By R.E. Porter
Associated Web Press
NASHVEGAS—At the NFFA draft extravaganza held Sunday evening in the main ballroom at Opryland Hotel, 12th Avenue Bakers fans booed the team's first pick (Roddy White) and they booed every pick thereafter, as the founding franchise noted for the most bizarre drafts in the league's decade-long history added to its twisted legacy.
When deputy commissioner Meemaw Murrman announced wide receiver Roddy White as the first overall pick in the draft, Bakers supporters first moaned, then booed. When the team took a tight end (Antonio Gates) and a backup quarterback (Robert Griffin III) with their second and third picks, the boos grew louder and longer. The Bakers waited until the fourth round to draft their first running back and when Murrman announced their pick as DeAngelo Williams, the team's faithful were beside themselves. Fans began throwing chairs and were escorted by league security out of the hotel to the parking lot, where fistfights broke out among the Bakers supporters.
"This is bullshit," Bakers super fan Bill Cheatham said, nursing a black eye. "I wish they had moved the team to La La Land. Stumpy Legg and Dead Lombardi would have never had a draft this bad, and Dead Lombardi was dead."
By the time 12th Avenue made their pick in the eleventh round, they still had drafted only one starting running back, the aforementioned DeAngelo Williams. It was hard to imagine how the Bakers draft could go any further south, but it did with the very next pick when the team's hated rival, the Cambridge Animals, selected longtime Bakers placekicker Rob Bironas. The Bironas pick was engineered by new Cambridge GM Wilder the Animal, son of team owner Dave the Animal. With that one bodacious pick, Wilder brought about the ruination of the Bakers season. According to a Cambridge official who wished to remain anonymous, Wilder hoped to force the Bakers to trade quarterback Tom Brady to the Animals. The Bakers drafting of Brady a season ago resulted in DTA casting a horrendous, season-long curse on the 12th Avenue franchise.
But Wilder's slick pick aside, what was the cause of the Bakers dysfunctional draft? The answer to that question was provided by team media maven Faith Popcorn by phone yesterday evening. "It was the Green Caviar," Popcorn said. She then explained that Green Caviar "is a highly potent strain of marijuana brought back from Jamaica by [head coach] Snoop Lion." Continuing Popcorn explained, "QCurl [Sharif] was so out of it, he kept insisting the team draft 'Air McNair.' When he was informed McNair was killed a number of years ago, he sobbed uncontrollably for three-quarters of an hour. Then when the Animals drafted Bironas, QCS was so despondent he had to be sedated."
According to Popcorn, from the twelfth round forward, Snoop Lion, who was almost as ripped on Green Caviar as Sharif, was in charge of the team's draft picks and proceeded to pick up a backup kicker (John Kasay). "Snoop was so high, I thought it was Soul Plane II," Popcorn added."The only good news is that when fans come up and ask what they were smoking, I have an answer."
Neither Sharif nor Snoop Lion were available for comment.
