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More about those hog people Sunday, Mar 30, 2008 By John Brummett I've received several e-mails instructing me to go to Texas or hell, and a few explaining that the destinations would be the same. These kindnesses were extended because I wrote a column on a rampantly subhuman condition within Razorback fanhood. You have these primitive life forms with red T-shirts pulled tautly over well-graveyed girths. They booed University of Texas band members. They called the hogs during a basketball game between Texas and Miami. They made the NCAA subregional all about their provincial and myopic selves rather than the participants. Several people pointed out that the Arkansas boorishness was repayment to Texas for its rude treatment of our team and fans in 1990 and 1995 when the Razorbacks went to Austin for NCAA regional basketball contests. Even if so, could we not admit that this provides the very definition of childishness? Tit for tat is something our parents and our churches told us to put aside as we moved toward our chronological equivalent of adulthood. One of those cases, the one in 1990, was a little different. We were in the same conference with Texas in 1990. To be more specific about that instance, there had been, only a few weeks before, a hard-fought Razorback game against Texas in Austin. Our coach, the ever-goofy Nolan Richardson, just up and walked off. He left the bench during the game and strolled all sullen-like straight into the dressing room. He should have been fired, which would have saved a ton of heartache and litigation later. Texas fans were still understandably worked up about that very recent Arkansas effrontery and buffoonery. That does not excuse their boorishness. But it does provide more context than existed for our rear-end exposure last weekend. So far as I can tell, Texas had no more excuse for its behavior in 1995 than we did for ours last week, except that 1995 was a heck of a lot closer to the time when these two institutions actually competed. I'm reminded that there also was a little hostility in 1981 when Arkansas first played in a NCAA basketball subregional in Austin. But that mostly sprung from the fact that the Texas coach, Abe Lemons, couldn't stand the Arkansas coach, Eddie Sutton. Time has shown that Abe was on to something. Even so, Abe called the hogs with Razorback fans after U.S. Reed hit a half-court shot to beat Louisville. Several readers took great exception to my assertion that Texas has never given a rip about Arkansas. The Longhorns surely gave a rip from 1964 through 1966, I am advised, when Arkansas beat them three times consecutively in football. That was short-term, driven by aberrant outcomes, in much the same way Arkansas fans fixated on SMU in the early 1990s when Danny Ford kept losing football games to the pitiable Mustangs. But that didn't make SMU our sustaining rival. It doesn't mean we give SMU even a second thought anymore. As for my moving to Texas, I respectfully decline. I find Arkansas to be altogether preferable. Our state is naturally prettier. We tend to be less right-wing in our politics. We spawned a smarter president, if no more honest. While I'm on this subject: There are those in North Little Rock who are offended that the national media referred to the NCAA events as taking place last weekend in Little Rock rather than North Little Rock. The Dallas Cowboys are the Dallas Cowboys, even though their stadium is in an entirely different town, that being Irving. The world champion New York Giants are the New York Giants, even though their stadium is in a whole different state. There are these things called metropolitan statistical areas, named for the largest city that provides the hub for a surrounding expanse. Little Rock is the largest city of our such statistical area, thus our commonly identifying name. North Little Rock is a mighty fine place, one hardly in need of some sports announcer's validation. ------- John Brummett is a columnist for the Arkansas News Bureau in Little Rock. His e-mail address is jbrummett@arkansasnews.com; his telephone number is (501) 374-0699. |
