Six days to go

Six days and counting. Yup, six days is what I have before the opening of my first official football play-by-play gig as the voice of Middlebury College. (Division III) Am I nervous? Are you nuts? If I wasn't nervous there would be something seriously wrong with me.

Now, I know football, and have been doing quite a bit of warming up as the color voice of the Vermont Ice Storm, and doing high school football on Friday nights. I have sat in front of the tube and filled the DVR with college and pro football games and done mock play-by-play. On my way to Middlebury, I do the play-by-play of a cop pulling over a trucker. Yes, I am obsessed but ready to get the first game out of the way.

As I have learned, and the approach I will use is to picture describing the game to someone who has never listened to a single down of football. I am not one for "Lyon is going to run a 32 slot A go nuts zip 42 on six". It will be more of, "Lyon is in the shotgun, one back to his left, two receivers to the near side, one to the far side with Colby putting defensive backs right up on the Panther receivers." That is more friendly to listeners and will keep my brain from exploding.

Will I mess things up? Of course I will. Believe it or not, announcers are human and mess things up a bit. We can prepare and prepare, but then when game time hits and we can't hit the rewind button on the DVR, things are different. We may see something we actually didn't, call the wrong guy carrying the ball, or miss a tackle or three. The game moves fast, and three hours feels like three minutes. Am I looking forward to this? Does a baby go goo?

This week starts pure chaos for me. Coaches show on Thursday, high school game in Plattsburgh, NY on Friday, Sox Show on Saturday morning, Middlebury game that afternoon. The next week, repeat, but the Middlebury game is on the road at Colby, then I have to FLY back to Vermont for the Ice Storm/Lake City rematch part II in which I will be late and start doing color in about the second quarter. Ah, the glory and fun of it all.

By the way, in the announcer game from hell, Vermont took out Lake City last night 34-27. COUNTLESS problems before the game, and we had to do the game from the bleachers. I am not going there right now as I am still infuriated with some people(Not having to do with the Ice Storm or the station.) during the pre-game. Once I calm down, I will get into some more detail.