Happy Monday.
Football is back. Actually back. Week zero gave us a taste this past weekend and then made us wait, and now we’re here.
Saturday. 3:30. Beaver Stadium. Marshall comes into Happy Valley for a Stripe Out and the Matt Campbell era starts.
I’m ready. I’ve got the receipt to prove it.
Four hundred dollars
Two t-shirts. A crewneck. Two hats.
And a starter style bomber jacket that is the warmest thing I have ever put on my body. Since I live in Georgia, I’ll get about nine days a year out of it. Bought it anyway.
All of it from Homefield. They do vintage gear for damn near every college in the country, and the quality is better than I expected it to be. Not a little better either. This is not the stuff that goes stiff and starts cracking after four washes.
Two years enrolled at this school without owning a single piece of it. Then all of it in one sitting.
Let’s talk about the timing
Penn State opened last season ranked No. 2 in the country. Everybody had them in the playoff.
They finished 7-6. Three and six in the Big Ten.
They became the first team in the history of college football to lose back to back games as a 20 point favorite.
Franklin was gone by October 12.
So what I bought into is a brand new head coach, a brand new staff, and a roster full of guys who were Iowa State Cyclones in December.
And I know we’re making the playoff.
There is a real chance I’m wearing a four hundred dollar egg on my face by Thanksgiving. I’ve made my peace with that.
Now let me get out ahead of you
Somebody is going to bring this up, and I’d rather it come from me.
This is my third team.
Team one
I grew up a Georgia Tech fan.
Not by choice. My uncles handed me Georgia Tech everything from the time I could walk. Shirts, hats, jackets, whatever fit. You root for what shows up in your closet when you’re eight years old.
So I rooted for Tech. For years. Through all of it.
September 14, 2019
The Citadel beat Georgia Tech 27-24. In overtime. At home.
The Citadel.
I was done that day. Not that season. That day.
I got rid of the Tech stuff and bought a D’Andre Swift Rose Bowl jersey before the sun went down. Told everybody I knew I was a Georgia fan now. Make fun of me all you want.
And I’m not apologizing for it
Here’s the honest version.
I was never as into college football as the people around me. Everybody I knew lived and died every Saturday and I was mostly just in the room.
So I figured maybe pulling for a team that’s actually good would make me care about it.
It worked. Two national championships, an absurd number of tailgates, and I finally understood what everybody had been screaming about all those years. I got to be part of it instead of watching other people enjoy it.
No regrets on that. None.
But I always knew what I was
My mom has a degree from Georgia. My aunt has a degree from Georgia.
I have a D’Andre Swift Rose Bowl jersey I bought on the internet when I was 25.
Those are not the same thing, and I never once pretended they were. Growing up in something is different from signing up for it. Everybody knows that, including me, the entire time.
You know exactly the guy I’m describing
The Ohio State fan whose entire connection to that university is a cousin in Dayton.
The guy who picked LSU the same year Saban won his first one there and hasn’t missed a Saturday since.
The guy who can name Gunner Stockton and could not tell you one other player Kirby Smart coaches.
And look, I’m not throwing rocks from a house I don’t live in. I was that guy. At twenty five. Which is worse, because the fourteen year olds at least have an excuse.
So here’s why this one is different
I’m a Penn State student.
Enrolled. Right now. Twelfth year junior.
I’m sitting in Georgia doing coursework between podcast episodes for a school eight hundred miles north of me. That’s a real tie to a real university, which is more than most of you are working with.
Back To School came out in 1986 and I’m running the same play. Grown man, back in class, taking my sweet time about it.
Rodney had the diving board. I’ve got a bomber jacket I can’t wear until January.
Why I waited two years
I hadn’t earned it yet.
That’s the whole answer. I wasn’t going to be the guy who enrolls in August and shows up in head to toe merch by September. I wanted to actually be there a minute first.
Last year was supposed to be the year I became a real fan. Ranked second, everybody talking playoff, perfect timing.
Then the whole thing burned down in six weeks.
Hard to join a party that’s on fire.
Campbell starting clean is the invitation. Nothing before this counts for me. Not the good years, not the bad ones, none of it.
We start here.
The call
Eleven and one.
I’m not picking which one we drop. Michigan on the road, USC at home, Washington in November. Take your shot.
Then Indianapolis.
Ohio State is not on our schedule this year. The only way I get them is the Big Ten championship, and that is exactly where I want them. Beat Ohio State, punch the ticket, College Football Playoff.
Write it down.
They were waiting on me
Franklin had to go. That had to happen first.
Then they had to go get Campbell. Then they had to flip the roster.
And then they had to wait on me.
Two years enrolled, zero merch, no commitment from the most important fan on the roster. Now there’s four hundred dollars of it hanging in a closet in Cobb County, Georgia.
I’m in. Which means you should be in.
Three teams? Yes. Am I going to hear about it? Absolutely. Do I care?
No.
Because this is the first one I’ve ever had an actual reason for.
Riley motherfucking Belflower. Small town in middle Georgia. Eight year Navy vet. Twelfth year junior. Biggest Penn State fan in the southeast.
Stripe out. Saturday. 3:30.
We are.
-Bel
Call me a fake fan in the comments. I’ll be down there waiting. Or call the hill and leave us a voicemail at speakpipe.com/manonahillpod. Gear is from Homefield. First of a few of these this fall.
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