Speaker 1: Welcome to Special Teams, a production of My Heart Radio
Speaker 1: Greetings and Welcome inside Special Teams with Jason Smith and
Speaker 1: Mike Harmon, a podcast where we look back in specific
Speaker 1: years and special teams in that year. In the world
Speaker 1: of sports. You've been listening the past few podcasts. We've
Speaker 1: kind of been on a weather run here in the
Speaker 1: eighties and nine nineties, talking about games that took place
Speaker 1: in big mud, like the mud ball, games that took
Speaker 1: place in the incredible cold, like the Freezer Bowl. We
Speaker 1: had the snowplow game earlier on Special Teams. Today, well,
Speaker 1: let's finish up the weather with snowball games. Three big games,
Speaker 1: three big football games that were affected by fans throwing
Speaker 1: snowballs on the field. So this kind of I feel
Speaker 1: like this is this is one of our opus. Is
Speaker 1: like the weather opus that we we started with with
Speaker 1: with the Freezer Bowl, and now we're ending here with
Speaker 1: some snowball games. I feel like it's part of like
Speaker 1: the the Lord of the Rings, this is our quest.
Speaker 1: We just hit another season. Uh so here you go
Speaker 1: with the first snowball game coming to you in nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty five game between the forty Niners and the Broncos. Now,
Speaker 1: both these teams who you could say we're teams of
Speaker 1: the eighties and teams of late eighties. Uh, they were
Speaker 1: both just okay so far at this point in the
Speaker 1: Niners have won fifteen games in the Super Bowl. The
Speaker 1: year before, they drafted Jerry Rice in the off season,
Speaker 1: and this was like, hey boy, the nine we're rolling.
Speaker 1: But for the forty Niners, it was a season of frustration.
Speaker 1: They never really got going enough. And look eighty five,
Speaker 1: of course was the five Bears. Meanwhile, for the Broncos,
Speaker 1: they were a trendy Super Bowl pick. They had draft
Speaker 1: Advance Johnson. Remember that that was when they had the amigos,
Speaker 1: like the three of me, go Watcher Sivers. You know,
Speaker 1: it was a big game for both of the teams
Speaker 1: at this point in the season, because you're talking about
Speaker 1: in November, heyty, Broncos nationally televised game, and it turned
Speaker 1: out to be a game that potentially turned on one
Speaker 1: snowball being thrown. It was not you, my Carmen, because
Speaker 1: this fits into your wheelhouse of you be the troublemaker
Speaker 1: when you were a kid, well a bit of an agitator. Uh. College,
Speaker 1: I was a guy that was around the big ten
Speaker 1: a ton. But you know five, I was just uh
Speaker 1: you know, a kid in in middle school, trying to
Speaker 1: play football, trying to do my thing. Actually I was.
Speaker 1: I had to had to have a surgery that had
Speaker 1: me sitting around and doing nothing but watching football for
Speaker 1: that fall. I had to miss a season with the surgery,
Speaker 1: which which was awful. But what are you gonna do? Uh?
Speaker 1: You sitting watching a lot of good football and a
Speaker 1: lot of curious moments much like this one. But yes,
Speaker 1: if I'd been in the crowd like I was in
Speaker 1: my college days, snow might have found my hand. I
Speaker 1: think so. I also might have been the guy yelling
Speaker 1: at people to not do it. I don't know now
Speaker 1: now that back then, Now now you're that guy? Though,
Speaker 1: Now that would be you think I'm that guy? And
Speaker 1: would that make me a Karen Nacular? Isn't it Karen
Speaker 1: and ken right? Because you don't hear about Kenza, But
Speaker 1: it's like Karen and ken right those that's what's that's okay. Uh.
Speaker 1: So here we are November eleventh, Dan Reeves and the
Speaker 1: Broncos hosting Bill Walsh and the forty Niners. Uh, there
Speaker 1: was no snow on the ground believe there for a
Speaker 1: snowball game. There was no snow on the field. It
Speaker 1: had been shoveled off. Right. The game started out well
Speaker 1: for the Broncos. Elway through a couple of touchdowns, one
Speaker 1: to Steve Watson, Denver was up fourteen three. San Francisco
Speaker 1: couldn't really mount a lot of offense, but near the
Speaker 1: end of the first half they drive down to the
Speaker 1: Denver three yard line. This is where it becomes the
Speaker 1: snowball game, right. San Francisco had no timeouts. They wanted
Speaker 1: to get a scoring before halftime, because look, they're trailing
Speaker 1: four teen three. So Ray Worshing comes out for a
Speaker 1: twenty yard field goal and the holder is wait for it,
Speaker 1: wait for it, wait for it, Mat Kavanaugh, who was
Speaker 1: the holder for the game winning field goal in the
Speaker 1: snowplow game. So if there's snow involved and you need
Speaker 1: a field goal, well Matt Kavanaugh, he is your holder.
Speaker 1: So on this play, two snowballs actually get thrown. So
Speaker 1: the snap comes and whoever was throwing the snowballs from
Speaker 1: the stands wanted a time and so they threw the snowball,
Speaker 1: so it landed on the field and potentially distracted Ray Worshing.
Speaker 1: All right, So what happens is you see the snowballs
Speaker 1: hit the ground. Kavanaugh says he was distracted, he lost concentration,
Speaker 1: couldn't catch the ball and place it down. This is
Speaker 1: a chip shot twenty yard field goal, so he tries
Speaker 1: to throw it in a scrum. He can't. Denver takes over.
Speaker 1: They kill the clock. They go to halftime up four
Speaker 1: teen three. You know what's funny, though, Jason, right there
Speaker 1: is the end of that play would be a would
Speaker 1: have been a fifteen yard flag all day every day. Now.
Speaker 1: The defender comes up and butts him in the head. Yeah,
Speaker 1: knocks him. It's like, what the hell? That's like, that's
Speaker 1: one where there's a pedally flag immediately. He also didn't
Speaker 1: sell it right, Kevana, you gotta go to the ground
Speaker 1: like you you just got hit by a Rick Flair
Speaker 1: Judo chop man. And that that's one that Kavanaugh failed on.
Speaker 1: So the Broncos go on to win the game seventeen sixteen, Right,
Speaker 1: fourteen three and a a half time, they win seventeen sixteen
Speaker 1: Rich Carlos game winning field goal of the minute twenty
Speaker 1: seven left to go. So this field goal play turned
Speaker 1: out to be a really big deal. And if you
Speaker 1: watch this replay, you can see the two snowballs come
Speaker 1: in and you can easily tell that Kavanaugh looks like
Speaker 1: he's distracted. Right. He tries, but you can see, okay,
Speaker 1: whether the corners I or something else, and he doesn't
Speaker 1: the ball cleanly and he can't put it down. And
Speaker 1: it's amazing to see it because it's it looks like
Speaker 1: it's just ice that hits the ground in a couple
Speaker 1: of spots and and and splatters. When you see it live,
Speaker 1: you can't really see it. But on the replay you
Speaker 1: see the snowballs fly in hit the ground, and that
Speaker 1: distracts Kavanaugh. You can't put the football down. Now. The
Speaker 1: referee at the time, Jim Tunney, said they couldn't call
Speaker 1: a foul on the home team as a result of
Speaker 1: somebody throwing a snowball on the field, right, So we
Speaker 1: couldn't call a foul home team. They did wind up
Speaker 1: increasing security at halftime because it was a people are
Speaker 1: throwing snowballs on the field. We we don't want this
Speaker 1: to happen, so let's put uh let's let's put more
Speaker 1: security on the field. But they said they couldn't call
Speaker 1: a foul on the home team, when now they would
Speaker 1: they would usher a warning saying, anybody does us again,
Speaker 1: you're gonna wind up getting thrown now as to be
Speaker 1: a fifteen yard penalty and you would see that um.
Speaker 1: But there was nothing they could do on this. So
Speaker 1: it goes in the books as as an unsuccessful field
Speaker 1: goal attempt. And it's just crazy to see that this
Speaker 1: is what winds up costing a team the game. And
Speaker 1: after the game was over, Dan Reeves, head coach of
Speaker 1: the Broncos, said it probably didn't disrupt the play because
Speaker 1: Kavanaugh didn't argue at that time. So I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: so because you didn't argue, it didn't disrupt the play. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1: Uh And and look, and it was one of those
Speaker 1: situations where it's difficult because you can see what can
Speaker 1: you really do about it, and there's not a lot
Speaker 1: to do, but still to see it go down this way,
Speaker 1: you could just tell something was wrong here. Well, it's
Speaker 1: funny because they actually in the broadcast because you know,
Speaker 1: if you if you can go back and watch young
Speaker 1: Joe Montana and John Elway, you're gonna do this right,
Speaker 1: and then you're gonna light this up is that they
Speaker 1: didn't come back after a bit of a time out
Speaker 1: to say here's the SlowMo, which was brilliant, right to
Speaker 1: bring that back. Uh, and Frank Gifford on the call, Hey,
Speaker 1: there's the snowball. I spoke of, man, that had to
Speaker 1: be distracting. One of those kind of moments. You can
Speaker 1: see the second one here. You know you figured five
Speaker 1: years later you got to tell us straighter and boom,
Speaker 1: see there's a snowball right there. Even I had a
Speaker 1: John Madden like effect as it went. But you know,
Speaker 1: they certainly made sure to point that out there. And
Speaker 1: some technological glitches over the course of the telecast too
Speaker 1: that made it interesting. Hey, we didn't get to show
Speaker 1: you this angle before, but we got a beam back
Speaker 1: from New York, so let's see this. So they did
Speaker 1: that on the field goal, they did that on some
Speaker 1: other things. But yeah, the fact that he didn't go
Speaker 1: and argue it was it was the time. Man. It
Speaker 1: looks like like, hey, did you see that, Hey, we
Speaker 1: look what's going on. I looked like he was still
Speaker 1: incredulous that this is what went on, This is this
Speaker 1: is what happened. You know. It was weird, but that's
Speaker 1: what Dan Reeves hooked onto as he said, quote, I
Speaker 1: don't think Kevin Off thought of effect in him, because
Speaker 1: if it did, he'd be standing there arguing with the official.
Speaker 1: Right now, Here's where Dan Reeves, who never releases anything
Speaker 1: and never really said anything while he was a head coach,
Speaker 1: he was a master of of of of coach speak
Speaker 1: where he could talk for hours and just not say anything. Uh.
Speaker 1: He said this quote, I think if you shot me
Speaker 1: with a thirty odd six when I was a holder,
Speaker 1: you've still got to catch that football. So here's Dan Reeves. Yeah,
Speaker 1: here's a foot, there's snowball that was started. Helped my
Speaker 1: team win. But you know what, Yeah, hey, I would
Speaker 1: catch that ball. You gotta catch that ball. You could
Speaker 1: have shot me, you still got to catch the football
Speaker 1: and put it down. This is Dan Reeves saying that
Speaker 1: after the game. I dig that though. I mean, you
Speaker 1: can put that on a T shirt these days. Look
Speaker 1: how now many people in the NFL after this was over,
Speaker 1: said that the officials should have intervened in this but didn't.
Speaker 1: And here's a big quote Giants general manager George Young
Speaker 1: remember New York Giants for something coming up later in
Speaker 1: this podcast. New York Giants general manager George Young said
Speaker 1: it was a disgrace. We have a game that's decided
Speaker 1: on something like a snowball, and clearly that field goal.
Speaker 1: Maybe game doesn't end with a nineteen seventeen when, but
Speaker 1: it's a different game, and clearly you're adding three more
Speaker 1: points to the forty niners total, and maybe the game
Speaker 1: does and differently. After this was over, people in San
Speaker 1: Francisco were so pissed, and rightfully so. The San Francisco
Speaker 1: Examiner offered five hundred dollars for an interview with the
Speaker 1: person who threw the snowball, and a young guy came forward,
Speaker 1: apologized for it, did the interview, but didn't take the money.
Speaker 1: Now I'll do what. I'll talk about it. But he
Speaker 1: didn't take the money. So I was like, wow, he
Speaker 1: came forward to that, if I'm doing that, I'm taking
Speaker 1: the money. Unless he thought, like it's the movies. Hey,
Speaker 1: they're gonna say they're gonna pay me, They're gonna find
Speaker 1: out where I live and there there's gonna be guys
Speaker 1: there and and and I'm not gonna like that. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna have to be on the run for the rest
Speaker 1: of my life and suddenly I'm I'm hopping freight cars
Speaker 1: from town to town and and and living on the
Speaker 1: railroad tracks. I don't want that. No, no, no, you
Speaker 1: keep your money going down to Bartman Road is what
Speaker 1: you're saying there. I mean, but it's like knock out
Speaker 1: the door. Who's there? Goons? Who iron goons? Uh? And
Speaker 1: I don't know that is a curiosity. Five hundred bucks
Speaker 1: at the time, that's pretty decent money. I didn't look
Speaker 1: never never say five isn't a lot of money. But
Speaker 1: you know, for throwing the snowball and coming forward, which
Speaker 1: means he would have had to identify himself. So he
Speaker 1: was the identity of this dude in the process, whether
Speaker 1: he took the money or not. I just gotta say, though, Jason,
Speaker 1: it was it was a gift to go back in
Speaker 1: time and watch a young spride. John Elway running a
Speaker 1: flee flicker was Jim but running the flea flicker and
Speaker 1: advanced Johnson. There was a play where he started getting
Speaker 1: towards the sideline, didn't quite tap out fast enough for
Speaker 1: Ronnie Lott's taste, so he kind of bumped him a bit.
Speaker 1: And because it's wet and slippery, Elway goes down, so
Speaker 1: all hell breaks loose. I mean, you got all sorts
Speaker 1: of cool little moments watching this game. Game John Joe
Speaker 1: Montana trying to do his magic, and Roger Craig coming
Speaker 1: up short uh to to cement the game at Rice
Speaker 1: with an athletic catch, but he's two feet out of
Speaker 1: bounce like that's fun. But he also took the official
Speaker 1: down with him, so I think maybe the officials were
Speaker 1: still salty. I mean, there's so much going on, but
Speaker 1: it's fun to go down memory lane and and you
Speaker 1: forget about the snowball game. Now remember George Young, Jim
Speaker 1: of the Giants. It's ridiculous, it's cost that way. Dan Reeves,
Speaker 1: head coach of the Broncos, doesn't matter. You gotta catch that.
Speaker 1: Just remember those two names, because if you like the
Speaker 1: snowball game here, you ain't heard nothing yet. That's coming
Speaker 1: up next right here on special Teams. So snowball game
Speaker 1: in our rear view mirror. Remember the names again, George Young, Giants, GM,
Speaker 1: Dan Reeves, head coach of the Denver Broncos, because we
Speaker 1: are jumping ahead now ten years to the next snowball game,
Speaker 1: which lives in infamy in NFL history as the New
Speaker 1: York Giants, who were then coached by Dan Reeves, hosted
Speaker 1: the San Diego Chargers in the final game of the season.
Speaker 1: This game is notable because this was a year where
Speaker 1: San Diego had a huge run of the playoffs where
Speaker 1: they started four and seven but won their last five
Speaker 1: games to get in. You know, starting the run of
Speaker 1: the Charges when every year all the Chargers are terrible
Speaker 1: the first few games and they go on a big run.
Speaker 1: This was the first game year where they had that
Speaker 1: big run four and seven, They win five in a
Speaker 1: row to get to the playoffs. Now the Giants, they
Speaker 1: were done right there, five and ten. They're finishing out
Speaker 1: the Season's the final game of the regular season. So
Speaker 1: in New York in the winter, it gets snowy. Now,
Speaker 1: the snow wasn't on the field because the snow was
Speaker 1: was pushed off, but it was on the corners of
Speaker 1: the fields, and it was all over the stands, all right. Somehow,
Speaker 1: the Giants in this game get up seventeen nothing while
Speaker 1: fans are throwing snowballs at each other in the stands.
Speaker 1: This is New York, all right, or New Jersey. Hey,
Speaker 1: the game we're winning. Yeah, but let's throw snowballs at
Speaker 1: each other. I mean, this is the Giants are terrible,
Speaker 1: and then there's they're playing for nothing and the Chargers
Speaker 1: are playing for everything and the Giants get up seventeen nothing.
Speaker 1: So what do you think is gonna happen? Well, you
Speaker 1: got a bunch of New Yorkers and New Jerry have
Speaker 1: a snowball. Fine, you know you, You and me I.
Speaker 1: Everybody turns into Rocky Bell boy, you know you. And
Speaker 1: so eventually it gets to, hey, no, we should do
Speaker 1: a forget about throwing stuff at each other. How ably
Speaker 1: show some stuff on the field of the players. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's New York. So they started throwing snowballs at the
Speaker 1: players on the field and players started getting hitting with
Speaker 1: these snowballs regularly. This wasn't like one or two, but
Speaker 1: this was snowballs are being bombed every few seconds because
Speaker 1: there was so much snow in the stands that they
Speaker 1: were hitting the players. And this is where things started
Speaker 1: to get out of control. Yeah, the report was that
Speaker 1: Wednesday of that week they had about a foot of
Speaker 1: snowfall by game time, and this is a Saturday game.
Speaker 1: They moved it from the aisles and the the well
Speaker 1: the seats were cleared, but it was all under the
Speaker 1: seats and packed and condensed, and because it was cold.
Speaker 1: We're also not just talking snowballs, we're talking ice balls,
Speaker 1: and that that become part of this. So about fifty
Speaker 1: people in attendance trying to pass the time and finish
Speaker 1: off the season. Yeah, that's uh, that's a recipe for disaster. Well,
Speaker 1: don't forget. You have to add alcohol to this because
Speaker 1: as the game is going on, people are drinking and
Speaker 1: you know, shock, hey, wait stop, people are drinking beer
Speaker 1: and alcohol NFL games. As the beer gets flowing, things
Speaker 1: get even more crazy. It's not like, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: after a while, everybody stopped throwing snowballs at the players.
Speaker 1: It's just keep drinking and throwing snowballs. The Giants start
Speaker 1: giving away the lead on the field, the Chargers start
Speaker 1: coming back, and it's crazy. So now you have fans
Speaker 1: who are really upset, and snowballs are flying faster, more consistently.
Speaker 1: You can see the games, you can see the highlights
Speaker 1: of this game. You just see snowballs into the picture.
Speaker 1: Out of the picture. Every few feet you see one
Speaker 1: laughing Giants. Officials said they saw kids throwing snowballs on
Speaker 1: the field and Dad's given them I fives after their Hey,
Speaker 1: that was a good troke, Tommy. I bet you cant
Speaker 1: throwing far to out. You know, Hey, how about I'll
Speaker 1: buy you a bicycle if you control want to hit
Speaker 1: somebody on the field. That's a good one, Tommy. Hi five.
Speaker 1: I mean that's really what it was. That that's what
Speaker 1: you went all good fellas at the end there too,
Speaker 1: you're like, I went, Tommy, Hey, Tommy know, just amazing video, man,
Speaker 1: Just yeah, the way in the way it starts to flow,
Speaker 1: because look, we're used to seeing games in Philadelphia, Chicago
Speaker 1: and other places where you'll have the you know, snowball here,
Speaker 1: a snowball there. This is just a constant barrage. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then that we're we're only in the third quarter
Speaker 1: at this point. Yeah, I mean you feel like, okay,
Speaker 1: you're no, no, no, you're only the third quarter. Because
Speaker 1: like I said, things always get more and more insane
Speaker 1: the more alcohol, the more time you bring. And in
Speaker 1: the third quarter of this game, uh, a security guard
Speaker 1: gets hit with a snowball. Then a fight breaks out
Speaker 1: in the stand. So now violence is going on. Snowball
Speaker 1: start coming down from the upper deck, which if you
Speaker 1: throw a snowball from the upper deck in a football game,
Speaker 1: you had somebody you could really hurt them, especially with
Speaker 1: a lot of these being made up of ice, because
Speaker 1: it's not like you know, you just this is just
Speaker 1: all like fresh fallen snow and hits you and and
Speaker 1: falls off, and you go, oh, it's funny. You'll have
Speaker 1: a snowball fighting like. This is not elf Okay, this
Speaker 1: is this is you know, throwing snowball from the top
Speaker 1: deck in a football game. The game gets halted and
Speaker 1: halls are made up to the booth to have an
Speaker 1: announcement made to warn the fans about not throwing snowballs anymore.
Speaker 1: All right, So you have this warning go out to
Speaker 1: the fans and and of course it doesn't matter because
Speaker 1: people still keep throwing. Yeah, what are they gonna do
Speaker 1: to us? Uh? The San Diego charges equipment manager, who
Speaker 1: is standing next to one of the officials, gets hit
Speaker 1: in the head by a snowball and is knocked unconscious. Yes,
Speaker 1: Sid Brooks then sixty years old. He gets hit and
Speaker 1: is knocked unconscious. The cord guy. And when I say that,
Speaker 1: because that's the that's the assistant on the sideline. Who
Speaker 1: who holds the cord for the head coach? Back when
Speaker 1: before they had wireless records, you know that you had
Speaker 1: two hundreds of yards who came. Yeah, you had the
Speaker 1: guy who would hold the cords for the head coach,
Speaker 1: like Bruce Coslet when he was head coach of the Jets,
Speaker 1: his daughter would hold the cord form. My roommate in
Speaker 1: college was the cord guy for Syracuse Paul. Yeah, he was.
Speaker 1: He was an equipment manager and uh, you know he
Speaker 1: got money to go to college, but equipment man because
Speaker 1: he did that in high school. And he job on
Speaker 1: game day was the cord guy for Paul Pasqualoney. And
Speaker 1: so who was the head coach? You would always sit
Speaker 1: there and I'll move around, move around, move around. He
Speaker 1: was the cord guy. So the cord guy for Dan Reeves,
Speaker 1: responsible for Dan reeves headset took off because he knew
Speaker 1: Dan Reeves is gonna be a target because the Charges
Speaker 1: are coming back winning this game. So I'm like, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm done. I know they're gonna start throwing
Speaker 1: stuff at Dan Reeves. I'm gonna get hit. So the
Speaker 1: cord guy just leaves. It's the end of the year
Speaker 1: and he probably knew Reeves hated him. Anyway, I'm not
Speaker 1: coming back to this. There's no way I do in
Speaker 1: this again. It's the way they're we're doing my contract
Speaker 1: um out of here. So the chord guy takes off.
Speaker 1: The game is seventeen seventeen. Sean Gale picks off a
Speaker 1: pass and goes nine nine yards for a touchdown. You
Speaker 1: can watch this highlight and you see his Sean Gale
Speaker 1: is getting ready to cross the goal line. Snowballs come
Speaker 1: flying down at him. So San Diego Chargers they go
Speaker 1: up seventeen. They wind up winning the game. More people
Speaker 1: are getting hit, a initials are getting hit. One flipped
Speaker 1: off the crowd after getting hit. How this game wasn't
Speaker 1: stopped or even forfeited after the Shaan Gail touchdown is
Speaker 1: beyond me because officials clearly had no control of this game.
Speaker 1: And at that point it's I go, you know what.
Speaker 1: I know you don't have forefeits that often, but but
Speaker 1: you had no control over what was going on the Giants.
Speaker 1: You gave up the lead, you're losing the game. Now
Speaker 1: we're done, we're going off the field. But they kept
Speaker 1: playing the game even though they had no way to
Speaker 1: stop the snowballs from flying out of the stands. It
Speaker 1: was a barrage near Sean Gale. As he runs into
Speaker 1: the end of with his touchdown and still the the
Speaker 1: officials said, Okay, hey, sorry, Dave Brown, you just through
Speaker 1: that big ninety nine yard pick. You gotta go back
Speaker 1: out there. Good luck staying away from the snowballs. It's
Speaker 1: just amazing right now. It's safety, safety, safety. Then can
Speaker 1: we finish running clock? What don't we do? Uh? And
Speaker 1: just you know, getting over the loudspeaker, please refrain, be
Speaker 1: a good citizen and you're no nobody cares. It's done
Speaker 1: between the alcohol or the kids trying to impress their
Speaker 1: dad's it's over. You're just open to get out of
Speaker 1: there in one piece. Man. Just crazy scene the Shawn
Speaker 1: Gayle former bear uh yard or uh. That is the
Speaker 1: play that that stands out when you see any video
Speaker 1: footage of Here's the great weather moments in NFL history.
Speaker 1: Fourteen people were arrested, A hundred and seventy five people
Speaker 1: were ejected, so at least they were ejecting some of
Speaker 1: the fans. They but it doesn't matter because I mean,
Speaker 1: this is how many thousands of people at a football game.
Speaker 1: You inject a hundred seventy Yeah, there's yeah. We got
Speaker 1: rid of those people throwing snowballs. Their tickets were confiscated.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness. Ten security guards got hurt. Three were hospitalized,
Speaker 1: said Brooks. As you mentioned, was knocked out for about
Speaker 1: thirty seconds after getting hit. And look, Shawn Gayle's return
Speaker 1: was with five and a half minutes to go in
Speaker 1: the game. Nobody would have complained if you stop the
Speaker 1: game at that point. Nobody would have. The Giants didn't
Speaker 1: need it. The Chargers rearly had come back to win
Speaker 1: this game. You could have stopped at that point. No no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: Let's keep going. They actually get another field goal and
Speaker 1: win the game. Seventeen Dan Reeves, who was so much
Speaker 1: oh yes, snowball snowballs. He had to sit here and
Speaker 1: watch that the whole thing unfold, like his penance for
Speaker 1: yelling at Matt Kavanaugh on being so haughty ten years ago. Well,
Speaker 1: and his man deserted him. I mean that's the other part. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, you're you're supposed to be a leader. Leader
Speaker 1: said beat it. You know, the kids, the guy that's
Speaker 1: supposed to be following him said I'm I'm not standing
Speaker 1: in and taking incoming for this guy. What does that
Speaker 1: say about you? Dan Reeves. After the game, Sean Gaylee
Speaker 1: was asked, Hey, did you feel weird about getting hit
Speaker 1: with a snowball? And he said, no, we have equipment on,
Speaker 1: so I didn't worry too much about getting hit. All right.
Speaker 1: The Charges they lost Dan Humphries early in this game.
Speaker 1: Gail Gilbert was playing quarterback and it was all this
Speaker 1: is gonna be done. We're done on the platt and
Speaker 1: they come back and win, They win this snowball game,
Speaker 1: and all this controversy happens, and and it's you know,
Speaker 1: look to have that kind of Hey, we're gonna stick
Speaker 1: with this and win in in an in a hostile
Speaker 1: environment when it's the weather is zero degrees and it's
Speaker 1: not fun for us because we're in San Diego. I
Speaker 1: get the charge of a lot of credit for coming
Speaker 1: back and winning this football game. Yeah, no question. I
Speaker 1: mean being able to battle through because when when we
Speaker 1: know the the reputation of teams in cold weather environments
Speaker 1: and the data backs that out, you know. So that's
Speaker 1: how it ended the snowball game with the Giants and
Speaker 1: the Chargers there's one other huge snowball game we're gonna
Speaker 1: get to coming up next. Because I was actually in
Speaker 1: attendance for this one. I didn't throw any snowballs. Where
Speaker 1: are you really? I was in attendance for this game.
Speaker 1: My feet have never been so cold as I was
Speaker 1: at this game. And it's the biggest college football snowball game.
Speaker 1: We're gonna get to coming up next on special teams.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to special teams. Before we get to the
Speaker 1: college football snowball game up, We're for a couple of
Speaker 1: minutes here. Uh, you know, we talked a few minutes
Speaker 1: ago about how fifteen fans got arrested, hundred and seventy
Speaker 1: five people got ejected. One of the people was a
Speaker 1: former police chief. Right, so it's a former police chief
Speaker 1: is throwing snowballs get injected in from the game. A lot.
Speaker 1: You throw that snowball? Alright, chief, I got it. Uh.
Speaker 1: The Giants actually apologized to the Chargers in one of
Speaker 1: the San Diego newspapers following the game. Uh that, hey,
Speaker 1: sorry this happened, We treated you this way and all
Speaker 1: these things charged right, Yeah, we don't can We won
Speaker 1: the game where you know, we went to the playoffs
Speaker 1: now in regards to forfeitting, because this is an interesting
Speaker 1: thing because we talked about forefeitting in this whole weather run,
Speaker 1: whether it was the snowplow game or this game right here.
Speaker 1: NFL and officials do have the power to a rulings
Speaker 1: in regards to forfeit and overturning results. It's called the
Speaker 1: palpably unfair acts in a game. That's the actual name,
Speaker 1: the palpably unfair I like that, which it wasn't so
Speaker 1: hard to say, would be a great name for a band.
Speaker 1: I mean, palpably unfair acts. But who was really gonna
Speaker 1: do that? I'm really gonna say, oh, yeah, you know what, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that this happened, and your forfeit in the act, you
Speaker 1: could have just you could have ended games in in
Speaker 1: the in the you could have ended this game with
Speaker 1: the score being the way it was and the Dolphin
Speaker 1: the Johnts after forefeit. You were ending the game early.
Speaker 1: We're just ending the game now because we all gotta
Speaker 1: go away. But it does exist from the NFL. If
Speaker 1: there is a palpably unfair act that is deemed unfair enough,
Speaker 1: you could end a football game with it, and you
Speaker 1: could forfeit a game about that. Wonder what they'd actually
Speaker 1: determine needs to happen to uh put that into effect.
Speaker 1: I read a New York Times article in addition to
Speaker 1: going back and watching as much as I could have
Speaker 1: this one, uh, that there was a photograph of an
Speaker 1: individual who's throwing a snowball. He was arrested and charged
Speaker 1: with disorderly conduct. He was convicted of improper behavior. Boy,
Speaker 1: every one of us could getting nailed for that at
Speaker 1: some point. Now I found coodn't we uh? And he
Speaker 1: was fine six d fifty dollars. Oh okay, Well, you
Speaker 1: know fifty bucks back in that's like a grand now,
Speaker 1: so you know it's a lot of cash, straight cash.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's uh, some small fraction of what
Speaker 1: the seat licenses in the new stadium. So this game
Speaker 1: was not the first snowball game that I had seen
Speaker 1: this year, and I was actually a part of the
Speaker 1: biggest one in college football. On my birthday in I
Speaker 1: went to go see Michigan and Penn State in Happy Valley, right.
Speaker 1: Pam and I had just started dating. My wife and
Speaker 1: I and one of the first places we went to
Speaker 1: by ourselves. She's a Michigan grad, huge Michigan football fan.
Speaker 1: We were living in Kinneta get working for ESPN, and
Speaker 1: we said, hey, you have the weekend, I'll let let's
Speaker 1: go to the Michigan Penn State game. And it was
Speaker 1: awesome because I was meeting a lot of her family
Speaker 1: for the first time, because her aunt and uncle, who
Speaker 1: were more like her brother and sister in law because
Speaker 1: they were they're close in age. Uh, they came down
Speaker 1: to the game and met us. It was awesome. We've
Speaker 1: been so close for the past, you know, twenty five years.
Speaker 1: So they come down to the game and so, like
Speaker 1: I said, it's my birthday, which is in November, and
Speaker 1: it's so cold and my feet are in water and
Speaker 1: ice the entire game. It's terrible. There's snowballs and there's
Speaker 1: snow in the stands everywhere else, and it's it's just
Speaker 1: a miserable experience. Because to go to a game at
Speaker 1: Penn State, you have to get there early, Like if
Speaker 1: you don't want to tailgate, tough, you kind of have
Speaker 1: to because there's so many people going to the games,
Speaker 1: you gotta get there. So we had to leave it
Speaker 1: like nine o'clock in the morning or ten o'clock in
Speaker 1: the morning. The games at three thirty or and so
Speaker 1: we're like, okay, we'll go and we'll go to the game.
Speaker 1: And so we're there for hours and it's so cold
Speaker 1: and it's miserable and Michigan's losing the game. But people
Speaker 1: start throwing snowballs. And there was a play in the
Speaker 1: in the second half. At one point, so many people
Speaker 1: were throwing snowballs. It was a play in the quarter
Speaker 1: of the ends, and I think it was I want
Speaker 1: to say it was Mercury Hayes, but I'm not quite sure.
Speaker 1: It was a play in the corner with the ball
Speaker 1: was thrown to the end zone and I couldn't see
Speaker 1: it because it was it wasn't close to where I
Speaker 1: was in the stands. But the play goes to the
Speaker 1: corey ends and it's an incomplete pass and snowballs come
Speaker 1: flying out during this during this play, and my wife
Speaker 1: pen goes, Oh, that's gonna be a penalty. I'm like,
Speaker 1: that's not gonna can't throw a penalty flag snowballs on
Speaker 1: the field. You're not getting that call. At Penn State,
Speaker 1: you're not getting it. But the snowballs came flying out.
Speaker 1: I was like, always like so many from the upper deck,
Speaker 1: and this was like the last straw. Joe Paterno got
Speaker 1: on the microphone. They but they gave him a mic
Speaker 1: and he goes, hey, you guys, stop throwing snowballs. It's
Speaker 1: not who we are on the field here. And I
Speaker 1: was like, oh my god, Joe pau is yelling at
Speaker 1: the fans, you know, in the field. This is obviously
Speaker 1: years before all the scandal in Penn State, and we're
Speaker 1: I'm going, oh my, this is this is crazy. This
Speaker 1: is Joe. Joe Paterno was yelling at the fans to
Speaker 1: stop throwing snowballs. They wound up, Penn State went up
Speaker 1: win in the game. Wally Richardson threw a touchdown and
Speaker 1: he was the quarterback that year. And but I walked
Speaker 1: away going, I can't believe that. And then I saw
Speaker 1: the coverage of this game, and now it was a
Speaker 1: lead story on Sports Enter and everywhere else. I'm like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I was at a piece of history.
Speaker 1: I was I was actually in a game that was
Speaker 1: part of history. And when I got back, one of
Speaker 1: my friends said to me, the people were trying to
Speaker 1: get in touch with you. I'm like, really, go yeah,
Speaker 1: we didn't have anybody at this game where they were
Speaker 1: trying to see if there was a way to get
Speaker 1: in touch with me where I could go in the
Speaker 1: locker room and get stuck. Like working for ESPN at
Speaker 1: the time, but I had the time off this before
Speaker 1: I had cell phones everything else. We're like, yeah, we
Speaker 1: were trying to fare a way to call you to
Speaker 1: get you to do something because you know you were
Speaker 1: We knew you were at the game, and and and
Speaker 1: you could have done something. I was like, what did
Speaker 1: you want me to do? I didn't bring a camera
Speaker 1: to the game with me. I didn't bring microphone to
Speaker 1: the game. It's not like you know, I had stuff.
Speaker 1: I Oh, yeah, I'll just go in and do interviews.
Speaker 1: I mean, if it was too housand and twenty, yeah,
Speaker 1: I could go in with my phone and do interview.
Speaker 1: You could text me and say Yea'll go in and
Speaker 1: do some interviews, and trying to do this. Yeah, we
Speaker 1: try to get to So obviously they wind up getting
Speaker 1: all the stuff they needed from different um news sources
Speaker 1: and local stations, and obviously had the broadcast of Joe
Speaker 1: Paterno yelling at the fans. But my friend told me
Speaker 1: they wanted me to do some stuff at this at
Speaker 1: the game for them just absolutely insane. When you go
Speaker 1: through and you and you look at this footage, I
Speaker 1: can only imagine being there. I went to to State
Speaker 1: College maybe three times, I think, in between my school
Speaker 1: years and after, and it was always the bitterest cold
Speaker 1: of any of the Big Ten. And I went to
Speaker 1: all the Big ten schools on road trips. Man, I
Speaker 1: don't think I ever experienced anything like this. Now, for
Speaker 1: for Penn State, this was also they were pretty salty
Speaker 1: because they were number twelve in the country the week
Speaker 1: before and came to evan stin and lost to Northwestern.
Speaker 1: So you've got a little bit of anger. Not to
Speaker 1: mention it's Michigan, but you add that up. You had
Speaker 1: ten of these guys got drafted along the way, and
Speaker 1: you know, big time players. Maybe Penn State maybe maybe
Speaker 1: it's it gets muted now and again, but remember when
Speaker 1: they first came into the conference, they were like rock stars,
Speaker 1: right because number number one ranked team all the time
Speaker 1: or top five, and it's like, I, what, what is
Speaker 1: this mystique with Joe Paterno? And when you did your
Speaker 1: Joe paternal impression, I mean it was Wallace Shawn right
Speaker 1: out of the Princess Bride. I was waiting for you
Speaker 1: to tell me about guilder people or something. But tons
Speaker 1: of snow. Uh. There's actually the video I watched of
Speaker 1: it had that Mercury Hayes video where he's absolutely uh
Speaker 1: Will Ferrold and he got a snowball inside the uh
Speaker 1: inside the dome there because he slid into the wall
Speaker 1: where there's a banking and banking of snow, and that's
Speaker 1: where you have Joe Paterno come running up to side.
Speaker 1: What the hell are we do? We're like, oh my god.
Speaker 1: And you know, the game ended. It was so much momentum,
Speaker 1: was it was exciting, was all this so I'm exhausted, right.
Speaker 1: So after the game was that we went to a
Speaker 1: pizza place, right and I'm so cold all day all day.
Speaker 1: We go into this pizza place and we have to
Speaker 1: we have to find a place because you know, everything
Speaker 1: on campus is just mobs. It's after a football We
Speaker 1: find a place we're able to get in and sit
Speaker 1: down and it's so warm. I sit down and I'm
Speaker 1: sitting next to Pam and I'm sitting up and I
Speaker 1: fall asleep, not laying down I'm sitting up at a
Speaker 1: table waiting for pizza, and I fall asleep. I don't
Speaker 1: I don't put my head down on my hands. I
Speaker 1: don't do any of that. No, no, no, I I
Speaker 1: just sitting straight up. I wind up falling asleep, and
Speaker 1: I sleep that way until the pizza comes and I
Speaker 1: wake up and I go, oh, I'm up, and and
Speaker 1: Pam looks at me and goes, you were just asleep
Speaker 1: sitting up for twenty minute, I said, I was. You
Speaker 1: didn't even move. We were like, are you okay? And
Speaker 1: I can just tell you were sleeping. That's how tired.
Speaker 1: I didn't didn't move to the side, didn't fall that
Speaker 1: I nope. I just sat up and and that's what
Speaker 1: I did. I sat up and slept for I was
Speaker 1: so tired, so exhausted. That's that's what happened. I really
Speaker 1: wish I could say I have no idea what you're
Speaker 1: talking about. But my older daughter, as you know, my
Speaker 1: my beloved Eleanor just turned fifteen. Every now and again
Speaker 1: I go through, you know, as you do, you go
Speaker 1: through some old pictures of that. I look at you
Speaker 1: when you're little. Uh, there's a lot of pictures of
Speaker 1: her in my arms like a football with me sleeping
Speaker 1: sitting up. So I am no stranger to that position,
Speaker 1: my friend, and I applaud you for allowing your body
Speaker 1: to just say, you know what, it's time. So there
Speaker 1: it is the end of our weather opus that takes
Speaker 1: us from freezing cold to snow and mud and snowballs.
Speaker 1: Hopefully you've enjoyed it. I'm Jason Smith, He's Mike Carmen.
Speaker 1: Our show was heard on Fox Sports Radio Monday through Fridays,
Speaker 1: tend to two am on the East coast, seven to
Speaker 1: eleven on the West coast. If you're listening to Special
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Speaker 1: episodes to Special Teams, hit us up on Twitter at
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