A Typical Day For The Purdue Football Coaching Staff

[Joe Tiller enters room where assistants are already waiting and sits down.]


Tiller: Hello, men. Sorry I'm late. I was just talking to a satellite plate installer out in Wyoming. Can you believe what they can get on those plates now?

Danny Hope: Coach, I think you mean satellite “dish,” not “plate.”

Tiller: Fourteen kinds of porn! It's amazing.

Danny Hope: Um, well, coach, shouldn't we talk about the team?

Tiller: Oh, Danny, when you're head man you can do whatever the hell you want. But you're not. You're my underling for five more games. Plus the bowl.

[silence, Hope grits teeth]

Tiller: I'll tell you what. I think we should talk about the team. Here we are, 2-5. And I'll tell you what I want -- I want two trick plays for this weekend and I want them decided on in the next ten minutes.

Hope: Oh, I see, cool. You're giving the staff a time limit so that they bear down and focus. Good tactic.

Tiller: What about Tic Tacs? No, I have a frozen pizza in the oven and it only has twelve minutes left on it. And then I'm taking a nap and watching Captain Kangaroo.

Hope: I see.

Tiller: Brock! What do you have for me?

Spack:

Tiller: Same as usual, eh Brock?

Hope: Do you think Curtis could handle a flea flicker?

Tiller: A what?

Hope: [calls Curtis Painter up, tells him to come to coaches room]

Painter: What's up, coach?

Hope: Can you throw a flea flicker?

Painter: hmmmmm.....

......no, coach, I don’t throw fleas. I don’t even think that’s possible. I throw footballs.

Hope: [sighs] A flea flicker is where you hand off to Kory and then he tosses it back to you…

Painter: Oh.

Hope: …and you then look downfield and go through your progression, pick out the receiver, and let fly.

Painter: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow down. What’s a progression?


Tiller: That’s mah boy!

Hope: Curtis, it’s when you look at each receiver in the order of whom you’d like to throw to and decide on the best option.

Painter: Oh, right! I always just settle on the first guy. I’m that freaking good. I just laser it in there no matter what.

Hope: Yes, we know.

Painter: Watch me thrown a dead-accurate pass!

Hope: Hold on, let’s go to the aquatics center – I want to try something.

[at aquatics center]

Hope: Okay, Curtis, your target is there:

Curtis: [lets fly]

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!

[ball sails over pool]

Hope: [sigh]

[back to coaches room]

Hope: Curtis, you need to work on your game.

Tiller: It’ll come around.

Hope: No, coach, it won’t. It’s more than halfway through his senior season – when do we begin to coach him?

Tiller: Do what now? I sure do like fly fishing. Curtis, you need to promise me you'll come visit in Wyoming and go fly fishing with me.

Painter: Of course, Coach. [looking at Hope] Look, I don’t need to be coached. I’m a Heisman candidate AND and a bowl-game MVP!

Hope: Argh. The bloggers you're afraid of are right, Joe. We have to do something about this team’s mindset and the culture we’re letting develop here.

Tiller: zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz