‘Jimmy Dunne Says’

The Palisadian-Post presents an homage to Will Rogers’ column, “Will Rogers Says,” with a column by Palisadian Jimmy Dunne—on life in the “greatest town in America.”

Throw It Out of Bounds

I stopped my bike looking at Pali High’s football field the other day. A hot August day.

Started dreaming about my football career. Peaked when I was in eighth grade.

St. Francis Falcons. Our Catholic grammar school team in La Grange, Illinois. Those autumn Sunday games would be absolutely packed.

As a little kid, you dreamed of someday running through the huge banner held out by the cutest cheerleaders. Just roaring across the field to a sea of St. Francis fans cheering on their Falcon warriors.

I played left halfback. I had one move. That’s it.

I didn’t care what play the quarterback called. If I got the ball, I was grabbing that thing and going “left.”

Heading straight to the left sideline and then doing my move. The “stiff arm.” The goal of my play was to end up still standing up.

The other end of the spectrum? What hell looked like. Running straight up the middle. Get slaughtered and end up at the bottom of a big pile of giant, goat-smelling friends.

It was a pre-season summer practice—in a record-squelching August.

Smack in the middle of the afternoon on that practice field, it felt more like the top of a barbecue grill than a park. About 250ºF, with no wind, and I’m pretty sure the Woodstock for flying bugs.

My football scouting report wasn’t exactly “peaking” after my less-than-stellar seventh-grade season. In seventh grade, they demoted me to the sixth-grade team.

That makes you feel really cool inside.

And to rub a bucket of vinegar in my wounds, my younger brother (who was in sixth grade) played on the eighth-grade team.

Didn’t help very much in the potential girlfriend department, either.

Back to that eighth-grade practice.

After a few practices, the coaches had pretty much set in stone that I (and this other kid on the team, Rick Carney) were the runts of the litter.

Carney lived right behind our house, so we were best buddies growing up. Now that I think about it, maybe Carney and I should have spent a little more time running around the block instead of on our walkie-talkie wires that ran from my house to his.

Carney and I got the hint that the coaches weren’t exactly drinking the Kool-Aid of our amazing potential—when they dished out our practice uniforms.

They ran out of football jerseys for everybody, so Carney and I just wore undershirts over our shoulder pads. When we’d run, we’d be like flapping geese with the shoulder pads bouncing and clacking around.

But the kicker was the helmets.

They didn’t have any “regular” helmets for both of us—you know, the kind with facemasks to protect you. They gave Carney and me the used, reject helmets from the old Pop Warner league in town.

Those were the kind Knute Rockne wore back in the ’30s.

No facemask. Just this decades-old, hand-me-down, brown leather thing Carney and I stuck on our heads.

But my problem was my helmet (if you’d want to call it that) didn’t really fit on my big head. I found if I wore the thing backward, it was a little snugger.

So I did that.

The only problem was sometimes the thing would flop down in front of my eyes when I was running. But you do what you gotta do.

It was the start of practice, all melting in the heat. Carney and I were standing around the coach, looking like absolute dopes in our caveman helmets. The coach told everybody to do the same thing we did at the start of every practice.

Four laps around the goalposts. Off we all went.

That’s fun.

By the end of the first lap, Carney and I were already exhausted, chugging along in our spots of last and next-to-last place. Only Carney was behind me.

I was heading down the field for lap two—now only 50 yards away from those white, wooden goalposts—where everybody else had already made the turn.

I had to stay positive, one step at a time.

Just kept picturing and dreaming about all my favorite cheerleaders who barely knew my name—wildly cheering as I’d be busting through that banner on the first game.

I wiped off the mosquitoes snacking on my face, let those shoulder pads bounce around under my Fruit of the Loom and charged down that field.

Only three yards from the goalpost. Making the turn.

I figured no point in running one extra foot if I didn’t have to. So I’d cut it close around that goal post like a downhill skier.

What I didn’t count on was the helmet flopping in front of my eyes.

Next thing I knew, I plowed right into that goalpost. And down I went. Flat on my back with my arms spread out. Out cold.

And I know this sounds like something that would happen in a cartoon, but I swear to God, my Knute Rockne helmet snapped in two—right down the middle.

The helmet looked like a cracked eggshell on the dirt next to my head, and I was like a sizzling patty on the Memorial Park griddle.

Next thing I knew, I came to, looking up at the whole team of St. Francis players.

Coach Pridmore looked down at me and asked, “Dunne, do you know what day it is?”

I looked up at my teammates.

I looked over at the two halves of my helmet. I said, “The last day of my football career.”

Fast-forward to the first game of the season. I had a new role on the team.

Announcer.

Stood on top of this two-story scaffolding with a mic and called the play-by-play.

The fans loved me. Couldn’t have been better.

Here’s the lesson I learned.

So what?

So what if I’m not a professional football player?

Last time I checked, none of those bozos on that team ever were either.

Sometimes, in football, the best move you can make is to throw it out of bounds.

Cut your losses. Take a breath.

Think of a better play—and do that.

Jimmy Dunne is a modern-day Renaissance Man; a hit songwriter (28 million hit records), screenwriter/producer of hit television series, award-winning author, an entrepreneur—and a Palisadian “Citizen of the Year.” You can reach him at j@jimmydunne.com or jimmydunne.substack.com.