On The Eve Of College Football’s Return, A Look At One Football’s Greatest Games

That sound you hear slowly gaining on you is the sweet noise of the day you no longer feel guilty about not making any sort of effort socially. You will no longer feel guilty because COLLEGE FOOTBALL IS HERE, FRIENDS, PLEASE STOP TALKING TO ME NOPE DON’T CARE YEP THAT’S REAL NICE OKAY TALK TO YOU IN LIKE FOUR MONTHS.

Tomorrow evening, we shall be free from this plague known as “not-football” and treated to things such as South Carolina false start penalties, Steve Spurrier visor-throws, and Jim Harbaugh staring with mouth agape at a referee who has correctly enforced a penalty on Michigan. Your wedding wasn’t as magical as those events will be.

While we wait for the clock to HURRY UP, we must pass the time. And what better way to pass the time than to look back at one of football’s greatest contests.

What game might that be, you ask? A billion-overtime affair with Houston Nutt pacing around like a hyena hopped up on various methamphetamines? A contest from years ago that sportswriters always bring up despite not having been alive at the time or too young to even recall it? No, none of these.

The game I’m referring to was played on a tiny stretch of beach in Southern California, at night, far from the bright lights of a stadium (though it did have the bright headlights from parked cars). It featured a former Ohio State quarterback and a group of surfers who robbed banks to finance their surfing lifestyle.

BEHOLD, THE FOOTBALL GAME FROM POINT BREAK.

It’s Bodhi and Johnny Utah sizing each other up while playing a version of football that lacks order and common sense, all in the name of showing the audience the establishment of the first step of tension and mutual respect between the two. Also, FOOTBALL.

To better understand one of the greatest games ever played, we need to immerse ourselves the goodness that is here. And what better way to do that than through the power of bullet points, the lazy man’s way of avoiding paragraphs and transition sentences.

• You witnessed history here, friends, as this was the first pickup/backyard game ever played that featured the quarterback lining up under center
• Some pickup/backyard games use a center because everyone maybe hates that person, but even then, the quarterback is in shotgun because taking snaps under center is really boring, pointless, and no one wants the authenticity of sticking their hands in the neighborhood of another’s sweaty undercarriage
• It’s difficult to tell how many people are on each team, but my best guess is five, which, in a SCALDING HOT TAKE, I believe is the best number for pickup/backyard football; space to maneuver, but enough traffic that it’s not miles and miles of running like a three-on-three game
• “How about that offensive pass interference at the five-second mark!”, screamed Darren Rovell
• “THE BRAND OF OFFENSIVE PASS INTERFERENCE JUST LOST $2.83!”
• 95-yard penalty for that thing that posed as a touchdown celebration starting at the 10-second mark
• DON’T HURT ‘EM WITH THAT SHOULDER FAKE, JOHNNY UTAH (:18)
• At the 21-second mark, Johnny froze Bodhi so badly on the play fake that he looked like Landon Collins against Ole Miss (here and here)
• CAN’T TAKE A SACK IN FIELD GOAL RANGE, JOHNNY (:45)
• DID THEY TEACH YOU NOTHING AT OHIO STATE?
• Starting at 1:00, Bodhi hit them with the ol’ throw it back to the quarterback leaking out of the backfield play, and then he ran like five miles down the beach before Johnny tackled him in the surf
• Bro, you scored a touchdown like 50 yards back, stop running
• Or was this the one play that the field quadrupled in length?
• That’s fine if it did, just a heads up for those of us at home would’ve been nice
• What? I’m not being a stickler for the rules
• I’m just saying it’s easier to understand why Bodhi left the dry sand where the rest of the game was played and took off down the shoreline, presumably to an end zone we didn’t know existed
• No, you’re stupid
• You are
• Shut up
• In fact, Bodhi went so far out of the way that I don’t think Johnny can be penalized, because at that point it’s all about just getting the ball back so they can keep playing
• The anxiety I have from thinking about all the car batteries running down due to them using the car headlights to light the field is CRIPPLING