Still Love My Frogs

Until I have the time to write anything on my own about my feelings for the season and how it ended, here is a great article from Killer Frogs.com that Ashley shared with me and I think it sums it up nicely:

I still wear purple and white, I'm still a Horned Frog, For the trolls . . .

Up all night, and the sun brings back the world in its reality. The magic is gone, the dream died. It's s a sad day.

But, like the sun, I'm still here. I still wear purple and white. I'm still a Horned Frog!

Trying to dry his tears last night, I told my son that this is the bad part of being a sports addict -- very seldom do you get to ride your team and see them accomplish the ultimate goal; 99 percent of the time, your held-to-the-heart team falls short.

It rips your heart out, and the pain is almost unbearable. It does one of three things to you: (1) it makes you love your team even more, (2) it makes you find another team that has a better chance, or (3) it makes you leave the sport, to spare your heart.

For me and my son, the last part is out of the question. We're addicted, and we have to feed it. I told him that if he needed to find a second team it was okay, that even if he decided to root for Texas -- since it has all the advantages to be a perennial contender for the championship -- that it was okay, and he would not hear a bad thing from me.

"But, I already hate the Longhorns," he said. That bring tears to my eyes. Ryne roots for who is dad roots for, hates the teams his dad hates. Maybe I do him a disservice by that; I know his pain, and last night I hurt for him more than anybody in the world.

However, his dad has no choice but to root for -- and continue to be ever so proud of -- the TCU Horned Frogs!

I can't root for the teams/schools that have all the inside tracks to the top. I can't root for the schools in a corrupt system where they have every built-in and built-atop-upon advantage imaginable.

I root for the small school. I root for the school that battles the odds. I root for the school that has no right being able to compete with the huge mega state schools, but does anyway. I root for the TCU Horned Frogs, and always will.

I have no connection to TCU, other than buying tickets. I didn't go to TCU, and I don't have the means to donate to the program. TCU gets nothing from me other than ticket sales, and the free advertising I proudly sport on my chest, my back or the back of my car. The only connection I have to TCU is that it is my hometown team.

But, TCU needs me. And I need the Horned Frogs.

As the game kicked off, I realized this one event meant more to me than any sporting event ever. "Son, I want this more than even the Steelers winning the Super Bowl." He asked, "What about the Cubs winning the World Series?" Yeah, this meant even more than that.

I was so disappointed last night. But yet, my heart swelled with pride that the Horned Frogs were even there! I remember as a kid TCU being one of the worst programs in the nation -- a bottom five, if not the bottom. I can remember just being proud to see TCU being on the scores at the bottom of the screen, next to the big names of college football. I was proud that they even scored at Nebraska, even though they lost by 50+.

If somebody had told me that TCU would be a perennial bowl team three decades later, I would have said they were crazy. Had they told me TCU would be a Top 10 team, and playing for a share of the mythical national championship, I would have said they were craziest person in the world!

It's unreal to see from where this program has come!

My heart aches today, but I'm as proud of the Horned Frogs as anybody could be. I'm just as proud as the Boise State fan today, which has seen his team just recently join the big-time and has already put itself in elite status amongst the biggest-name programs in the history of college football.

And I'm certainly as proud of TCU as any fan of Texas, Alabama or any other big school. In fact, I dare say I'm more proud than most of them.

I am not a wagon-jumper. I ride from start to finish. I don't brag about my Horned Frogs to say that "Your team sucks." I brag about my Horned Frogs because I am so proud of what they have done -- against all the odds. I brag about them to pat them on the back, to let people know that the underdog, the disenfranchised can succeed.

Because of all the hurdles, the successes of TCU football mean so much more to me in the long run.

No, they may not have reached the ultimate goal. They may never reach the top.
But like they say, life is a journey, not a destination. And it's been one helluva journey!

The trolls will come and gloat. The text from my son this morning indicates there's plenty of them at his school today, making it a miserable day. They troll because it's the only way they can deal with the disappointment of the 99-percent failure factor for their own teams. They can't win it all -- at least not all the time -- and thus they cover their own pain by rubbing it in my face when they can. Sometimes they even jump from bandwagon to bandwagon.

But not me. I still wear purple and white. I am still a Horned Frog!

Whether or not I ever get to celebrate TCU winning a national championship, I'll die wearing purple and white. I'll die a Horned Frog.

And nobody, no thing, no amount of facial rub will ever change that. Nor will it cause me to be any less proud of my team.

GO FROGS!!!!!