I love Sunday mornings during the season. You get your wake-up call, have a pre-game meal loaded with everything from omelets to filets and head out to the bus going to the stadium. Your stomach turns in anticipation as you get closer. I love that feeling.
The best part about the whole ordeal is that you don’t know what is going to happen. About the only thing you know is that the game is going to start with a kickoff and it’s going to last for three-plus hours. What happens in between is anybody’s guess. The anticipation is just awesome.
But I had a sort of different anticipation last Sunday.
Instead of waking up at the hotel in Chicago, with a little hop in my step from nervous anxiety, I woke up in my own bed and immediately reached for my crutches to brace my swollen knee. The injured reserve list was the last place I expected to be on a glorious October Sunday.
Watching football on Sundays is America. You can’t do it anywhere else. Sundays in the fall are made for NFL football. No chores, no lawn work. The Redskins are on, and that is all that matters for those hours.
On Sunday, for the first time, I was an outsider looking in.
I have to admit, even though I wasn’t at Soldier Field in Chicago, my stomach was. I had just as much anxiety waiting for that kickoff as I would if I were sitting in that locker room. I usually pace around the locker room the whole time before kickoff. I can’t pace around on crutches, so I decided to sit on the couch and watch Howie Long and Terry Bradshaw on the Fox pregame show.
Trust me, I couldn’t wait for it to end.
I wanted to see that ball kicked off. This was going to be a huge game for us going into the bye week. We had to win it, no other way around it. Our guys weren’t coming home without a win. I knew it, and I think all the fans knew it, too.
I wanted to see the national anthem. It’s one of my favorite parts of the game. I love standing there and hearing the anthem played. It is almost the calm before the storm. It makes the game pure and ours. Our country’s.
Apparently, Fox didn’t know I was watching. They decided to cut to a commercial and then brought me back at the kickoff. A travesty.
I had watched film on the Bears during the week, so I knew most of their offense going into the game. I tried to watch it like I was in the film room, but my emotions got the best of me.
The hard part was trying not to get involved as a fan, but when you can’t play in the game, it’s hard not to. I tried to stay reserved throughout, though I did find myself saying out loud, “Big play coming here,” or, “We need a stop!” when our defense was out there.
And I couldn’t help but get excited during the final two-minute drill when we stopped them. A couple of times I got a little squirmy on the couch, even flinching when a big hit was laid out. I was actually hoping for a blowout so I could relax. But as we know in this league, it’s not going to happen.
I do know this, though: I sat there and watched Clinton Portis run and run and run, and saw a defense play with more fire than anyone has seen in a long time. I knew throughout that game we were going to come out on top. It is a credit to our players and to our coaches that we won that game with the tough times we were going through.
Winning games on the road is hard, but it makes that plane flight home sweet. Man, I wanted to be there more than anything. I know this: I was proud to be a Redskin.
Once it was over, I did what you did. I watched the late games. Only in America.
Aren’t Sundays great?
Ask Matt
Q: Defenses often complain that when a quarterback does a hard count, it draws them offside. Wouldn’t it be easier to just watch the ball? Or am I missing something?
A: It isn’t as easy as it sounds. Sure, you could watch the ball the whole time if that was the only thing on your mind. But the anticipation of the play can get you from time to time. There is a lot going on pre-snap besides just the ball.
Q: With your injury, how do guys like you and Jon Jansen now approach the rest of the season? Do you try to contribute by being there on the sideline and giving your teammates your observations, or does this kind of push you aside and make you more of a spectator?
A: Having a season-ending injury only ends the season for you physically. You are still at Redskin Park everyday, and you help out the rest of the guys mentally as much as you can.
• Staff writer Mark Zuckerman collaborates with Redskins safety Matt Bowen on this column. It appears every Wednesday. If you have any questions for Matt, e-mail them tobowencolumn@aol.com.
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