Buddy Days
Have been doing a lot of reminiscing lately about the Buddy Ryan years, what with Rex in the playoffs with the other green team. It’s funny how fondly we all look back on those days now, even though at the time there were a lot of things to gripe about. Makes me think how much everybody’s going to miss Reid, McNabb and going to the playoffs every year when we eventually hit a serious downturn. Ah yes but it’s so much easier to remember Reggie and Jerome and Seth and to forget about things like…
• Never winning a playoff game (fog bowl still boils my blood)
• The complete lack of a running game (it being a big deal when Keith Byars managed a 4 yard run)
• The complete lack of an offensive line (Antone Davis anyone? Ooo and Mike Schad!)
• Ditto pretty much every aspect of our team except for the defense and the QB
Ahh yes, that defense. I still believe firmly it’s the best defense in the history of the league, but what the hell do I know.
Anyway, the point of this post was to tell a little story that I think I may have already told, but it’s awesome so here it is again.
Buddy's Watchin' You!
So I was at training camp, on that shitty practice field they used to have next to the Vet, with my Pop Pop. This must have been 1990, a year or two before Jerome died. It was the golden era of Gang Green, everybody was there: Erik Allen, Seth, Clyde, Wes, Andre, Reggie, Jerome. The coolest thing is that you could just literally wander around among the guys as they were practicing. It was such a loose atmosphere– Keith Byars would be catching passes from Matt Cavanaugh and you’d have to jump out of the way.
So we’re standing there at one point, and Buddy goes walking past us towards the porta-potties. He goes inside, and I look over and see Jerome and Reggie standing there watching him and whispering to each other. When Buddy closes the door, the two of them sneak over to the porta-potty, each one gets on one of the sides, and they start shaking the unholy shit out of the thing, with Buddy inside. This is like 700 pounds of awesome Eagles defensive muscle literally rocking the shit out of Buddy while he’s stuck inside this stinky plastic box. And at this point EVERYBODY is watching and giggling: players, coaches and fans, because they all know who’s inside.
After a good 15 second shake-up, Reggie and Jerome run off and hide in a big pack of green jerseys, and suddenly the door to the porta-potty busts open and Buddy comes stumbling out. He looks around, wild-eyed, for the culprit, and suddenly you hear Jerome just completely crack up. The whole place loses it, Buddy included. It was fuckin’ awesome. Those dudes all really loved each other, it was such a nice atmosphere.
I think we need to make a BRING IT HOME FOR JEROME shirt.
