Guest Column: MoMo Won't Back Down

by MoMo

Style and Culture Writer

Blatant Homerism

(Editor's note: Representing West Texas' upper crust, MoMo is back to show Homerism's readers how the other half lives. After an offseason spent wading through aisles of bourgeois bargain shoppers hoping to take a holiday on Saks Fifth Avenue's misery, MoMo has plenty of unsolicited advice for the great unwashed.)

The 2010 college football season is almost underway. Many coaches and players are spewing their big game talk to the media in anticipation of a successful season. I love the hype that surrounds these idiots who take their teams out on a limb with overreaching statements and guarantees. They’re living by my personal credo: Never Back Down.

(For those of you who have been living in a cave the last two years, Never Back Down is a movie about a high school football player forced to move from Iowa to Orlando, a land-locked city where kids take surfboards to school. Our fish-out-of-water becomes embroiled in the Orlando “party-fighting” scene and must take down a gang of super-rich dudes who wear all black and play karate.)

No coach does NBD better than first-year Tennessee head man Lane Kiffin. Have you ever seen Kiffin back down? No, he has the stones to say what we’re all thinking. We all hate Tim Tebow, and we all think Urban Meyer has a ridiculous name. NBD is saying it before you’ve even collected your first win as a college head coach.

Here’s some MoMo inside info for you: Know who taught Lane Kiffin to NBD? Pete Carroll? His father Monte? Nope… The Nature Boy Ric Flair. There is no better NBD instructor than The Nature Boy. At 55 years young, Flair is still teaching young pups that, “You gotta walk down that aisle, and to be the best, you gotta beat the best… WOOOOO!”

Back in the day, Monte, Lane and I took my hand-me-down Gulfstream to New York to watch Hulk Hogan and The Nature Boy battle it out in Wrestlemania at Madison Square Garden. The Hulkster had Flair against the ropes, calling for the big boot to the face. Blinded by pain, Flair somehow managed to reverse the hold and maneuver into the figure-four leg lock, regaining the title!

We met up at Flair’s private table at The Limelight afterwards. Even though I was only eight or nine at the time, I’ll never forget watching Flair look little Lane in the eyes and say, “That’s what it takes to be the best. Now go out there and become the head coach of Tennessee and see how many recruiting violations you can commit! Oh, and one more thing, Never back down! WOOOOO!”

With the spread offense taking the conference by storm, the national media is down on Big 12 defenses. Yet, the Oklahoma Sooners defense really knows NBD.

I caught up with OU head coach Bob Stoops at Fashion Week in Milan earlier this year, and I asked him where his team learned to get NBD. The legendary coach offered up four simple words, Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo.

“Do you think Turbo and Ozone were intimidated when Kelly’s dad tried to shut down the rec center, just because he wanted her to go to Princeton and give up her dreams of dancing in Paris?,” Stoops asked me, his voice reaching a fever pitch. “Hell no! They had a dance-off that literally shut down a bulldozer!”

Hey, BYU, NBDers Gerald McCoy and Auston English are polishing up their dancing shoes, getting ready to tap dance on some Mormons in Dallas. Y’all ain’t ready! Y’all ain’t ready!

Last up is TV titan Lee Corso, who really knows how to Never Back Down. Year in and year out, he plays the fool for College Football GameDay, and he’s totally fine with being the heel every week. For most regular GameDay viewers, Corso’s only redeeming quality is that he could be Mel Brooks’ identical twin.

Listen up, kids. If you’re looking for a role model, Corso does an exceptional job of Never Backing Down. No matter how many times he gets fired as a coach, no matter how many times he comes off like a douche on national television, no matter how many times he fails to realize the joke is on him, he gets right back up and gets ready to do it all over again. Well, actually it’s pretty sad. Corso is almost the real-life version of Michael Scott.

With the mouths of college football players, coaches and even TV personalities writing checks that their butts can’t hope to cash, I’m ready for the season to get started. I hope they all remember to Never Back Down.