The Troll

I couldn't help myself.  After a glass (bottle, whatever) of wine, I was bored with re-reading the Texas over A&M glory articles on the major sports sites so I started reading message boards and comment threads on some Longhorn Football blog sites I visit from time to time.

This, of course, led me (out of some morbid curiosity) to move on to some A&M fan sites. 

Before we get started here, Urban Dictionary defines Trolling as:

Posting a deliberately provocative message to a newsgroup or message board with the intention of causing maximum disruption and argument

In my defense, I was merely an observer of these threads, not a Troll.  Still, I felt dirty and had to work VERY hard to control myself in order to simply remain an observer.  I decided that instead of trolling, I will share some of my favorite posts here on Adventures of a Football Girl: where the posters cannot defend themselves and I get to moderate the comments.  Forever Scoreboard!!

How can you love this face? Wait - I mean: "How
can you NOT love this face?"

Side note: Remember that movie Troll?  Not. Good.  This troll builds a troll garden-thing in the basement of an apartment complex, then posing as a little girl and using a ring of some sort turns the residents into trolls.  As terrible as the movie was, it lurks somewhere in the back of my mind on my list of "irrational property manager fears" along with face-poking tenants and birds flying into transformers.

Side-side note:  When I was a kid I had dozens of those troll dolls.  I loved them.  Looking back, I think I was jealous of those round little butts on some psychic level as a kid, like I somehow knew that as an adult I would lack my own. 

Anyway.  I have to give one thing to the Aggies I stalked through message boards.  They think their team is the best and they are proud of it.  The Texas fansites I visit can be posting minutes after a game and still be dogging our players and coaches, nit-picking all of the mistakes we made and/or could have made.  Often proclaiming that we shouldn't have won or won in spite of ourselves.

Not the best quality in a fan, but still better that pure dellusion.

Here are some of my favorite posts - and the comments I refrained from making.  Also note that any confusing words with random punctuation in them were likely phrased that way by me.  So I wouldn't get flagged by the department of Hom3land Sec#rity or PETA or something:

"tsips think a fluke win makes them relevant to us?  poor irrelevant and unwanted teasips." 

You are a marvel of punctuation!  There may be some that don't want us, but it's clearly not you, since you've devoted a message board thread to us.  Also, what (or who) determines what makes a win a fluke?  Precision between the goal posts?  A fifth 2nd half meltdown?  The top defense in the Big XII?  76-37-5 (67%)?  I feel like those things aren't flukes.

"Winning on Thanksgiving was the ultimate "Look at Me!" for the tsips. Now they are operating under the mistaken notion that we respect them, or want to read their posts, or will stop the relentless ridicule of them, their butter-toothed coach, their worthless NFL players, their butthead AD or their horrific, anti-Am3rican, anti-Christ!an, pro-t3rrorism agenda."

Uh...Those are some pretty strong accusations, Aggie.  Let's pull the focus back to the game...

"Clearly, the rare win has inspired the [sic], who now feel emboldened to seek our attention. Poor ga4, t3rrorism-loving, Plan II rac!sts."

Hmm.  Again, 67% isn't really 'rare', but I understand this Ag is upset.  But the rest?  Come on now.  I'm fairly certain there were more non-white people at my pre-game tailgate than in the entire A&M core.  I find it especially ironic that this ignorant post was for some reason directed at the Texas Honor Student population.  Weird.

"Congrats on having a losing record to A&M during your lifetime."

Huh?  I hate to admit this, but in my lifetime the series is tied at 16-16.  So...you must have been talking to someone else.

"One of these days the Longhorns are going to open a case on the Wildcats and this looks like a good time to do so, with literally dozens watching on the Longhorn Network."

Heh.  Okay, that was funny. 

"literally everyone in the college football world, including Vegas, ESPN, all the way down to your own city's newspaper knows A&M is the better team. If you've watched these teams all year and really believe that Texas is a better team than A&M, you're so delusional it's not worth arguing over."

Oh my gosh...is that you Matt Leinart? I think maybe this guy doesn't literally know the definition of literally.  I'm not sure how you can define either team as "better" since this year they were both mediocre at best.  Better pre-season rank?  A&M.  Better current rank? Texas.  Better record? Texas. Actual game winner? Texas. 

"If the Ags would have had Von this year, theyd have 11 wins right now. That is all they lacked. A defensive leader to prevent his team from 3rd quarter collapses." 

Yeah, I hear ya, Aggie Brother.  If we had VY or Colt back, or Fozzy for that matter, we would probably have 11 wins too.  But we don't.  So we'll settle for 7-4 (as of posting) and a win over you.

"You're an absolute moron, craving validation and trying to point to our dismal BOWL record. Unless the bowl is a big-time bowl, who f'n cares?"

Wait.  What?

"A Longhorn trying to minimize their record against A&M? I wonder why?"

Wait.  What?  I'm pretty sure we don't need to minimize our record, since we have more wins...and what's the deal with Aggies always trying to start the Texas/Texas A&M rivalry in 1974 - when the corp became co-ed?  Is that also the year the football team became un-coed?  Because that's the only reason I'm willing change the date of when the series began.

"...be honest, Texas fans: you are really happy with TCU and West Virginia? Really?"

Um, I'm not, but...YOU LEFT THE CONFERENCE.  We had spots to fill.  What's the beef?

"Misspelling Aggie in a way that still works phonetically is stupid. It's like calling someone "Jon" instead of "John." No difference." 

Okay, now really?  Pot, or kettle?  t.u.? Incorrect casing and reverse letter ordering is different?  C'mon.

"You've been an underdog the last couple games we've played, and your team is in terrible shape. Your program isn't even approaching anything close to "2008" level for quite a while, buddy. Our program is in much better shape than yours is. Point to the gift-wrapped game on T-Day all you want, but we all know the reality. The last thing you need is to play teams that are better than you by an even greater margin than we already are."

Bwah hahaha!  The last thing YOU need is to play teams better than you by an even greater margin than all but three teams in your current conference are.  2008?  Did he forget 2009, when we went to the BCS Championship game and won more games than in 2008? Since the Big XII started in 1996, A&M has had four season with 9+ wins, Texas has had 12.  A&M has had one 10+ win season in that time frame, Texas has had nine. I don't think a coach out the door (well, he would be if you could afford the $7 million dollar payout) after blowing double digit halftime leads in almost half your games puts your program in better shape than ours.   Aside from the head to head, and barring a loss to Baylor Saturday, Texas & A&M have lost to the exact same conference teams.  Does it make you feel better that "underdogs" beat you?  I don't understand that logic. 

Well, that was fun.  I had to 1) stop reading that stuff and 2) stop reading that stuff. 

With all this in mind, I guess I can't fault them.  Universtiy employees have basically condoned the name calling.  Bear in mind, this is the same message board where the A&M Athletics Department CFO, Jeff Toole, has called A&M President Bowen Loftin a "putz" and a "hopelessly underqualified puppet" under an annonymous handle.  Maybe not so annonymous anymore, he was outed by a fellow Aggie who researched Toole's post history until he found one from over a year ago where Toole had stated he was the "CFO of A&M Athletics"  Oh, Toole...honey.  Don't you know nothing is secret on the interwebs?   

(By the way: crazy researching message board guy, I applaud you!  That's Bird Dog-level searching.  We might have been soul mates...if you weren't an Aggie...) 

Still, I couldn't sum it up any better than Toole himself, when on the subject of coach Mike Sherman’s contract he posted, “I have to admit that the stupidity on this board always brings me back to the point that I know I’m not the dumbest (expletive) out there.”  Well Jeff, I'm not so sure.  

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