I don't not love sports, there's just been a whole lot of real life lately and not a lot of time for extra-curricular activities. Unless I have to feed you, wipe your bottom, or give you a copay, you're outside the realm of my interests, as it were.
That doesn't change that since the day of my birth in August of 1980, approximately 34.25 years ago, I have been a Mississippi State fan.
It was just pretty inherent where I lived. We were thirty or so miles from Starkville. We grew up wearing maroon and white and yelling "Go Dawgs!" before we even knew why.
We played some pretty good football during my college days. Those were the days of Dicenzo and Pork Chop and McKinley and Smoot, back when we always had a pretty good season, but we never could quite show up for four whole quarters... Back in the days when Malfunction Junction still functioned. We believed in you then, boys. We knew that, for parts of the game, you were the best team in the whole country. We thrived on that. We loved you then. We loved you before. We've loved you since. We love you now.
This crazy phenomenon all around me, of State fans yelling "Hotty Toddy," and Ole Miss fans chanting "Hail State;" it's ridiculous. Never in the history of my life have I seen the people of the state of Mississippi so unified (at least until the Egg Bowl.) We've always believed in you, but now everyone, in-state and out, gets to see why. Everyone gets to know why we've all sat in the rain in the bad years and clanged our cowbells all the way to Rick's Cafe after a hard loss. You're our team, and right now you're the nation's team.
This is just the year of bad math at my house, Mississippi State. I'm battling a crazy rare cancer. On paper, the math says my season oughtta be ending about the same time yours should. But here's the thing. This is the year of bad math. You boys have dug up from the trenches and, by God, I never even knew State being number one in the polls could be on my bucket list, but, as of yesterday, you went ahead and checked that one off for me. Who'd have thunk it?!
I am so proud of you, Bulldogs. Sometimes bad math is the best math, and it's currently the only kind of math I like. Keep on doing what no one expected. Keep playing the best four quarters of football we've ever seen. Keep surprising people. We've always believed, and we still do. This is the year of bad math and miracles for all of us, boys.
Clanga, clanga, y'all.
#HAILSTATE
