’m not a sports fan, but even I’m intrigued. I gotta see this.

Uh, let me take you now
To the weather.

[Raising Helvetica" by Sims x Air Credits x ICETEP sims.bandcamp.com ]

The Scorpions got off to a rough start. Two of their defensive line men accepted compliments from the Whispering Forest players.
“Oh, that was such a nice tacklllllle, you must be very proud of your training and dedication to this spooooort,” the trees whispered. “We’re impressed by your talents and chaaaarm!”
Suddenly, the two Night Vale players were trees. The opposing teams rallied together, handing the ball off to the Pine Cliff running back Alfonso Menendez, who simply could not be tackled. By the end of the first quarter, the Scorpions were down 20 to nothing. It would have been 21, but Desert Bluffs kicker, Leonard Clayton, missed an extra point, probably because he’s so poorly coached. In the second quarter, Night Vale’s Prince Reynolds scored a quick touchdown to make it 20 to 7. They followed that with a field goal after a fumble by Cactus Park’s Patrick Lyle, who was carrying the ball with his teeth, instead of holding it tight to his chest, leaving Night Vale down 20 to 10. Coach Beaumont told her team at half time that they were doing great, but they needed to focus more on the fundamentals of the game.
“Keep your eyes on the runners’ hips,” she shouted, “not their feet! Wrap your tackles tight!”
She encouraged her offensive players to pick up their correct blocking assignments.
“Tim!” she yelled, referring to offensive guard Timothy Lano. “Stop trying to block the trees! They can’t run, and the ghosts, they can’t tackle! Worry about tangible humans, Tim!”

The team seemed dejected without their starting quarterback Junius Duncan. Beaumont began a powerful and inspiring pep talk. She brought in a ten-piece brass band to perform Gustav Holst’s “Second Suite in F” underneath her speech.
“You can beat anyone if you believe in yourselves!” she began. “It would totally help if we had Duncan in the game though.”
Then she said: “Surprise!” and opened up a Ralphs bag with three pairs of gloves. “Duncan, put these on like you have six arms,” she said. “Can you walk on your back two legs?”
Duncan nodded yes, but no one notice because there was no joint allowing free movement of his head atop his thorax. So he had to hiss and leap up and down to demonstrate his bipedal abilities. The team let out a relieved cheer of “Win! All the time! Right now!” and ran onto the field, rejuvenated by their flouting of government issued regulations.

Duncan struggled early with his passes, as he had no fingers to fill his gloves, but he did score six touchdowns by simply leaping 20 yards at a time down the field, and tying up defenders in webs. He was penalized 15 yards, though, for attempting to use his venom to paralyze the bodies of his prey.

In the end, Night Vale won, 52-45, earning the district title before the season even started. Uh, what an exciting game! Carlos and the rest of the family joined me and we ate nachos and drank sodas and shouted cheers like, “Go team go!” and “Ooooh, blood!” And “Ooooooo, bloooood!”
Carlos even bought me one of those pointing foam fingers that says “Someone talked! Identify the traitor.” [chuckles]

The whole game was visceral and communal. You know, maybe I’m a sports fan after all. I hope this victory, too, brings some joy to former coach Nazr al-Mujaheed. I’m sure it didn’t heal him, but hopefully it offered him temporary relief from pain.

Stay tuned next for Gentle Takes, our political roundtable where the hosts listen to each other talk about their days while they knit and say, “Thanks for sharing that with me.”

Good night,
Night Vale,
Good night.

Today’s proverb: Dress for the job you want: sports team mascot. Not the job you have: customer service manager.