Get Ready For An Electrifying Super Bowl!

           This weekend the Super Bowl will be held at the Embassy Suites in Columbus, Ohio.  What’s that you say?  You thought Super Bowl XLV was going to be held at the “Jerry Dome” in Arlington, Texas on February 6?  Well, I’m not talking about that Super Bowl.  I’m talking about a much more exciting Super Bowl…an electrifying one, if you will.

            This weekend the 15th Annual Miggle Electric Football Tournament and Convention will be held at the Rose Bowl of electric football, the Embassy Suites in Columbus, Ohio.  The convention/tournament will be attended by hundreds of kids (grown up kids, but still kids) from all across the country who love the greatest toy ever invented, electric football. 

            Electric football was invented some sixty-two years ago by Norman Tudor, the Vince Lombardi of electric football.  Tudor’s toy company, Tudor Metal Products, put electric football games in toy stores across America in December of 1949.  On Christmas morning, 1949, football-loving children across America played a wonderful new game that Santa Claus had placed by their Christmas tree. 

            I wasn’t around in 1949, but I was alive and well and 11 years old on Christmas day 1963.  That was the day that I discovered electric football. 

            Actually, I discovered it a few weeks earlier when the “Wish Book” (The Sears & Roebuck catalog) arrived at our house.  Everything a greedy 11 year old boy could possibly dream of having in 1963 was found in the Sears & Roebuck catalog.  There were no videogames back then, no CDs, no games to be played on your i-phone or personal computer.  But there were train sets, footballs, and Schwinn bicycles.

             There were bb guns and toy guns and holster sets that looked just like the holsters the Cartwright boys wore on Bonanza.

            There were skateboards and pogo sticks and even a few hula hoops left over from the Eisenhower years. 

            But the gift I wanted most of all in December of 1963 was proudly displayed in living color on one full page of that year’s Sears & Roebuck catalog.  It was an official NFL Tudor Electric Football Game Set. 

            I don’t know what made the Sears & Roebuck NFL Tudor Electric Football Game Set “official.” I guess Vince Lombardi and Norman Tudor certified it as such.  But it sure looked official.  More than that, it looked absolutely beautiful.  The game set contained not only an awesomely-realistic metal football field, but two complete teams consisting of 22 little bitty plastic football players, each bearing a remarkable resemblance to Dick Butkus. 

            There were little plastic goal posts at each end zone.  The goal posts were attached to the goal line because that is where the official NFL goal posts were located in those days. 

            There was also a tiny football made of felt that could be placed in a tiny running back’s plastic hands. 

            And there was good news for my Dad.  According to the ad in the catalog, the Sears & Roebuck official NFL Tudor Electric Football set required no batteries and came “completely assembled.”  That’s right.  My father did not have to worry about those three terrifying words: “Some Assembly Required.”   

            All an 11 year old boy had to do with the Sears & Roebuck official NFL Tudor Electric Football Game was to line up the official plastic players on the little official field, put the official plug in a household electrical outlet, and then push an official little red switch in the official “on” position.  When this happened, the official little metal football field would vibrate like an earthquake and make a loud noise that was guaranteed to wake up your parents at 5:00 on Christmas morning.  The little plastic football players would then shake, rattle & roll in all directions on the metal playing field.  Sometimes your running back would turn around and run the wrong way, just like Roy “Wrong Way” Riegels did in the 1929 Rose Bowl or Jim Marshal did for the Minnesota Vikings in a 1964 game against the San Francisco 49’ers.  

            The end result was more like a demolition derby than a football game, but in the pre-videogame era, it was all very exciting.  

            There was no passing in electric football.  My friends and I tried to figure out a way to get the little plastic quarterbacks to toss the tiny felt football to a little plastic receiver.  But while the little plastic quarterbacks fumbled a lot, they couldn’t even do an underhanded Utah shovel pass.   

            And so, in playing electric football, my buddies and I ran the single wing, and whenever a player shook down the field in the right direction and scored a touchdown, we always went for a two point conversion.  Not only could the plastic players not pass, they couldn’t kick. 

            I loved my official NFL Tudor electric football game set.  It was my most prized possession, and for many years I was the head coach of the Memphis Chargers, an unofficial franchise of the National Electric Football League. 

            But somewhere between 6th grade and college, my official NFL Tudor Electric Football Game Set disappeared.  My mom probably sold it in a yard sale. 

            But a few weeks ago, a miracle occurred on Christmas morning.  It was the greatest miracle since Santa Claus won his lunacy trial in Miracle on 34th Street.  Believe it or not, I got a new electric football game set for Christmas.  No, not the Tudor model.  In so far as I know, Tudor Metal Products has gone out of business.  Santa brought me Miggle Rose Bowl Electric Football.  And it’s just like the original model I got in 1963!  It has a beautiful metal football field with the words “Rose Bowl” etched in the end zones.  It has 22 little bitty plastic football players, 11 wearing the uniforms of the Michigan Wolverines, and the other 11 in the uniforms of the Southern Cal Trojans.  Fortunately, there is no little bitty plastic Lane Kiffin standing on the sidelines.  If there were, I would throw him away. 

            I will not be in the Embassy Suites in Columbus, Ohio this weekend for the Super Bowl of electric football.  Having only recently re-discovered electric football after a 40 year sabbatical, my game is a little rusty. 

            But while I watch the NFL playoff games this Sunday, I intend to have my Rose Bowl Electric Football Field sitting on my coffee table right in front of my TV.  And while the Bears take on the Packers and the Steelers battle the Jets, I’ll be putting my own Memphis Chargers through some serious drills, including a scrimmage with the Southern Cal Electric Kiffins.

             But come next January, the Memphis Chargers will be on the metal field at the Embassy Suites in Columbus, Ohio, plugging away.  As head coach, I will be prowling the sidelines as my high voltage offense shocks the opposition by winning the World Championship of Electric Football.  And I’ll be just as happy as I was on Christmas morning, 1963.