I won a radio contest for free season tickets and a press pass for the Raiders. It was cool as hell. The only whack part was having to pay taxes on the value of the tickets as income, but I got to do a lot of cool stuff.

I got to meet Ice cube, most of Green Day, and a number of then current/ former players. I’ve always wondered if I was somehow related to Tebow mania being a thing. I was sitting in the press box next to someone who said he worked with the Broncos. We started discussing Tebow, and how bad he was. I told him something along the lines of “Tebow can’t throw to save his life. Idk why they don’t try to run the option with him. It worked in college, and it can’t get any worse than what we’re seeing.” The 1st half , the raiders were up big. The 2nd half Denver runs almost exclusively option plays, and came back to win. They continued to do so the rest of the season and turned their season around/ got into the playoffs. It could have been a complete coincidence, but I always wondered if that guy had any say, or talked to someone who did about it.

I got to network my way into an internship with the team the next year. I tried to make a career of it. That didn’t work out, but it was a helluva life experience. Wouldn’t have traded it for the world.