"And everybody knew it. He'd been fired less than twenty-four hours earlier, so the funeral had the added drama of his departure. Quite ashow, and nobody missed it."
"Wish I'd been here."
"Where were you?"
"Summer of '92? OutWest somewhere.Probably Vancouver."
"The boosters tried to convene a massive meeting on Wednesday in the school gym. Reardon said, 'Not on this campus.' So they went to the VFW and had an Eddie Rake revival. Some of the hotheads threatened to cut off the money, boycott the games, picket Reardon's office, even start a new school, where I guess they would worship Rake."
"Was Rake there?"
"Oh no.He sent Rabbit. He was content to stay at home and work the phones. He truly believed that he could exert enough pressure to get his job back. But Reardon wasn't budging. He went to the assistants and named Snake Thomas as the new head coach. Snake declined. Reardon fired him. Donnie Malone said no. Reardon fired him. Quick Upchurch said no. Reardon fired him."
"I like this guy more and more."
"Finally, the Griffin brothers said they would fill in until someone was found. They played for Rake in the late seventies—"
"I remember them.The pecan orchard."
"That's them. Great players, nice guys, and because Rake never changed anything they knew the system, the plays, most of the kids. Friday night rolled around, first game of the season. We were playing Porterville, and the boycott was on. Problem was, nobody wanted to miss the game. Rake's folks, who were probably in the majority, couldn't stay away because they wanted the team to get slaughtered. The real fans were there for the right reasons. The place was packed, as always, with complicated loyalties yelling in all directions. The players were pumped. They dedicated the game to Scotty, and won by four touchdowns.A wonderful night. Sad, because of Scotty, and sad because the Rake era was apparently over, but winning is everything."
"This bench is hard," Neely said, standing. "Let's walk."
"Meanwhile, Rake hired a lawyer. A suit was filed, things got ugly, Reardon held hisground, and the town, though deeply divided, still managed to come together every Friday night. The team played with more guts than I've ever seen. Years later, one kid I know said it was such a relief playing football for the sheer fun of it, and not playing out of fear."
"How beautiful is that?"
"We never knew."
"No, we didn't."