It took me a couple of days, but I’ve finally figured it out. I kept looking at the name of the event, NFL Quarterback Challenge, trying to unearth something deeper than a competition among gunslingers for what to them amounts
It took me a couple of days, but I’ve finally figured it out. I kept looking at the name of the event, NFL Quarterback Challenge, trying to unearth something deeper than a competition among gunslingers for what to them amounts to chump change.
I just got it.
The “challenge” actually refers to the difficulty these players — particularly the legends — had even feigning focus during their time on Kaua’i. Admittedly, there were a few who appeared to center their attention on actually winning the 11th Annual Challenge, but there were a few more who couldn’t have cared less. For them, the week on the island was a vacation with some football interruptions.
This goes more specifically for the legends.
For the first time, the NFL added some past greats to the guest list, giving them their own competition and including them in one phase of the regular QB Challenge. These former on-the-field thrillers included Steve Young, Warren Moon, Boomer Esiason, Jim Kelly, Jim Everett and Bernie Kosar.
Their individual event was the DIRECTV $1 Million Throw. It was your classic carnival game: see if the 45-year-old NFL veteran with tendinitis in his throwing shoulder can toss a softball into the tilted peach basket — from 30 yards out. It would have been nearly impossible to get the football through the tiny hole from three yards out.
Anyway, it was good promotion for the NFL to put all of those guys in one place at one time. In the duo competition, each of the legends paired with a current player in the accuracy competition. Steve Young put all snap-callers on the field to shame.
But this is what I’m saying. I don’t think the legends got serious for even one moment, except when ordering their drinks from the poolside bar at the Marriott. These were the kind of guys, for the most part, you’d want to hang out with. Rather than ask Jim Kelly or Bernie Kosar for an autograph, one might challenge them to a beer-pounding contest.
Kosar, in particular, still obviously adores the spotlight — in a very good way. All of the quarterbacks were announced just prior to the start of Thursday’s Challenge. When the emcee arrived at Kosar’s name, NFL personnel scrambled to find him. He could hardly be bothered; he was signing autographs for the throng of kids chanting his name. The former Cleveland Brown told jokes, posed for pictures and, it appeared, made every effort possible to accommodate all in search of his John Hancock.
Arizona’s Jake Plummer, here for the second time, was the same.
Me: “So, Jake, do you have a favorite spot on the island, perhaps a place you wouldn’t want to leave without visiting?”
Plummer: “Uh, there’s this little bar down by the beach . . . nah, I’m just kidding.”
In fact, Plummer was a crowd favorite, always ready with an ear-touching grin. He was the last quarterback to leave Vidinha Stadium; he took care of every last autograph request. Of particular merit was the time he spent with a cancer victim from Salem, Ore., at the Challenge under the umbrella of a granted wish. With hundreds screaming his name, Plummer focused on the girl for 15 minutes — they’d talked before, too — giving the impression only the two of them mattered.
Thursday’s highlight for this writer, however, was the scene of Steve Young. Fans sought no signature more frequently or with more vigor than Young’s. Be it San Francisco’s proximity to Hawai’i or Young’s charismatic ability to encompass all, Young managed to grab the attention of the fans like a rock singer.
He yielded to some of the clamor, but for the most part Young caught up with old acquaintances and sat idly in the players’ tent with his wife and newborn son, Braden, flushing out the screeching of his name.
It wasn’t outlandish ignoring; rather, Young simply set himself on bonding with his son. In a frame that would’ve had the feature photographers at Life Magazine boiling over with glee, Young sat hunched over in a flimsy white chair, holding his son with two massive hands, one under his head, the other beneath his backside. The industrial former QB spoke not a word for five minutes. He just gazed into the eyes of his son and vice versa. Five minutes of mind-to-mind connection.
Of course, then he handed Braden off to his wife, trotted onto the field and fired the best accuracy score of the morning. It was an unfair display of talent.
It was also as close as Young got to football on the day.
Sports editor Jason Gallic at 245-3681 or mailto:kauaisports@pulitzer.net
