Great column and observations, Lyle. We had tickets for Packers and Vikings preseason games as part of silent auction packages at my church in Waterloo.
I'm not suprised by the Twins or the Packers. The Cedar Rapids Kernels of course are a Twins affiliate; Hall of Famer Joe Mauer's brother was Kernels manager a few years ago. And I know I had a lot of Twins fans razzing me for my support of my then-faltering Yankees when I was growing up in the late '60s when the Twins were riding high.
Recently deceased Green Bay Packers president emeritus Bob Harlan was a native of Des Moines and educated at Marquette University in Milwaukee. They've has a lot of Hawkeyes and Cyclones on their roster over the years dating back to the days of Hawkeyes Bob Jeter and Emlen Tunnell in Vince Lombardi's early years. I also remember attending a Packers game with my son at Lambeau Field in 2008 and many of my fellow Packer fans were very well aware of that year's devastating tornado in Parkersburg and New Hartford that killed nine people. Iowa Hawkeye and Aplington-Parkersburg High School alum Aaron Kampman was a Packers starter then and the team afforded him time to make a personal appeal.
And as far as the NFL as a whole, well, there's that guy from Cedar Rapids and UNI named Kurt Warner who received the NFL Walter Payton Man of the Year award for his work with Habitat for Humanity in Iowa and relief here from the record flood of 2008.
The pros know where we are even if the national sports networks frequently mix up Hawkeyes and Cyclones and cite tap water and pool tables as our main assets (well, in Ames anyway, Iowa City's far more sophisticated, right?).
And a little plug: The top minor league affiliates of the Cubs and Twins, the Iowa Cubs and the St. Paul Saints, will play at the Field of Dreams movie site in Dyersville, on Tuesday August 11.
Great column and observations, Lyle. We had tickets for Packers and Vikings preseason games as part of silent auction packages at my church in Waterloo.
I'm not suprised by the Twins or the Packers. The Cedar Rapids Kernels of course are a Twins affiliate; Hall of Famer Joe Mauer's brother was Kernels manager a few years ago. And I know I had a lot of Twins fans razzing me for my support of my then-faltering Yankees when I was growing up in the late '60s when the Twins were riding high.
Recently deceased Green Bay Packers president emeritus Bob Harlan was a native of Des Moines and educated at Marquette University in Milwaukee. They've has a lot of Hawkeyes and Cyclones on their roster over the years dating back to the days of Hawkeyes Bob Jeter and Emlen Tunnell in Vince Lombardi's early years. I also remember attending a Packers game with my son at Lambeau Field in 2008 and many of my fellow Packer fans were very well aware of that year's devastating tornado in Parkersburg and New Hartford that killed nine people. Iowa Hawkeye and Aplington-Parkersburg High School alum Aaron Kampman was a Packers starter then and the team afforded him time to make a personal appeal.
And as far as the NFL as a whole, well, there's that guy from Cedar Rapids and UNI named Kurt Warner who received the NFL Walter Payton Man of the Year award for his work with Habitat for Humanity in Iowa and relief here from the record flood of 2008.
The pros know where we are even if the national sports networks frequently mix up Hawkeyes and Cyclones and cite tap water and pool tables as our main assets (well, in Ames anyway, Iowa City's far more sophisticated, right?).
And a little plug: The top minor league affiliates of the Cubs and Twins, the Iowa Cubs and the St. Paul Saints, will play at the Field of Dreams movie site in Dyersville, on Tuesday August 11.