Dick jokes from decades past and great football names

I was just watching some ESPN classic episodes of "This week in the NFL"... you know, the ones with Pat Summerall and Tom Brookshire sitting in ultra cheesy low budget sets. My personal favorites are the ones that have them sitting in front of a football shaped coffee table.

Anyway while enjoying the week 8 recap from 1971 Pat Summerall was narrating over the martial music that became the mind soundtrack to every sandlot and backyard football game played by kids in the seventies and he called a play naming the quarterback for Atlanta... Dick Shiner.

Yeah, you read right. I had to rewind just to make sure I heard it right. Then I had to lie to my girlfriends young son who wanted to know why I was laughing.

I mean really... Dick Shiner?

I watched some more highlights because the youngster wanted to see the old Jets highlights but I was making a mental note to write an item about the Shineroski, the ol' Shinola. By the time I got around to writing I'd lost my certainty as to which team the Shine-man played for. I thought it was Atlanta but since I have my total lack of journalistic integrity to think of I decided to devoted at least 15 seconds to fact checking.

As luck would have it I have the Encyclopedia of Football in it's most current version and I looked up the Shine-ster .
Sure enough there he was and to my surprise, he'd played for ten years! For the Falcons, the Giants, the Saints, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Washington... the Shiner shone nationwide. Here's a picture of the man showing the gritty determination he would need to endure his habit of forgetting his helmet on the sidelines.


I couldn't believe I didn't recognize his name as I was around twelve back then and even though it seems impossible, I liked a good Dick joke then even more than I do now. How the hell did I let that meatball by me without hitting it out of the park?

Surprisingly enough that is not the worst Dick related, joke ready football name I ever heard. When I went to college at Glassboro State our football teams coach sported the moniker (gods honest truth) Dick Wacker. Pronounced Dick Wacker. Now really, what sadistic son of a bitch, boy named Sue parents hung that albatross around some poor infants neck? Ya know? Who would do that to a kid?

On the other side of that fence are many great Football names like Joe Namath, Emerson Boozer (cool and funny) Wilbur Marshall, Deacon Jones, Dexter Manly (a good contradiction that tips in favor of cool by the fact that he was big and scary) Joe Kapp, Too Tall Jones, Hollywood Henderson, Mean Joe Greene, Hacksaw Reynolds ... yeah I know these are all from the Stone age but I was just watching highlights from 71 so bear with me. Or is it bare with me?.... oh who the hell cares.

Anyway my friend had a kid a while back and as soon as I heard his name I thought "this kid has got to play ball" His name is just to good not to. Wanna know what it is? .... wait for it... a little more... ok, ya ready? get a load of this... Diesel Beck. Eh? eh? Is that awesomely perfect or what? When you're on the sandlot choosing up sides is there anyway you don't pick Diesel? If he's even remotely good and his name comes up on the draft board, could you resist calling that name? If your an announcer calling a game is there any cooler name to be calling?

I tell you this. If Brian Urlacher had the name Diesel Beck he would get at least a few extra Pro Bowl votes every year... no doubt.

And thats all I have to say about that. .... except Dick Wacker, Dick Wacker, Dick Wacker