Here at Bru Velvet world headquarters, we get torrential amounts of email. Many of the messages we receive are hawking OxyContin from Central America or pills to help me gratify ladies in the bedroom; these are the ones I attend to personally, and my staff of interns has standing instructions to print them out for my immediate consideration.
Most other emails, which tend to be from university presidents offering me sickening amounts of money to work as their athletic directors, get an auto-generated “no thank you” response, often including a hilarious photo of a disapproving bunny. Hey, I’m a busy guy! Those Doctor Who episodes aren’t gonna watch themselves.
Following UCLA’s stunning road upset of Tennessee this past Saturday, a somewhat different mix of correspondence has been pouring in. In many cases I’ve heard from prominent figures in the college football world, whose requests that I keep their names and missives confidential I’ve decided to ignore. What are they going to do, send a squad of lethal assassins after me? It’s widely known that Internet columnists wield unchecked power and rule the sports industry like genocidal Serbian war-criminals. No one’s about to mess with yours truly.
So please, enjoy this glimpse behind the scenes of a glamorous “Internet Web Blog.” I assure you that none of the emails reprinted below have been invented to serve as a column gimmick. If necessary, official Bru Velvet fact-checker Stephen Glass will testify to this under oath.
Dear Mr. Fishmore: Holy crap! UCLA beat Tennessee in Knoxville?!? Does this mean that the Bruins are better than every team in the SEC and that if I win another national title this year, it will be a tainted honor because I didn’t have UCLA on my schedule? Halps! ~Urban Meyer of Gainesville, Florida
Yes, I’m afraid that’s exactly what it means, Coach Meyer. That UCLA would go undefeated in the SEC is now a received fact and will remain so even if the Bruins go 4-5 in Pac-10 play. Florida might go undefeated and win the BCS title game, but history will long remember that you didn’t have to face this mighty edition of Bruin football. You should have thought of that before you refused to play UCLA, in that famous schedule-dodging incident I just made up.
Dere FisHMORe GUy: I r BAD at Teh quaRTerbakKiNg. i can Haz job at bRu vELVET iNsTed? ~jOnatHAn crOMPTOn in biG TENNesEEe STAyT I’m not sure that’s such a great idea, Jonathan. Your propensity to throw interceptions at the worst possible time has brought me considerable joy this past year, but it also indicates an inability to ascend learning curves at a rate normal for adults. I recommend a career in which substandard performance is willfully overlooked or, when too obvious to ignore, tolerated indefinitely. Maybe the L.A. public school system is hiring?
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