Furlong’s Falcons heartbreak shows how cruel sport can be
It’s a massive relief for the rest of us that the season finally kicks off tomorrow night. The Super Bowl champions, the Seattle Seahawks, will host the Green Bay Packers ahead of the rest of the teams taking to fields across the US on Sunday. But for the guys discarded into reserve squads or — worse — Canada, it’s a torturous week, left out in the cold as the frenzy builds and builds.
It was timely then that GAA scribe Pat Nolan had an edited extract of his new book about the Furlong brothers in one of the Sunday papers over the weekend.
The Furlong family dominated Offaly GAA but one of the brothers, Tom Furlong, almost managed to transfer his Gaelic football talents onto the gridiron after emigrating to New York in the early 1960s.
Furlong was tantalisingly close to a professional kicking career in American Football just as the merger of the NFL and the AFL was beginning to take shape, and just as the unparalleled Super Bowl era was about to dawn.
I’ll leave you to enjoy Nolan’s book The Furlongs but it’s safe to say that even though the stakes were nowhere near as big back then as they are now, how Tom Furlong’s dream died at the Atlanta Falcons is a shocking reminder of how cruel sport can be. Players are a lot better managed these days, of course.
Player unions have ensured that there is somewhat of a safety net should poor luck take you down, as it did Furlong.
These days too, thanks to the entertainment demands of big-time sport, fans enjoy a bit of an insight into what goes on behind the scenes with the HBO series Hard Knocks.
Coincidentally, the Atlanta Falcons have been the subject of our voyeuristic gaze this past month.
Each Tuesday, even a reality TV show denier like me will rise and fall with the outgoing rookie defensive end who will surely be told to report to the office of the head coach with his playbook.
The biggest hard knock story of the weekend was of course the decision of the St Louis Rams to cut Michael Sam from their squad. Sam was of course the first ever footballer to come out as gay, and all eyes were on him since that historic moment. He had enjoyed a strong pre-season and had survived a couple of culls due to his impressive performances. But he was fighting for a spot among a competitive group of defensive ends and he ultimately got the chop.
The feeling remains he will one day play a competitive professional game but not with the Rams.
However, amidst all the comings and goings, somewhere between all the tough breaks and dreams fulfilled, a young GAA man from New Jersey was given his shot. As if to make up for what happened to Tom Furlong half a century ago, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers surprised many by replacing their veteran kicker with a first generation Monaghan man, a rookie called Patrick Murray.
The Bucs are sweeping house with a new coach, Lovie Smith, but the fact that Connor Barth was asked to move on was a testament to Murray who enjoyed a great college career at Fordham in the Bronx.
Murray was given the good news on Friday, causing delight in New York GAA circles, Fordham and as far away as Monaghan, where he spent so many summers.
According to the Tampa Bay Times, Coach Smith backed Murray to one day succeed but that he’d have to “score a knockout over Barth in training camp and preseason”.
Apparently he did that, never flinching after being reportedly subjected to high pressure situations.
“Mental toughness is the key for a kicker,” Murray told the Times. “I thought I performed well in training camp and the preseason, and I’m very thankful to have won the job.”
But he was also sympathetic to the man he ousted.
“There’s no doubt that Connor Barth is one of the best kickers in this league and he will land somewhere,” Murray said.
“He’s been a true professional since the first day I met him, and he’s really helped me grow, not only as a kicker but as a professional.”
It’s a far cry from the nefarious manner in which Tom Furlong exited the Atlanta Falcons training camp way back when.
And it did my heart good to find out thanks to Pat Nolan that at least Furlong recovered enough to become a player in the 1960s for my soccer club, the New York Shamrocks.
* johnwriordan@gmail.com Twitter: JohnWRiordan
