Prep Review : The $2 Football Program Sign of Times : Content Runs Gamut from Poetry, Predictions, Descriptive Ads to Bios

It used to be that football programs cost a quarter and were expendable, like the popcorn carton casually dropped on the floor at the movies.

Back then, nobody was upset if the kid sitting behind you got excited and spilled his Coke on the cover of your program, or if somebody’s little brother tore out the pages at halftime to make paper airplanes. As long as he didn’t rip the rosters, who cared, right?

If you watched how people treated their programs, you could always tell a stadium rat from a fair-weather fan.

The gung-ho types knew their team so well they’d buy the thing and never bother to open it up.

Instead, some of the programs became props. Back-seat coaches would roll it into a megaphone, which amplified their strategic inspirations while tending to alienate the majority of their neighbors in the bleachers.

The reluctant fans--those are the ones who secretly would rather be at home playing Scrabble--would seldom open their programs, either. They chose to use them as econo-seat covers, 25-cents-worth of protection against the possibility of getting splinters or gum on the back of their pants.

Then, if it started to sprinkle, there was always some bald guy using his program as a rain hat.

Once upon a time, programs were cheap and plentiful, a paper item everyone took for granted. A game isn’t the ballet, after all. But the hard realities of a modern economy are changing that.

Programs in the Sunset League and elsewhere cost as much as $2 each.

In some sense of the term, they’ve become a luxury item.

Those sweet ladies with their card tables and booster-club windbreakers bring to mind images of IRS agents, ticket scalpers, meter maids in three-wheelers and all the other villains of the world who hold the power to threaten a citizen’s wallet.

When a program-seller approaches, you may suddenly feel an impulse to check the balance in your savings account or consult a financial expert before committing yourself to any risky, short-term investments.

If you decide to take the plunge--justify it by telling yourself the proceeds must be for a good cause--you’re certainly not going to sit on the thing, roll it up, or, God forbid, allow some brat to pull the precious pages out.

Paying $2 for a program would seem to imply some responsibility to look after your new possession. Geez, how would you feel if somebody splashed soda on your new table-top copy of Ansel Adams?

So let’s see what your hard-earned dollars can buy in the bullish Orange County football program market of 1985.

- Servite’s program exposes the buyer to a real rarity--football poetry. Joyce Kilmer once wrote, “I think that I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree.” But how about a poem as lovely as a Friar Hut Drill?

That sight inspired freshman Coach Larry Toner to compose this freeform verse, arguably the best football poetry contained in any program in the county:

” . . . A sign to the unsuspecting and unwary. A dynamic capturing of the moment, yet streaking into history. Classic black under lights. Frozen motion. Swift strikes into the night. A command . . . action. A command . . . precision. A command . . . execution . . .”

Don’t ask for a critical interpretation. If you want the complete text, you’ll have to buy the program.

- Less highfalutin, but surely as relevant to a physical sport, is the “Chart of the Effects of Spinal Misalignments” contained in a full-page advertisement by a chiropractor in Sonora’s program. The 5-inch artistic rendering in two colors offers a full rundown on how spine problems are actually the cause of everything from hay fever to hemorrhoids. It’s enough to make a fellow quit the team.

- The player biographies alone are worth at least 90 cents of the price of the Orange program.

Open the pages and meet lineman Frank Ambriz, a senior who “plans to attend Cal State Fullerton and become a professional wrestler.” Now you need a degree for that, Frank? Then there’s Steve “Igs” Acuna, a lineman who “enjoys punk music” and is, like so many of us, “undecided about the future.”

Or the Century 21 agent of the 21st century, linebacker Blair Minnis, “nicknamed Rambo,” and hellbent on a career in real estate banking . . . or else.

- The highlight of the El Dorado program is the biographies of the cheerleaders. There’s Karen Svoboda, whose stated plans include “pursuing a business or psychology major” and “grabbing that special guy.”

But even that prospect seems mundane compared to Veronica Ramirez’ plan--to “meet Madonna, who is one of a kind and I love her for being good to me in ways nobody knows.” But the real Material Girl philosophy apparently belongs to Vickie Stewart, who says her dreams include “being part of the Impossible Missions force and owning a BMW 2002.”

- You can depend on Fountain Valley to put together a real over-achievers’ program--62-pages with a staggering 162 individual and group photos.

What other team would select 11 Players of the Week, including an offensive player, offensive back and offensive lineman, plus the “flat back of the week” and the “hit of the week,” the latter soon to appear on Casey Kasem’s Top 40, one would presume. At a rate of 11 per week without repeats, every starter on the team should have been a Player of the Week by the third game.

The publishers of the Baron program deserve some credit for originality. How many other programs would be thorough enough to offer a photo and a write-up on the team dentist? For that matter, how many teams have a dentist?

- The early season is the natural time for optimism, but any bragging is usually tempered by the desire to deny one’s opponents extra fuel. One exception to this rule is the principal’s message in the front piece of the Edison program.

“I wouldn’t want to be the coach who has to defend against a mobile, accurate-throwing quarterback who has quick agile receivers behind a strong, large, aggressive line plus a few running backs of blue chip quality,” writes Principal Jack Kennedy. “This year’s team is a quality team. I predict they (sic) will be Sunset League champions and represent Edison in the CIF playoffs very well. Let’s hope I’m right.”

Now there’s a man who knows his football, as he knows his own mind. He dispenses with all that regular namby-pamby stuff about physical and mental challenges, the spirit of competition, and the value of dedication and personal growth. Hurry up with that title, already, and let’s get onto those playoffs.

- Last but never least, there’s the inimitable program that represents Bob Lester’s inimitable El Modena program.

Here’s a team that doesn’t take itself too seriously. The cartoon on the cover shows a gaggle of ducks in football jerseys bursting out of a six-pack of soda. “Quack Pac--El Mo Football 85,” it says, as Lester fires another round in his longtime quest to change the school mascot from the stuffy Vanguard to the irreverent Duck.

The photo on the back cover is enough to turn members of the opposing teams green with envy. Entitled, “Spring Football ‘85,” it shows 75 minimally-clad players, cheerleaders and coaches relaxing at the beach. All it lacks is a handwritten note--”Wish you were here . . .”

Prep Notes

Katella basketball player Bob Erbst has completed recruiting trips to the University of Washington, Syracuse, Arizona, USC and UCLA. He is expected to sign a national letter of intent during the early signing period beginning Nov. 1. Erbst, a Times All-Orange county selection as a junior, is considered one of the 25 best senior players in the nation. . . . The Empire League will play its first round of basketball games on Dec. 18 in the Anaheim Convention Center. All eight teams will be showcased in four contests. The first game, Cypress versus Loara, will begin at 3:15 p.m. with the other three games, Katella versus Pacifica (5 p.m.), Los Alamitos versus Esperanza (6:45), and Kennedy versus El Dorado (8:15), to follow. Tickets will be available at the schools for $3 for the entire event. . . . After nine years, the Anaheim basketball tournament will cease operation because tournament director Dan Miller had problems finding eight teams to participate. . . . Former CIF Southern Section commissioner Ken Fagans, now retired and living on Balboa Island, will be honored at the National Athletic Directors’ Assn. meeting Dec. 15-18 at the Anaheim Marriott. . . . The fall meeting of the Orange County Athletic Directors’ Assn. is scheduled for Oct. 21 at the Anaheim Stadium Club. The organization will honor former stadium Manager Tom Liegler. . . . Orange High athletic director Dave Zirkle is looking for two teams to complete the field for the Panthers’ 16-team basketball tournament scheduled to begin Dec. 26 at Hutton Sports Center. . . . Capistrano Valley wide receiver Nathan Call recently visited the University of Utah. Call is also being recruited as a point guard by the basketball program at nearby Brigham Young . . . Former Santiago football Coach Fenton Tomlinson is now an assistant to Ted Mullen at Foothill.