Men.

This is a real life conversation between my significant other this weekend. I'm sure others will be able to relate!

Backstory: Kyle loves sports. I mean, loves them. Before we started dating he warned me of this and I was all "oh yeah I can totally handle that! That's sooooo not a problem! And honestly, this could be fun! We'll spend hours bonding over this kind of stuff. Got it." Clearly I was on crack.

No. I did not have it.

He warned me about college football. Got it. NFL, okay. Sure. But they play multiple times a week. Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and sometime Thursdays. Okay. Then we have basketball. And then came Kyle's random love for the Royals. There goes any sort of quality time together.

This weekend we spent all of Sunday watching Netflix together (shout out to Criminal Minds and Prison Break!)

Kyle: Thanks for watching all of these shows with me today!

Me: No, thank you for not watching sports all day and actually spending some time with me! It's been awesome.

Kyle: Yeah, well I didn't have any teams playing today that I really cared about so it wasn't a big deal. Plus we have the Royals game tomorrow and Tuesday we're going to watch. 


He sure knows how to make a girl feel special.  ;)

"relaxin' all cool, shootin' some bball outside of school"

...or in Kyles case - 'relaxin' all cool, shootin' some bball inside of the church." Doesn't have quite the ring to it.

Here's a little known fact: Kyle enjoys sports.

WHAAAT!?

I'm sure you're all blown away by this.

Here's a well known fact: I could go without.

WHAT!? Just kidding. We all knew that. I'm like a fish out of water when Kyle is schooling me on the lifestyle (of the rich and famous) that is sports. Because you literally eat, breathe, and sleep sports when you're a true fan. Okay, maybe not literally. But you catch my drift (see what I did there?)

Not only do I watch sports on tv, but I also watch highlights on youtube (I really enjoy this!), go to professional games, go to Kyle's games, and watch Ky play NBA2K14. Repeat. Then repeat again.

what.

He warned me. He really did. I knew how into this stuff he was when we started dating. I was like "oh yeah, totally cool. I love my dog. I get it. We each have things we love."

No.

I didn't get it.

I get it now.

I'm slowly coming around to the idea of this. I REALLY REALLY REALLY enjoy watching him play. He is immensely talented and athletic. So clearly, he's great eye candy. ;)

Here are the dreaded phone pics from his most recent basketball practice I attended - yep. Practice. I was there AANNND I enjoyed it. Progress.

Blurry, but still a stud.

Pullin’ the Flag – Flag Football 2013

Monday, September 30, 2013

There comes a time in your life when your level of play on the field starts to dwindle down, fortunately for me, my time has NOT come yet.  Admit it, you thought I was going to say I’m getting old.  After my Sunday afternoon on the football field, I felt renewed and fresh.  Granted, today I feel like I got hit by a semi and I grunt every time I have to get up and walk, but on Sunday, I felt great!  In fact, it was the first time since I tore my ACL that I played without my ACL designed knee brace.  I still used a knee brace, but I felt free from that load of metal that used to grace my knee.  And I had zero limitations on the field because of my knee.  So all is well on my physical health… Let’s get down to the actual gameplay.  This is going to be rough.

I got a call late last week at work to see if I would be interested in playing flag football since I signed up as a free agent.  I said I was, so the guy told me a coach was looking for a player and he would give him my contact information.  I got a text later that evening about playing.  I could tell just from his text that he was going to be an interesting character.  When you ask someone their name and they respond, “They call me JD,” you know you’re going to have your hands full with this fella.

He wanted to practice on Saturday morning, so I was game.  Unfortunately, it rained, so he re-scheduled for Saturday night.  I drove to Overland Park to practice.  Which consisted of us throwing the ball around and playing 2 on 2.  Now, I’m not one that likes to toot my own horn, but I was without a doubt the most athletic one on the field.  We played 2 on 2 and I volunteer to take the little guy on my team (he was probably like 16, 5’7”, a buck thirty as most, and rather uncoordinated.  I ended up having 5 interceptions from our “quarterback” JD.  While on offense I kept telling my teammate to just throw it up and I’ll catch it.  Which worked.  Pathetic, but that’s how brutal our team was.  I’m only 5’11”, so for me to just go up and get it with no problem speaks volumes to the caliber of players I possess on my newly acquired flag football team.  Granted, it was muddy since it rained that morning, so there were a lot of errant throws… or so I thought that was the reason.

Then came Sunday, the games.  First of all, this JD character tells me that our game is at 3:30.  Nope, we don’t play until 4:30.  Awesome.  Kristin appreciates that.  We could have spent another hour finishing the Chiefs game… err, watching Pretty Little Liars?  Anyway, Kristin is a trooper through all this.  The good news is she got some sun (this albino family needed it) and there were a TON of people there so she got to do one of her favorite things… people watch!  But, I wanted to give Kristin a shoutout for putting up with all of JD’s shenanigans and not complain once about being there for over 3 hours and watching me play ball (with the worst team in the league).  So thanks, love!

So our first game is delayed because JD can’t find a set of flags that fit around him. This JD character sits a staggering 5’8” and carries over 260 plus pounds with him.  There’s a lot of people who talk a big game… we ALL know people like that.  And usually, they fail to impress.  But this guy… this guy is without question the worst I’ve ever dealt with. He talks SO much game and I have never seen anyone under perform up to their own standards and then talk about how amazing they played… seriously…. MIND BLOWN!  There aren’t words… None.  So we spend 10 minutes trying to find flags that fit and we end up having him tuck the two ends into his shorts. 

We are on offense first.  First drive, pick 6.  Awesome.  We’re down 7-0.  Great start to the game.  Next possession, they finally throw me the ball and we move down the field.  JD actually let Dakota throw the ball and he could get me the ball.  Though they were always behind me… I had a one handed catch and a diving catch, so I expected to be on SportsCenter later that night.  It never happened.  Turns out, if you’re on a team as bad as mine, they don’t show highlights.  The team we were playing actually took it easy on us.  When an opposing team starts encouraging your teammates, that’s NEVER a good sign.  We only lost by 2 TDs and it could have been times that.  I think the final was 31-18.

The second game wasn’t even worth it.  These guys were straight up legit.  We had 4 total players.  They had 4 players for offense and 4 players for defense.  Their QB had a wristband with plays and they ran all their trick plays on us (we’re an easy practice target)… with success.  Why?  Well, let me tell you a little bit about our defense.  First off, JD makes all the decisions.  He told us at practice, “You guys can give your opinions and suggestions, but I’m the coach so we’re going to do what I say, know what I’m sayin’?” (If you’ve seen the movie “We’re The Miller’s” and you know that kid that always says, “know what I’m sayin’?” after nearly every sentence, JD does the exact same thing.)   

So, JD wants to play safety on defense.  The SLOWEST guy on our team, decides to play safety… makes sense right?  On top of that, he chooses to not only play safety, but literally plays on our goal line… he’s FIFTY FIVE yards off the ball. And what do teams do?  They run a crossing route that beats the man coverage and they have nothing but green in front of them because there is NEVER safety help.  He can’t even prevent a TD.  So we’re handicapped on defense playing 3 on 4.  He is NO help… but you don’t question him, or you’re off the team.  His words.  Cool coach/leader, huh?  We lost our second game, 43-0.  It was called before the end of the game.  I did have an interception and a nice little one handed grab, but we got smoked.  After the game, a guy said to me, “Just keep doing what you’re doing, you’ll start clicking.”  I respond, “You know, I think that might actually be our problem, we need to make some changes.”  A few laughs ensued, but I was straight serious.  Changes or every game will be that bad.

JD texted me today and wants to practice tomorrow at 6:30pm.  Really?  You expect me to take a night away from my week to practice with you when you won’t even take a suggestion or do what’s best for the team and put someone at safety who knows how to actually play the position… or play a zone? You spend half your time speaking volumes about your talent and how we need to step up.  You tell me to stop juking and just run straight when juking is what got us one of our only couple touchdowns? Yeah, I’ll show up on game day and work my ass off.  And you best believe I will speak my mind about the defense and how the offense is ran.  Someone needs to take charge who knows what they’re talking about.  If you want to kick me from the team, please, be my guest… I’m sure you have players in line waiting to play with a superior talent like yourself.  No really, he says that this is the case, that “we’re lucky to be on his team because he has a ton of players looking to play on his team.”

I like Dakota… he’s decently athletic and knows the game and agrees with the changes we need to make.  I hope next week we can convince JD that changes need to be made.

This basically turned into a rant, but I’m sure the majority of you who actually got through this wouldn’t even play next week.  I honestly enjoy playing and getting the great cardio… so despite the embarrassment of a team I’m a part of, I’m always committed to continue to do me and playing hard and showing top tier sportsmanship that I have always prided myself on for years.

Lastly, if you’re in KC or have a boyfriend or know of someone who would like to look into forming any sort of rec team for any sport, I would love to be a part of it.  I’m looking for different activities, though basketball and flag football will be my go to sports.  I just love being active.  So I’m sorry for all the negative comments (though they were only aimed on one individual who makes it very hard to respect through his comments and attitude), but thanks for listening.

-Mr. Deal