My Email to 960TheRef

For those of you who don't know, AM 960 is a local sports radio station in Athens, Georgia. They are affiliated with ESPN Radio, so they broadcast the Colin Cowherd show, as well as Dan Patrick, and the regular ESPN Radio night feed. More specifically, they broadcast UGA sports such as football, baseball, basketball, and occasionally something else, like soccer.

They do two shows on 960. There is "The Morning Show" which runs from 6-10AM. It's VERY good. I used to listen to it every morning on my way to work or school, and pretty much whenever I was in the car during those hours. The two hosts are funny guys and always seem to talk about something of interest to me.

There is also "The Home Team" which airs from 4-6PM. Although they do talk about a lot of Georgia stuff, and Jeff Dantzler is one of the only people out there whose knowledge of Georgia football I consider superior to mine, their show isn't quite as good as The Morning Show.

I've won a number of things from 960 TheRef over the years, everything from combo meals at Krystal, to college football trivia book, to tickets to Monday Night Football in Atlanta. Well, that's actually about all that I've won, but whatever.

I wrote the guys at The Morning Show this email on Sunday night. Since I live in Seattle, and 960's broadcast range is about 40 miles, I can't really pick them up, so I don't know if they ever read it on the air or not. But I thought it was funny.

Here it is:

"Hey fellas.

So when you graduate from high school, pretty much everyone gives you cash. I made out pretty well upon high school graduation. Five years later when I graduated from UGA, I felt like a lot of people didn't really know what to give me. I already had a job lined up, and judging by the lack of monetary gifts that I received, I think it is safe to say that people felt somewhat uncomfortable in again piling cash (in the form of checks) at my feet. So I got some interesting gifts.

One of those gifts came from my aunt. She gave me a "960TheRef" t-shirt. It's pretty sharp.
So fast forward a few months, and I find myself living here in Seattle Washington and working at that aforementioned job.

In an attempt to subject one (or more) "lucky" females to my advances, I joined a co-ed softball league. It's pretty informal. And by "informal" I mean "beer league"....our second baseman was chugging cans of PBRs that SHE carried in her gym bag before the first game.

Our team isn't very good. We lose by scores that would be considered ass kickings in football. I'd like to say that I do my job, but I guess that isn't entirely accurate. I did pretty well for the first game, going 2-2 with 2 RBIs.

Then the second game rolled around. Unable to continue to torrent hit streak, I saw my average plummet .400 points in one afternoon following a 1-3 day. My last at-bat, I grounded out to the pitcher, and very frankly, lost control of myself in a fit of rage. Deadly ill over the prospect of falling to 0-2 while my teammates literally drank in the dugout, I slammed my bat down so hard that Joey Side must have smiled somewhere, and launched into a profanity laced tirade so foul that a small boy vomited.

Several days later, after calming down, I came to a conclusion over luke warm bourbon and South Park reruns. I needed a spark on this softball field. And since our team is too disorganized to have uniforms (or practices), the solution was simple. Rather than practice, I'd break out a new shirt for game 3.

With a renewed since of vigor (and bad headache from the night before) I dressed myself for game 3 with one noteable change. I would still sport the gray baseball pants, pulled halfway up my shins (a la Rip Warren) with black socks (since I'm not buying another pair of baseball pants or tall black socks, one of each is plenty), only this time, I'd don the 960TheRef shirt that my aunt had presented me with way back in May 06.

I think the main thing that it gave me was an additional sense of pride. I felt that, by wearing this shirt, I would play to a higher level, or at least not lower my average by .400 points again.
So I'm staring at myself in the mirror before I leave my apartment, as I'm wont to do, and I can't get over how good I look in my 960TheRef shirt. I mean, I look good in everything, but even against myself, I looked pretty sharp on this day.

Sometimes I like to change things up and speak in street lingo, and I found the morning of game 3 to be one such time. I looked at myself and said "aight, you'd better step it up homeboy. 'Cause you're not only repping The G, but you're repping their Speak too." I didn't really know a good street term for "radio station" but I thought that "speak" was a pretty good guess.
As for game 3, well, we still lost, which was about as predictable as rain up here. But I played great. I went 3-4 with a couple RBIs. The highlight though was a triple that I laced into left center field, which I managed to leg into a double. From now on, 960TheRef will be worn proudly at the diamond, and hopefully kept clean, although I can't promise that I won't fall down when I attempt to run to first base.

So even though we lost, it was an all around great day, expect for our second basewomen who got so drunk that she told everyone that she and her husband live in downtown "Cialis" before passing out on the dugout bench in the third inning.

I love softball."