Celebrating the boys and bruises of fall
This is a commentary by Mark Murphy, a local author and physician. He is a longtime contributor to the Savannah Morning News.
When I was a child, my grandparents Groze and Fanny Lou Murphy lived in a white wood frame house beneath a giant magnolia tree near Macon, alongside rural Highway 41, a road made famous by the Allman brothers in their hit song “Ramblin’ Man.”
Although Granny Fanny and Daddy Groze had eight grandchildren, I was the oldest, and they doted on me a bit.
The summer I turned 14, I was sitting at their kitchen table eating breakfast when I realized my grandfather was staring at me.
“How old are you now?” he asked.
“Fourteen,” I said.
“You know, the Murphy men have always played football,” he said.
I knew, all right.
In 1973’s “Magnum Force,” Clint Eastwood’s character “Dirty Harry” Callahan famously said, “A man’s got to know his limitations.” I knew mine — and I was no athlete. However, I thought I was safe.
I was a student at Calvary. It was common knowledge that Mrs. Tippett, our headmaster’s wife, opposed football because she thought it was too violent.
“I’ll play when Calvary has a team,” I told Daddy Groze, confident that I would never have to strap on shoulder pads and put on a helmet in my lifetime.
A year later, Calvary announced they would field a football team during my sophomore year. Daddy Groze was elated.
“I’ll come to all of your games!” he said.
“Great,” I said halfheartedly.
I knew nothing about playing football. I had to look up the positions in the World Book Encyclopedia the night before our first practice.
On Sept. 1, 1977, I found myself on the sidelines of Memorial Stadium, lining up for the kickoff of Calvary’s first-ever football game against Hancock Day School.
Hancock’s QB that night was a gifted athlete named Mark Burns, now the CEO of Gulfstream. We lost 28-6. That game was the highlight of our season since we at least managed to score a touchdown, something we would not do again until mid-October.
We finished 1977 with an ignominious 0-10 record.
By my senior year, in 1979, we were approaching competency. The opening game of the ’79 season was delayed by Hurricane David, which swamped our practice fields, but we were a respectable 2-2 by the time we played the Savannah Christian Raiders for the first time.
Savannah Christian, our archrival in every other sport, was the defending state champion.
They returned phenomenal athletes Larry Brobst, Gene Dodd, and Jeff Adams, and they were heavily favored against us. But we were fired up — and that should have counted for something.
As it turns out, it didn’t.
We lost the game 69-0. Humiliated, physically beaten up by an SCPS team that would go on to win another state title, the team bus after the game was very quiet until Mitchell Minick, seated in the back, piped up, “Well, at least they didn’t get to 70. That would have been really embarrassing!”
Everybody cracked up.
Calvary lost every year against Savannah Christian until 1983, when the Cavs finally broke through with a hard-fought 21-16 win. My brother Andy played on that team, registering a huge sack which helped seal the victory.
A couple of Fridays ago, I watched on television as Calvary, ranked second in the state, defeated Savannah Christian 42-21 for the school’s 300th football win. Savannah Christian still leads the series 26-19, but the gap is closing.
To this day, I remain grateful that I took my promise to my grandfather seriously and showed up on that first day of summer practice 46 years ago. Don’t get me wrong: I have no nostalgia for football practice. Summer camp, with two (or three) daily practices, was miserable, a sweaty, gnat-infested slog that left you battered, bruised, and exhausted. However, like basic training, the brutality of summer football practice brings a team together. Your teammates, through pain and hardship, become your brothers, forging a bond that lasts the rest of your life.
Ultimately, football made me a better person. It taught me to sublimate individual accomplishments for team goals. Playing football those three seasons has reverberated through my life in ways I could never have imagined when I first laced up my cleats in the sweltering summer of 1977.
Some of my old teammates are dead now. Craig Williamson, Bobby Evans, Dana Strickland, Herbie Curry, Joey Blissett, and Chris Morris are all gone. But those of us who are left, when we see each other, still have that collective memory that binds us to one another — and we fondly remember our brothers, keeping them alive in our hearts and minds even after they have left this earthly plane for a better place.
So, in memory of Craig, Bobby, Dana, Herbie, Joey, and Chris, and in honor of all the other young men I once played with, let’s salute this year’s edition of the Boys of Fall. Go Cavs!
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Football gave me plenty of bruises and life lessons as well
