While most of Cleveland is heaping opprobrium on the head of “Johnny Football” Manziel, I’m positive that he’s going to get the last laugh. He’s been putting one over on us the whole time.
Allow me to elucidate by way of digression.
The first time I got busted was in back in 1958 for shooting pool underage. In Ohio one had to be 16 to go into a poolroom, and, alas, I was only 15. The incident foretold of many more busts to come. The poolroom was run by a dude named Ross, but was actually owned by my father, who also owned the beer and wine joint next door, and the building to boot. He had fronted Ross the money to open the “Billiards Emporium.”
Every day after school I dropped my schoolbooks (both of them) on one of the back pool tables and honed my skills. This was how I earned my lunch money, taking the other kids’ lunch money off the green felt. I was damn good.
Then, in my late 20s the poolroom was closed and I ventured out into the wider world. Shooting pool, you see, is poor man’s golf: Concentration on only one thing — putting the ball into the hole. And like I said, I was damn good at it — or so I thought.
Wells Pool Room sat across from Lancer’s on Carnegie Avenue at 77th Street. I thought it would be easy pickings. But I’d been used to playing 8-ball, and then 9-ball for real money, and at Wells they were playing one-pocket, the real pool hustler’s game.
Money was placed on the light fixture that hung above the table (gambling on pool in Ohio is against the law) and I made the foolish mistake of challenging Carl B. Stokes to a game of one-pocket. He beat me like I was a runaway slave, like I was a stepchild (and a redheaded one at that.) He cleaned my clock. Carl was one of the best pool shooters in not only the city — but the entire country. I was way, way out of my league.
Which brings me back to Manziel. He too was out of his league in the NFL, and he probably knew it the first time he stepped on the field with the pros. But he was (and is), if nothing else, clever.
Rather than go out like a failed quarterback, he made up his mind long ago to go out in a manner that assured his future celebrity — and income. He’s now going to be famous for being — what else but famous? We’ll be following his antics long after he’s finally cut by the Browns, and no other team picks him up.
He’ll always be able to tell himself that if it wasn’t for his love of Dom Perignon, fast women and faster cars, he would have been a standout All-Star. Now he’ll join the ranks of other no-talents who dominate American culture in this “Age of Illusion” where the only thing that matters is not being anonymous. Johnny Football has spoofed us all.
From Cool Cleveland correspondent Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com. Frazier’s From Behind The Wall: Commentary on Crime, Punishment, Race and the Underclass by a Prison Inmate is available again in hardback. Snag your copy and have it signed by the author by visiting http://NeighborhoodSolutionsInc.com.
One Response to “MANSFIELD: Johnny Manziel and the Age of Illusion”
Cicero
Interesting theory. If it’s true, he left an awful lot of money on the table. Can he make it back outside of the NFL?