The Wright/Heavrin Curse continues. David’s daughter, Tiffany, dates a baseball player from PRP. PRP had one of the best baseball teams in the state and Dave and I planned to go to the championship game. We predicted that PRP would roll over the Little Sisters of the Poor in the semi final game. Therefore, there was no reason to go. The team PRP played had a losing record and could only field seven players, and two of the players were on crutches. However, they beat PRP without taking a deep breath and then promptly lost in the state championship game. Tiffany’s boyfriend said that PRP could beat the team they lost to 99 times out of 100 and he asked if Dave and I had cursed PRP by predicting a PRP win. We denied mading such a prediction and told him that we had no intention of going to the championship game. I understand there are some skeptics at PRP and they may be out looking for us right now, so I’m not telling anybody where I’ve moved. In my article title, ‘Predictions,’ I said I would provide some more information about Otto Graham, who may have been the finest quarterback of all time. He only played ten years and retired at the top of his game. In his youth he was an accomplished musician and played the piano, violin, French horn, and cornet, but he gave up music in college. Otto said that he would trade all of his trophies if he could still play the piano, because you can play until your 70 or 80 years old, but you can’t play football at 70 or 80. He tells kids, ‘If you have a talent, keep it up and you’ll have the last laugh.’ Otto reported in a 1995 interview, that after listening to The Three Tenors, ‘I got chills (and so do I) listening to those guys and that if he could sing like that, he would melt down all of his trophies.’ When Otto got out of the Navy, he had a year before football started so he signed up to play basketball for the Rochester Royals (today’s Sacramento Kings) on a team which was in the pre-NBA era. The Rochester Royals won the National Basketball League championship in 1946 but Otto could not stand the constant travel so he retired to football. In football (percentage win record), Sid Luckman is in second place ,100 points behind Otto Graham, who had a winning percentage of .849. Luckman’s winning percentage was .748. Bart Star’s winning percentage was .717, Joe Montana’s .711, and Johnny Unitas’s was .689. As an aside, Otto also returned 22 punts for 250 yards in 1946-1947. On defense he intercepted five passes and returned one for a touchdown, playing safety his first year. He never missed a game in a ten year pro career. A great player by any standards. Respectfully submitted, Donald M. Heavrin Literary Critic for the Old Goats Back To Menu  |