Sunday, November 29, 2009

Max Hall's Example of "Class"

Below you will find a bitter, generalizing, Max Hall who just WON (well, his team won) the big rivalry game this year. It was an awesome game (as it is every year), and one we've learned over the years is never over until it's over. The rivalry is intense accompanied by varying levels of fans who either bitterly hate each other, who participate just for fun, and those who don't really care because they're from out of state and don't understand why we all just can't get along.

As to the ones who bitterly hate each other - it's ridiculous. Really, there's so much hate and resentment that it ruins the intensity and fun of the game, the harmless banter between alumni, and the spirit of sportsmanship. As to Utah and BYU respectively: they each carry with them that group of asinine jerk fans who make the entire school look like a bunch of either 1. Drunken idiots or 2. Self-righteous cry babies. In case you aren't sure which is which - Utah sports some drunken moron representation while BYU totes some seriously self-righteous tools. But as any reasonable person knows - not ALL Utes are beer guzzling morons and not ALL BYU fans are "holier than thou" Provo drones. Smart people know that. Max Hall does not fall into that category...

Max Hall is now the poster child exemplifying one of those BYU alum who take the name "BYU" and paint a naive, close-minded, and yes, self-righteous stereotype (though no one did that better than that git Austin Collie) that only propagates the stupid antics exhibited by what he claims a Ute fan did to his family. Of COURSE that's wrong and of COURSE those Ute fans should be ashamed and probably kicked around a little... but it was a handful of morons you're taking as the representation of an ENTIRE institution. An instituion, I might mention, who carries with it some very prestigious programs, world-renowned scientists (cough.. Nobel Prize Winners) cough, and a great football program headed by non-other than a former BYU player. Hey Kyle! Max HATES YOU!!!!

(Listen, I'm going on a tangent. What BYU fans don't get about Ute fans is they WILL punch you in the face and speak all manner of deragtory comments against your mother if you provoke them. What BYU fans don't get is that UTE fans can be VERY mean, REAL WORLD MEAN, and it would be in their BEST interest not to provoke them with their stupid comments... because when they're punched in the face and cry about it on TV, they just look like retards. I'm not saying this is acceptable; but come ON! You wouldn't poke an angry rattle snake with a stick, would you? No. You wouldn't. THINK a little bit and just avoid the situation geniuses).

Anyway... flash forward, IF what Hall said happened to his fam and it was an idiot Ute fan, fault the idiocy of the fan, Hall, and not an entire program, university, every single player, and group of people who for the majority just come out to watch a great game and have fun. As a Ute fan, I found his comments childish and bitter. Yes Hall, last year's "honk if you intercepted Max Hall" hit your where it hurt - in your big puffed up proud head. So get over it. Learn from it. Come back next year and do better (because hello, you WON you fool!). Have some CLASS.

Frankly, BYU fans and alum like Max Hall don't do much for the "class" of BYU and what it CLAIMS to represent. He did the University a disservice with his bitterness. And now he'll get to hear about it for the rest of his footballess life. Just keep on poking that angry snake with your stick Hall, and see what happens. Honk if you "hate" Max Hall!

See article below
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Monson: Mad Max's thunder a blunder
By Gordon Monson

Salt Lake Tribune Columnist

Max Hall was ticked off.

No, he was pissed off.

Royally (blue) pissed off.

If that language offends you, just wait a paragraph or two, you haven't read anything yet, especially if you favor in any way the University of Utah. Hall had a postgame message for all of you: He "hates" you. He thinks you, your football program, your school is "classless."

The senior BYU quarterback made no bones about that, and no apologies for it.

After throwing the game-winning touchdown pass in overtime to beat Utah by the count of 26-23 on Saturday night at LaVell Edwards Stadium, Hall fired off anger and frustration and hatefulness that had been building inside him for a year.

When asked after the win whether he felt any kind of personal redemption, particularly following last season's loss at Rice-Eccles Stadium in which he committed six turnovers, Hall spiraled a string of Ute loathing that was not only steely-eyed and straight-faced, it was delivered with unmistakable intent.

He wanted everybody to know exactly what he had been hiding inside for 12 months. Hall's been around long enough, and is media-savvy enough, to know full well what the reaction would be. He said it anyway.

The eruption after the question went like this ...

"A little bit, yeah. I don't like Utah. In fact, I hate them. I hate everything about them. I hate their program, I hate their fans, I hate everything.

"So it felt really good to send those guys home. They didn't deserve it. It was our turn, and our turn to win. We deserved it. We played as hard as we could tonight. And it felt really good, again, to send them home, to get them out of here, and so it is a game I will always remember."


Then, Hall was asked: Any particular reason you hate Utah?

"You really want me to go into it?"

Sure.

"I think the whole university, their fans, and their organization is classless. They threw beer on my family and stuff last year, and they did a whole bunch of nasty things, and I don't respect them, and they deserve to lose."

That's what the quarterback said.

Think what you want of it. Castigate him, if you will.

I won't.

I will say he's wrong. His emotion is over-the-top and misplaced. There's too much collateral damage in the bombs he let fly. Too much irresponsibility. After all, some BYU fans behave horribly, as well. And he knows that.

He should also know Utah is a terrific university, with a terrific football program, with terrific people involved with it. Most the fans are terrific, too. Some of them, indeed, are as ridiculous as they are narrow-minded and, in a some cases, small-minded.

Anybody who would toss beer on a player's family, especially after that player pretty much lost the game for his team, is a dope, an idiot, a stooge.

There's no excusing that behavior.

Hall's rant, however, ran beyond just that.

For a year, he had been a laughingstock, the brunt of jokes passed along among Utes, spoken derisively on radio shows, posted on the Internet, written across T-shirts, chucked directly into a proud man's face.

He had been hurt by it, and that was clearly evident on Saturday, just a few minutes after one of the highest moments in his long career at BYU.

One second, he was dog-piling with his teammates in the north end zone at LES, being mobbed by Cougar fans, overcome with unadulterated happiness. "It felt so good," he said.

And the next, he was spraying hate toward the school, its players and fans, he had just so gloriously defeated -- with all the specificity of a sawed-off shotgun.

I hate everything about them? The whole university is classless?

Come on, Max.

It's like hating on a community of 500,000 people because a couple hundred of them were asses toward you and yours.

Hall even took shots at his own fans, the ones who had criticized him in the wake of earlier failings, saving special mention for those who hide behind anonymous Internet names and rip away in the safety of their facelessness.

"People can say whatever they want," he said. "... It felt good to win for the true fans."

Everyone else can stick it.

Max Hall, sadly, hates your guts

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So what do think of Hall now?


As for me... I don't think much of him at all. Him nor his "game." Goodbye Max Hall and goooooood riddance.

SLC Trib: http://www.sltrib.com/ci_13887821

11 comments:

alpinekleins said...

yeah, it's a sad story - Hall will probably wake up today and wonder what the heck he was thinking (or not thinking) at the time. We all make mistakes - but unfortunately that was a biggie.

Kristin

Nasher said...

Good blog post. Wish I had been in Utah to see the news reports about it.

Mike & Emily West said...

so...of course I am stoked BYU won BUT I couldn't agree with you more. Hall was simply an arrogant idiot! As a flaming BYU fan, I was completely embarrassed and angry by his comments...he left a bitter taste to something that should have remained sugar sweet. What a poor example of what BYU is supposed to stand for!

Anonymous said...

Wow, I'd like to see you walk in Max Halls shoes for one day. Then maybe you might understand him a little more. He apologized, so move on and point your judgemental finger at yourself.

Andrea Jolene said...

Judgemental finger. HAHAHHAHAHAAAA!!! "I hate ALL Utah fans and their program and their players." I think it's pretty safe to say "idiotic comment" to that. And if I Ute had said "I hate BYU! I hate their program! I hate their fans!" I would say the same thing "idiotic comment." But like most Y fans, anonymous, you won't step up to your comment nor recognize idiocy when it's staring you in the face JUST because it's wearing blue. Oh and his apology "I didn't mean for it to come out that way..." BWahahahahaha! How did you mean for it to come out silly?

Andrea Jolene said...

Observe: "Yeah, there's plenty of hate to go around.

Maybe, just maybe, everyone can learn from this whole thing. Maybe everyone can learn that there really is too much animosity and antipathy, too much bitterness and nastiness, too much malice and rancor in this rivalry.

Too much hatred. Too much hatred mixed with religion.

There's guilt on both sides in this state, the red and the blue.

Nobody has to join hands and sing Kumbaya, but real hating, even in limited doses, on the other guys is ridiculous. Perhaps everybody can pull back and get this thing under control.

It's more likely, sadly, that it will go the other way, and Hall's words about hate will generate more hate. When I sat directly in front of him and heard them come out of his mouth, it reminded me of the quote spoken by that great philosopher Yoda.

"Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering."

When it comes to this sometimes-glorious, sometimes-pathetic rivalry, haven't both Cougars and Utes and everyone around them suffered enough?"

http://www.sltrib.com/sports/ci_13890201

Amen and amen.

Gina said...

Yoda is not a philosopher. He isn't real. Just like Santa Claus isn't real. Sorry if I burst your bubble, I hoped that most adults realized movies were fake by now...haha.

Andrea Jolene said...

Wait wait wait... dude... Yoda isn't real? You've destroyed my world. ;)

Anonymous said...

I like the whole "Ute's will punch you in the face" comment. If you're so tough give out your address and I'll come over as a byu fan. sound fun?

Andrea Jolene said...

I do hear that's the BYU way anonymous - going after the women. ARe you that guy in the photos going after Kyle's wife and screaming daughter? Good ol' BYU pride... in every sense of the word pride.

Lauren said...

Amen and Amen. Good Riddance to Hall. I have despised that guy for the past 4 years. He is nothing to write home about and is a terrible quarterback.