TX 21 AL 37: Sweet Defeat, Bitter Victory

January 8, 2010




I’ve decided that every now and then I can do a “hoopdedoodle” (with a nod to John Steinbeck) on the blog and write about things that have little or nothing to do with Down Home Ranch.

Like most of Texas last night, Jerry and I settled in to watch the Texas-Alabama game. I really don’t care much about football, but this game was a must. Even the maroon-bloods (Aggies, to you non-Texans) at the Ranch all drove in to Taylor to watch the game on the Howard Theatre screen. We were all rooting for the Horns.

Alas, the evening was not destined to go as planned. When Colt McCoy’s injury took him out early in the game I commented to Jerry, “This stinks for both teams. What a pity!”

“What are you talking about?” he retorted. “This hands Alabama the game on a platter. It doesn’t stink for them!”

“My point exactly,” I said. “Texas doesn’t get to be the team they are, and Alabama doesn’t get to play the team they came to play.”

But I was wrong on both counts, and so was Jer. Alabama won, but the victory sure as heck wasn’t handed to them on any platter, and they’ll never know how things would have turned out with the great McCoy in the game. That’s got to sting.

Sometimes you can’t help being as proud of a loss as you would a win, when a kid a few months out of high school has to walk out on the field and take over for a legend and your team closes the gap and darned near seals the deal.

I call it a sweet defeat.