Bonus Ten Things: Today’s Parade and Season Post Script

[gblowfish]

Bonus Ten Things: Today’s Parade and Season Post Script

10. I was too young to go to the parade in 1970, but my dad was there. I’ve been to both of the Royals World Series parades in 1985 and again in 2015, and now this glorious parade in 2020. There’s going to be lots of pictures and such all over social media, so I just wanted to share what my day was like in pictures for those of you who couldn’t make it to Downtown KC for today’s festivities. I was up at 4:45 AM, Do the three essential “S”es (Sh*t Shower Shave) -sorry TMI- Then a thermos of hot coffee, small flask of Crown, hand and toe warmers, same radio I use at Arrowhead to listen to local coverage of the parade, and the same winter gear I wear at Arrowhead. 28 degrees, snow flurries expected. Left the house at 6AM sharp to the Englewood Cafe to meet up with my oldest dearest friend Gary (best man at my wedding) and one of my other best friends Page and his son Keric, who just graduated from Mizzou about a year ago. We had our Breakfast Bs & Gs -essential on a day like this- then loaded up in the Blowfish Mobile and headed out. Gary and I learned a lot from the World Series Parade in 2015. This was our plan of attack: Since it was so cold, we wanted to be at the head of the parade rather than at Union Station. Why? Because we’d get to see the parade first. It’s easier to park on the north side of downtown and get out after. Also, we could high tail out once the parade passed us, and get to a warm place to eat pizza and drink beer in Independence before the parade even reached Union Station. We took camp chairs, parked next to the big Federal Courthouse that looks like a giant air conditioning compressor, and found spots one row from the front rail just south of 7th and Grand. Perfect spot. News trucks were set up right across from us. Whole bunch of porta potties a half block down. Got situated around 7:15. Shazam! We were landed and in the parade bidness!

9. Just like in 2015 for the Royals, the crowd was well behaved and everyone was in a great mood. Around 8am or so we saw the Silver POS Ford go right by us with four or five cop cars in pursuit. This was at 7th and Grand, and his tires were already flat from stop sticks. Whatta moron. Of course, the car had Kansas plates…no surprise there. Loved the comments on the CP that it must have been Dee Ford crashing the party. By 11AM the sidewalk was filled probably five or six deep. People were on top of buildings and in the trees and everywhere imaginable. At 11:30 on the dot the first truck turned the corner and came up Grand. Right on time!

8. First came pickup trucks with all the government yahoos: Mayor Q, The Gov, Frank White. Then came a big military flatbed truck with cheerleaders, Warpaint clopping down the street, then KC Wolf. After that, we started getting the double decker buses. But the buses didn’t say who was on what bus. All the Chiefs execs and family members and coaches and the players were in civvies, and it was hard to tell who was who. I saw Spags for sure -he was holding the Lombardi when he passed us. After a few buses, the defensive players were all walking the route. I saw Frank Clark and Chris Jones, and Honey Badger, and saw Damien Williams walking too. Too far back to high five them, but close enough to recognize some of them. Plus a bunch of guys were wearing stocking caps and ski goggles, so it was hard to tell exactly who was who.

7. The actual parade itself probably lasted a half hour. Once they passed 8th and Grand, everybody just pulled up stake and boogied. Some people tried to follow South, but the sidewalks were so congested, that was very hard to do. We just went back to our car and got the Hell out. We had an easy time, our plan worked well. Ended up at Fun House Pizza in Independence. The ceremony at the station hadn’t started yet, the parade was just coming up on the bridge over the tracks by the station. So we got our pitchers of beers and pizza and enjoyed the rest of the ceremony in the nice warm pizza parlor, drinking copious amounts of beer. I DVRed the parade, got home, kind of napped out for a couple hours with it on the bedroom TV, then got my second wind and downloaded the pics off my phone and went through them. I’ll post a bunch of them in this thread.

6. Some general observations about the day: Except for the party crasher in silver Ford -I understand the KCMO police finally got him down by Union Station- the only other stupid thing I heard about was some bare assed guy falling out of a tree. KCMO police said only five total arrests for the entire day. Wow! That’s amazing for a crowd of hundreds of thousands of people. Since people had to get out there in the morning and stand around in the cold, not nearly as much public drunkenness as you’d have, say at a MNF game at Arrowhead. Actually most of the public drunkenness I saw was from the Chiefs players themselves, and I’m totally OK with that. They absolutely earned it. Saw the video of PMII catching a beer from the crowd and shotgunning it, and pouring one from the bus into Kelce's mouth. Heh…Young Patrick is the 2020 version of Bobby Layne! I also saw a lot of the players smoking cigars, which kind of surprised me. I guess these guys like to smoke them and other things, and again, I’m totally OK with that. OTAs aren’t for another four months or so. There were a lot of little kids in the crowd. I saw on some social media where some people were complaining about the players behavior “in front of the children.” Hey helicopter mom and dad, get this: they’re 20 and 30 year old guys who just conquered the football world. They’re gonna drink and smoke and cuss. This day is NOT about your kids. If you don’t like that kind of stuff, stay in your safe little cul-de-sac and do your homeschooling. This party is for the grown ups. The middling to older kids already know all the dirty words anyway. And they probably learned them from YOU.

5. Mitch as MC was a little over the top. But I remember seeing footage of Bill Grigby in 1970, who was MC for that parade. He was way over the top too. BTW: the 1970 parade was up by the Liberty Memorial itself, on the south side of the monument. That’s where the 1985 Royals parade ceremonies were too. They moved the stage to Union Station starting with the 2015 Royals. For those of you outside KC who have never been here, Union Station was refurbished with a Bi-State Tax to save the building. Getting a Bi-State tax to pass in the KC Metro is a very difficult thing to do. So now it’s the touchstone place for anything important that happens in the city. It’s a beautiful building inside and out. You should see it, and the WWI Museum if you ever get to visit.

4. I thought Clark’s speech was very touching. We’re so lucky to have the Hunt family as owners, although they don’t live here. But this is their adopted football home, and they’re not going anywhere. It was also nice to hear Clark talk about the Super Bowl IV players who missed the parade in 1970. Those who missed it and are still alive were invited to ride in this one, which was a thoughtful classy move. I wish Len Dawson and Otis Taylor could have been here today, both are too ill to attend. Same for Marty, although somebody posted a pic of him with his Son Brian wearing a KC SB Champs hat. Saw Dwayne Bowe made it back for the parade. And I thought a lot about how much DT would have loved this day too.

3. The Chiefs announced that Hardman won the Mack Lee Hill Rookie of the Year award, and Honey Badger was team MVP. Great choices. Hardman was an NFL Pro Bowl pick, and without his return against the Tits this day doesn’t happen. Matthieu was what Eric Berry could have been had he not lost his desire to play and lost a couple steps from illness. Both very deserving. Veach should be NFL exec of the year too.

2. Kelce’s speech reminded me a lot of Johnny Gomes’ speech for the 2015 Royals. I got to meet Kelce at the Twisted Chief BBQ soiree, and he’s just a big goofy genuine guy with a huge heart. I hope he spends his whole career here and never goes Tony Gonzo on us. Very nice of him to mention Damien Williams in his speech. I think Williams is being overlooked for his SB performance, and a great case could be made that he should have been the MVP of that game. They all seem to be OK with PMII being chosen. Patrick is going to have a crushing hangover tomorrow, and that’s OK. The whole team was a barrel of monkeys, and why not? They’ll remember this day forever.

1. It’s nice to say lets meet back here again next year, and it certainly could happen. Next will come the speculation over NFL business: Who gets paid, who gets re-negotiated, who gets tagged, who gets cut. There will be changes for sure. Then the combine and draft speculation, free agent signing, etc etc etc. And we’ll all have to shell out some big bucks for next years tickets. But this is what it’s all about, and I’m so happy for this city. A great day fifty years in the making. Today is as good as it gets, and I’m glad I was there to see it!