Thank You Coach Bowden; The Robbins Family Will Never Forget You!

Hey guys,

Let me preface this by saying that for the past four or five years I have been one of those fans in favor of Coach Bowden retiring. My opinion has not changed on that matter. But, for some reason it hit me hard yesterday that Friday's game against West Virginia will be the last time I see Coach Bowden presiding over the Seminole Football Team, and I am sad. Let me explain.

I have a number of fond memories of my youth. Trips to the grove, dad coaching me and Rob at T-ball (Levy Park), playing with the Brocks, shaking President Spencer W. Kimball's hand at the Tallahassee Stake Center. And very close to the top of that list are my memories of going to FSU football games. Back then the stadium looked like a giant erector set. A system of criss crossing steel beems rising into the sky. I remember stepping in soda (or something sticky) as me, Rob and dad made our way up the metal ramps to our seats. I remember listening to my shoes make a sound like velcro being pulled apart as the sticky soles pulled away from the metal.

I remember hearing Uncle Richard talking about a guy falling off the top of the stadium during construction and bouncing when he hit the ground. I don't know if it's true, but I remember hearing it.

I remember sitting in the stadium for Larry Key's last football game. It seemed like the entire game fans stood and shook their car keys in his honor and chanted "Key, Key, Key, Key." Names like Ron Simmons, Wally Woodham, Jimmy Jordan, Paul Piurowski, Bill Capece, Rick Stockstill, Rohn Stark meant a lot to me. I remember dad telling me Wally Woodham was FSU's deep threat quarterback and Jimmy Jordan was better at throwing the shorter routes. Both quarterbacks were the same age and graduated from Leon High in Tallahassee. I later realized how rare that is.

I remember dad telling me Rohn Stark practiced punting by kicking the ball over the street that ran between the practice field from the stadium. I remember thinking how cool it would be to be driving down that road and see footballs flying over the roof of the car. That street used to sit on a gigantic embankment with a tunnel going through the middle for fans to walk through as they entered the stadium. I remember walking through that tunnel and feeling a little claustrophobic as a kid. The tunnel is gone now.

I remember dad telling me Ron Simmons had been arrested for stealing televisions out of someone's store and it made me sad. Ron Simmons is from Warner Robins, Geogia by the way.

I remember all of the kids in our family unwrapping FSU clothes at Christmas. Every Christmas. Just take a look at our old photos and you will see what I mean.

I remember crying when FSU lost to Oklahoma in the 1980 Orange Bowl and then again in 1981. I was 8 and 9 respectively. FSU was still a decade away from its "Dynasty Years" and I already bled Garnet and Gold.

I remember watching the Springtime Tallahasee parade at Uncle Walter's plumbing business surrounded by FSU football players. Mom and Dad always told us "Don't drink Uncle Walter's orange juice." Many of those players showed up at Uncle Walter's funeral, including Ron Simmons.

I remember singing "Thanks to Bobby B" as the song came on over the radio.

As I got older names like Pat Tomberlin, LeRoy Butler, Greg Allen, Danny McManus, Deion Sanders and Sammie Smith became important to me. I remember watching Coach Bowden go for a two point conversion and a win over Miami at the end of a game instead of a tie. A tie would have put FSU in the National Championship game, but Coach Bowden said a tie was like "kissing your sister." The conversion failed, but I loved Coach Bowden for going for it.

I remember the "Puntrooskie" and watching LeRoy Butler streak towards the end zone. Somehow in my convoluted memory I can see Butler getting into the end zone to win the game. Looking back, they tackled him short of the end zone and we kicked a field goal to beat Clemson.

I remember selling Cokes at FSU football games as a Boy Scout in middle and high school. Dad was in charge of coordinating the Coke sales and he was able to get one of his suppliers to donate some very nice knives to the scouts who sold the most Cokes. Out of 30 or so Boy Scouts, nobody ever beat Rob in Coke sales. But dad gave out knives to the top 3 or 4 scouts at the end of the year. The higher you placed in sales, the earlier you got to pick your knife. Rob always won, so Rob always got to pick first. I remember one year when Omar Thompkins came in 2nd to Rob and I didn't place. I had been spending the entire second halves of the games watching football instead of selling Cokes. Omar was surprised that year that dad actually let him pick 2nd instead of giving his [Omar's] knife to me. Dad told Omar "Travis didn't do what it took to get a knife, and you [Omar] did." I remember being proud of dad for not showing the favoritism toward me Omar assumed was coming. For those of you who don't know Omar, he was raised without a dad. Omar told me once that he had a great deal of respect for Dad. I think a lot of it had to do with the way Dad handled the Coke sales.

I remember watching "Prime Time" (that's Deion Sanders for those of you less familiar with FSU football) on television. The local TV station did an interview on Deion Sanders as he paraded around town with gold around his neck in a brand new hooride. While Deion played football for FSU he also played baseball for the New York Yankees so he was loaded. I remember Deion bating the Auburn quarterback during the 1988 Sugar Bowl. Auburn had stayed away from Deion all game long. On Auburn's final drive of the game they needed to score a touchdown. Out of desparation, they started to throw it to Deion's side of the field. It seemed like Deion was just letting the receivers catch the ball without making any real effort to stop them. This happened several times as Auburn drove the length of the field into FSU territory. Finally, on the last play of the game, Deion picked off the ball in the end zone. After the play Deion shook his finger at the Auburn quarterback as if to say "Now you know I was only trying to make the game more exciting."

I remember the Seminole Rap; a song recorded by some of FSU's players before the 1988 season. FSU was ranked preseaon No. 1 and I think the song was inspired by the Chicago Bears' Superbowl Shuffle. I remember Prime Time's lyrics went "I'm Deion Sanders. You should know my name. But if you don't then I'm not to blame. I got world class speed with moves to spare. You throw it my way you know I'll be there." I had just memorized the lyrics of the song when FSU was throttled by the Canes the very first game of the season. Say what you want, it wasn't Prime Time's fault.

I remember Brett Favre and Southern Miss coming out of nowhere in 1990 (I think) to beat the Noles. Nobody knew who Favre was then. We were just ticked that FSU could lose to some no name quarterback on some no name team.

I remember going on a mission and watching FSU beat BYU in the Pigskin Classic in Anaheim, California. President Chambers, my mission president, called me a week or so before the game and said he had bought all of the missionaries tickets to the game. I asked him what he thought I should do with the tickets I already had. I remember a picture in the Anaheim Newspaper the day after the game of all the missionaries in our mission watching the game. Right above us was a huge banner advertisement for cigarettes. The picture's caption read "Wouldn't Their Parents Be Proud?" I remember being in a zone where the Zone Leader and District Leader were both huge Michigan Wolverine fans. We decided to have lunch one Saturday as a Zone at a local restaurant that just so happened to have the FSU/Michigan game on. I watched as FSU (Amp Lee and T-Buck in particular) laid a beat down on the Wolverines.

I remember coming home from my mission to Utah and watching FSU play Notre Dame in 1993. We had to watch the game at 10:00 or so in the morning. I remember Richard calling one of his friends after FSU drove the length of the field on the first drive and scored a touchdown. His friend was a Notre Dame fan and Rich just wanted to make sure he was watching the game. FSU lost. Minutes after the game I remember the phone ringing but I can't remember if anyone answered it. I remember thinking that Richard's friend would probably be better off not bringing up the game for awhile. Our whole family was upset.

I remember going camping with Nate and some friends up in Heber the night before the FSU/UF game. It was Thanksgiving weekend. I woke up the next day and remembered the game. I told the guys I had to leave for awhile to watch a football game. They thought I was nuts. I made my way out of the mountains and the only place open was the emergency room at the local hospital. I convinced the nurses to put the game on. You wouldn't believe what it took me to get those kidney stone patients to shut up while I watched the game. Although that last sentence was just a joke, something did happen while I was in the ER. A group of people came in screaming. One of the adults was holding a kid in his arms. The kid just laid there limp. The kid looked about 10 or 11. They were speaking Spanish. The nurses came running over and saw that the kid wasn't breathing. It was like a tornado had started swirling in the middle of the ER as doctors and nurses ran to help the kid. Suddenly the kid was taken from the adult holding him and rushed out the door and into an ambulance.

The ER went silent as this group of people were now left stunned by what had just happened. Nobody seemed to notice that this group of about eight or nine people were just standing there stunned. They spoke to one another silently in spanish. I decided to break away from the football game to see if I could help. Using the spanish I had learned in high school and supplemented on my mission I found out that this was a family of grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles and cousins from South America on vacation in Heber. They didn't know what had just happened to the kid. I asked the nurses and they said the kid had been lifeflighted to Salt Lake City. I got directions to the SLC hospital and gave them to the family. They thanked me and left the hospital. I then went back to watching the game, but not before saying a prayer for that kid and his family.

I remember hearing about Warrick Dunn (an obscure FSU football recruit). He wasn't one of the most highly touted recruits. In fact he was way down the list of running backs coming into FSU (anybody remember the name Tiger McMillan). But Warrick's mom had been killed while on duty as a police officer in Louisiana about a month before Warrick was to come to FSU. Warrick was now the oldest sibling of a large family without a mother or father (his father had previously abandoned the family). But Warrick promised his mom he would get a college education so instead of staying home and trying to eek out a living he came to FSU. Warrick's little brothers and sisters struggled while he was at FSU. A lot of people thought Warrick would "Go Pro" after his junior year to start making money. But Warrick had not finished his degree yet. A lot of people questioned him on staying at FSU for his senior year given his family's financial difficulties. Warrick said his family had grown closer through their struggles and that they had met together and made the decision as a family for Warrick to stay in school. Warrick was picked in the first round the following year and played in the pro's for many years. Warrick spent his first few years in the pro's living in a modest apartment while he bought homes for his family and other single parent families. Warrick is my favorite FSU football player of all time.

I remember Charlie Ward and Warrick Dunn and beating Nebraska for the National Championship in 1993. I remember Charlie Ward graduating from high school when I did in 1989. Interestingly looking back, Charlie wasn't the highest ranked quarterback to commit to FSU that year. Nor was he the only 1989 high school graduate to win a Heisman Trophy for FSU. As it turns out, Chris Weinke also graduated in 1989 but decided to go play baseball for a few years before returning to FSU, winning the Heisman and a second national championship in 1999.

I could go on with FSU football memories for a very long time. But let me just say this. I have now lived in Florida/Georgia for the past 16 years while most of my family (parents and 4 brothers and 2 sisters) is scattered throughout the United States. No matter where we live it is not uncommon for me to get a phone call at halftime from one of my parents or siblings asking for my opinion on how the game is going. FSU is one of the strongest common threads running through our scattered family.

Now I hear my kids (a new generation of Robbins) talk about Christian Ponder and other current FSU players with the same fondness I have for the FSU players of my youth and it has helped me realize something. FSU football is about way more than FSU football to me. It is about being a Robbins. How can you be a Robbins without being a Nole fan? Win or lose, FSU is our team. Not because of what they did in the 80's or 90's or what they will do in the future. Not just because they have won two national championships or might win others in the future. Not just because the Tomahawk Chop is the coolest chant in college football or because Chief Osceola and Renegade are the best mascots. Not just because Garnet and Gold are the most awesome colors or because the Seminole Head logo was patterned after someone we know (rumor has it). Not just because Grandma Robbins went to school there and Dad graduated from there.

FSU is our team because other than being Mormon, nothing in this world has galvanized the Robbins family and brought us together for one common purpose like FSU football. How many times have we sat together as a family and screamed at the television for FSU football? How many times have we sat thousands of miles apart screaming at the television for FSU football and knowing that others of our family are rooting for the same common cause? That is what makes FSU football unique and why it is important for us to pass it on to our kids.

And, oh by the way, I know that "if if's and buts were candy and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas," but if a two point conversion is completed and if three kickers don't freeze up (one of them, Dan Mowry, a friend of mine from high school) in three separate games FSU could have been the College Football Dynasty of the century. As it is, fourteen years in the top 4 and two national championships is something FSU will always be proud of.

For as long as I can remember, Coach Bowden has been at the head of FSU football. Now that his time as Coach has come to an end, I would just like to say thanks for all the memories.