Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson’s third cousin, twice removed – at her request) wrote many poems about football and football teams. He even penned several poems about a scandal in the late 1800s known as “deflate-gate” when Princeton used deflated footballs to defeat Bryn Mawr. An example of one of his Deflate-gate poems is below.
| By Emmett Lee Dickinson: That it may never come again Is what makes the Super Bowl so sweet. Achieving what we must achieve The ball we must deflate. That if it’s so, it be at best A story of no weight – For investigators with appetite For a type of Gamer-Gate | Dickinson's poem inspired third cousin Emily Dickinson to write this: That it will never come again Is what make life so sweet. Believing what we don't believe Does not exhilarate. That if it be, it be at best An ablative estate – This instigates an appetite Precisely opposite |
Now, more than 100 years later, we are faced once again with a Deflate-gate dispute. Super Bowl XLIV is one week away, and we anxiously await the NFL’s response to the controversy. The Board of Directors of the Dickinson Organization of Poetry Enthusiasts (DOPE) has a number of recommendations for the NFL in response to this hullabaloo:
* First, President Obama should appoint a Ball Czar. He recently appointed an Ebola Czar to manage a possible public health crisis, and Deflate-gate has certainly reached the point of being a national football crisis, so we need a Ball Czar to ensure that no quarterback at the Super Bowl has soft or tender balls.
* Next, we advocate for many and frequent ball checks during the game. This can be performed by the refs, the teams’ centers, or even the team doctors, but someone needs to complete frequent checks with the quarterbacks to ensure their balls are firm and hard.
* Third, the NFL should develop and distribute a required chart of acceptable prefixes to be used with the root word “flate,” the Welsh word for “pancake” which came to mean “flat” in English. At a minimum, the chart should include the following:
* First, President Obama should appoint a Ball Czar. He recently appointed an Ebola Czar to manage a possible public health crisis, and Deflate-gate has certainly reached the point of being a national football crisis, so we need a Ball Czar to ensure that no quarterback at the Super Bowl has soft or tender balls.
* Next, we advocate for many and frequent ball checks during the game. This can be performed by the refs, the teams’ centers, or even the team doctors, but someone needs to complete frequent checks with the quarterbacks to ensure their balls are firm and hard.
* Third, the NFL should develop and distribute a required chart of acceptable prefixes to be used with the root word “flate,” the Welsh word for “pancake” which came to mean “flat” in English. At a minimum, the chart should include the following:
* Finally, the NFL should support deflation – but in relation to the cost of Super Bowl tickets. We checked the NFL Ticket Exchange last night for ticket availability to Super Bowl XLIV, and the site indicated that there were “713 ticket listings offered from $5015 $5015 to $15842 $15842 each.” Why, the price of one ticket alone is approaching the cost of a family of four to go to the movies! Flattened balls or not, the ridiculously inflated cost of Super Bowl admission is absurd.
The Super Bowl is almost synonymous with Emmett Lee Dickinson. The name “Super Bowl” itself is tied to Dickinson himself due to his creation of corn chowder. Dickinson also invented the marching band and half-time entertainment. Therefore, we are vitally interested in the presentation andoutcome of the game.
We hope the NFL – and President Obama – will take our recommendations under serious consideration. As the saying goes, “Deflaters are gonna deflate,” but if our proposals are implemented, perhaps we can all get pumped up for the game!
* Finally, the NFL should support deflation – but in relation to the cost of Super Bowl tickets. We checked the NFL Ticket Exchange last night for ticket availability to Super Bowl XLIV, and the site indicated that there were “713 ticket listings offered from $5015 $5015 to $15842 $15842 each.” Why, the price of one ticket alone is approaching the cost of a family of four to go to the movies! Flattened balls or not, the ridiculously inflated cost of Super Bowl admission is absurd.
The Super Bowl is almost synonymous with Emmett Lee Dickinson. The name “Super Bowl” itself is tied to Dickinson himself due to his creation of corn chowder. Dickinson also invented the marching band and half-time entertainment. Therefore, we are vitally interested in the presentation andoutcome of the game.
We hope the NFL – and President Obama – will take our recommendations under serious consideration. As the saying goes, “Deflaters are gonna deflate,” but if our proposals are implemented, perhaps we can all get pumped up for the game!
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