(S9) - Weekend PT 4 - Close Call

[JKortesi81]

You never forget your first brush with death. I was 8 years old, living in the Dominican Republic. My father had come home for a few weeks to spend time with us. He always did this during his time on the road wrestling, so it was like a big deal to have him home. He had just come back from deep sea fishing. He caught a mahi mahi and he was preparing to grill it for our lunch. We were at the beach, and the waves were MASSIVE! I loved the waves, and wanted to go swimming but he warned me not to. I didn’t listen. When his back was turned, I jumped in. Immediately I was hit by a big wave, and the undertoe started ripping me out to sea! I was being dragged along the bottom of the ocean when, by the grace of the Lord, my foot got stuck on a piece of driftwood or something. I was able to push myself up and out of the current and swim to the top, gasping for air when I got there. I screamed for my dad, who was already flying towards me. I was pulled about a quarter mile in an instant! I could have, and should have, drowned that day. But I got lucky. Not many do. (220)

[dub]

July 18. Wraiths vs Outlaws.

The two teams battled to a 6-6 tie, with both QB's struggling and throwing a pick.

With 4:31 left in the game with the score tied, Arizona rookie QB Fitzpatrick hit TE Balthazar Crindy over the middle for a five yard gain to the Arizona 42. Crindy, for the first time in his young career, coughed up the ball, and Taylor dove on it. With the game tied after a hard-fought defensive struggle, the young Crindy had coughed up the ball in his own territory.

After giving up dangerous 14 yards and moving into field goal range, the Wraiths were stopped. Three straight incompletions by Akelson, including two breakups by immortal S Davis, stalled the drive. With 2:21 left in the game, on 4th and 10 from the Arizona 28, Wraiths K Forfeit lined up for the potential game winner, but doinked it from 45 yards away. A real shankopotamus.

The Outlaws were alive again, and Crindy's mistake hadn't been fatal. On the next drive, Arizona knew they had to keep the confidence in their young TE. Fitzpatrick went back to Crindy, trying to force a pass in past Hendrix, incomplete. Then Fitzy was sacked for six yards. On 3rd and 16 with the clock running, Crindy got open, broke a tackle and dashed for the first down marker. He was just short. With 4th and inches from their own 37, the Outlaws had to give the ball back to Akelson, again.

But again, the Outlaws would come through. Jackson's punt was downed at the Wraiths goal line. Two heaves by Akelson later and the clock expired. Overtime.

The defensive struggle continued. The teams exchanged quick interceptions and punts. With 5:56 left in the game, Fitzpatrick had the best drive of his young career. He completed passed of 15 to Booter, 12 to Crindy, 17 to Chess, 17 to Wachter to move the Outlaws to the Wraith 14. Three plays later, with less than a minute left, Fitzy hit Watcher for the game-winning score, and the Outlaws won 12-6. That would be the first of only two games the Outlaws would win so far in S9, and was a total team effort.

Afterwards, Crindy thanked his young QB for the vote of confidence on twitter: https://twitter.com/BCrindy/status/1019766836286681089.

[YoungTB]

This close call actually happened just this evening to a young and fired up Marquise Brown. He was unfortunately watching the PHI - ARI shitshow that transpired at 8 PM Eastern on the NSFL channel, where he would once again root for his former QB, Kevin Fitz Magic, to beat the pulp out of his future NSFL team, the Philadelphia Liberty. A weird string of events, but be mindful that Marquise Brown was trusting the process at this time, which meant that the Liberty getting an L would actually be them getting a W in the 1OA race. Either way, they needed an L this game and a W from SJS to be in contention, and unfortunately, the Liberty won the game. At this point, Marquise Brown slammed his fist on his glass table, breaking it. He then proceeded to kick his TV until it broke using his blessed golden feet. He almost broke both his foot and his fist, but fortunately none of that happened. After the whole debacle, Brown screamed “GOD DAMN IT FITZ”

176 words

[Phobospwns]

Rax likes to take time to himself every so often to get away from the world. Being a pro athlete, you're essentially around people every waking moment, even in the off-season. Whether it's lifting weights, going over film, working on techniques, there's always something. But, occasionally, there's a few days to spare where one can get away.

One such time, Lo headed out on a solo canoe trip. Nothing too crazy, just packed for an overnighter on a simple out-and-back trip on the Nipissing River. The trip started off like many other, with no real wrinkles. That is, until Rax had settled down for the night at his camp site. Lo had taken all the typical best precautions, being a regular outdoorsman. He'd seen the evidence of their presence near him before, but this time, he'd get his first up close and personal encounter. Who knows what it was that pissed this bear off, but when Rax awoke from snoozing by his fire, he was all but face to face with death itself. In an effort to make himself bigger and more intimidating Lo stood up, outstretched his arms, and let out a howl, but that only serve to whip this bear into a frenzy. It came at Rax, swinging away with its claws, looking for blood. Rax dipped and ducked, slipping the blows, before turning the tables and demonstrating a perfect form tackle straight into the bear's gut. Stunned, the beast arose, snapped out of its bloodlust- turned tail and ran away. That was one close call that left Lo really pondering life on his paddle home.

[Renrut]

Back when Childish Gambino was a wee lad, he went for a motorcycle ride with his dad. He loved going for the rides. Near, far, it did not matter to Gambino, he just loved being on the bike with his dad and no cares in the world. That was until one day they were in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin and traffic was especially heavy that day. Coming into town there is a hill with a couple businesses littered on the top and bottom of each side. At the bottom of one side there used to sit a Walmart that has since been destroyed and rebuilt. Anyways, traffic from Gambino and his fathers' direction of travel was backed up because a single car was trying to cross traffic to turn into the Walmart. In the line of traffic, Gambino and his dad were just below the top of the hill....little did they know a speeder was about to come over the top of the hill, unaware of the line of traffic waiting for them after they hit the crest. As the car came over the hill, it smashed into the motorcycle carrying Gambino and his dad. It sent Gambino about 2-3 feet into the air and then back down again hard on the seat. The rear fender was lodged so tight into the front bumper of the car that hit them, that the police had to move the car with the bike still attached to it to the parking lot so they could pry it apart. I will never forget the paramedics and police telling my dad that that was the only thing that saved our lives that day...that rear fender locking into that bumper in just a way that it kept the bike upright and did not smash us into the car in front of us, or under the car that had hit us.

I was pretty shook after that incident and to this day, I refuse to get back on a motorcycle.

bonus points for being a true story? Thanks.

[Zoone16]

I don’t this many people would remember this but back in S1 right after the draft the Wraiths held a internal competition for the position of QB between Chris Orosz & Alexandre LeClair. In the end Orosz won out on a gut feeling from the head coach at the time. But what they don’t know is that behind the scene, both players were calling the cops on one another for various reasons. Orosz called the cops on LeClair for disorderly behaviour and drunken driving. Even if these were not true, the police came and held on to LeClair overnight and most of the next morning just in case. This did mean that he had to miss out on a day of training camp and get chewed on by the coaches.

In return, LeClair called the cops on Orosz claiming he had large amounts of drugs and LeClair had planted large bags of flour, salt, sugar as well as white M&Ms in Orosz’ place. Orosz spend 2 nights in jail and made the news across the NSFL. He was eventually released when a policeman decided to “examine” the goods.

(188 words)

[GoonerBear]

During his college days at UT-Austin, Kolby Deringer had some close brushes with hectic drivers along high-traffic pedestrian passages and other students on bicycles who didn't seem to care who else was along their way. One near-miss in particular stands out to him.

It was his junior year, spring semester. He had left one of his accounting major courses and was on his way to practice for the day with the spring game about two weeks away. Even with careful attention, it's hard to predict when or how an aggressive driver will take off trying to rush off campus or beat a light.

He was in a crosswalk with lights that had just turned and signaled him he was clear to walk. On this one freak occasion, his foot slipped out from under him on his first step and he fell to the ground. He didn't incur any major injury from the fall itself. A late arrival to the intersection gunned it through and blasted by where he would have been walking had he not slipped.

In his shock and gratitude for his survival, he remained where he was and prayed thankfulness for a moment before he gathered himself and his fallen belongings, stood back up and continued to practice.

(210)

[TannerH]

There are times in every persons life that challenges their character and strength. In college some of Hendrix’s teammates got into drugs and bad substances. As he was being ostracized for not partaking he almost gave in and could of thrown his life away, but with the help of his coaches and family Hendrix stayed on the straight and narrow and continued to follow the words of God and stayed away from such temptation. He then turned around and set records left and right at Missouri. This bad time in his life almost caused him immense mental and physical harm, but instead made Hendrix into a tougher player and leader. This time in college was one of the many times that challenges who Hendrix was as a person, and showed who the people around him truly were. This moment helped propel Hendrix to keep pushing forward and I turn get drafted into the DSFL.
(154 words)

[BWIII]

When I think of a time in my life where I had a close call, there's one situation that always pops into my mind first and that is the time that I almost drowned to death. We took a family trip to a lake, I think it was for a family reunion, and I was playing around in the water. At one point I was talking to my mom while walking backwards in the water and then all of a sudden the ground underneath my feet disappeared, basically it dropped off and it caught me by surprise. I was left bobbing in the water trying to get my head above water, but I was failing and at that point I was starting to panic. I was for sure certain that I was going to drown, but then the next thing I knew I was being drug back to dry land. My mom had jumped in and saved me. Easily the most scary time in my life.

[kckolbe]

Great timing on this one, because Friday night was almost a disaster. With a 2-8 record, Philadelphia at 3-7, and San Jose at 2-8 as well, the Arizona Outlaws were in serious danger of winning over the Philadelphia Liberty, pushing them to a two way tie for best record. Even worse, Arizona had the tiebreaker, meaning that the Outlaws would have had the 3rd overall pick. It seemed impossible to imagine with Tank Commander Logan Noble at the helm, but somehow the Liberty had managed to win 3 of their first 10 games. But surely Arizona would be able to stop them, right?

You don’t carry a name like Fitzpatrick without knowing how the real game of football works. Drafting first overall has too much value, and while a team can get a bad reputation for trying to tank, no one’s gonna be too hard on a rookie having a bad game, right? With 3 interceptions thrown beautifully to the team’s DBs, Fitz avoided a draft nightmare.