We all deal with grief in different ways. For the last three years, I have dealt with the pain of the Oregon Ducks being eliminated from College Football Playoff contention by photoshopping Mario Cristobal's face onto appropriate Mario covers. It's not perfect, but it's cathartic, and it works. Now, I have to find a new coping mechanism, and given what the future looks like for the Oregon football Ducks, it'll need to be a durable one.
My Duck fandom began when my football fandom began (not counting playing as the Jaguars in Madden '05 — they have cool colors, okay?) sometime in 2006. My mom was a Duck, living through the dark years of the early '80s, and started watching her alma mater again when my family was in our sports phase. (My dad and I remain eternally in said phase.) So I was formally introduced to the green and yellow with Bellotti, Chip, Dennis Dixon, Jonathan Stewart, and Jeremiah Johnson in 2007, and if you know anything about 2007 you understand how quickly I was hooked – both on the Ducks and on college football —and on pain. RIP Dennis' left knee. I was all-in for 2010 right up until more pain. In related news: I am not a masochist. Thank you to Michael Dyer for teaching me that. Similarly, I bought into Mariota from his first game, and was rewarded with my greatest sports memory when Jameis Winston slipped on an invisible banana at the Rose Bowl. All before Zeke Elliott spilled food all over my dreams.
The last several years, then, from Helfrich to one-year Willie to the titular Mario, were a different kind of pain for a spoiled Duck like me, even as I became a Bruin and stopped following Oregon so ferociously. So after Mario's first season, when everything seemed to be moving in the right direction while Jim Mora was collapsing, I migrated back home. I will still (usually) root for UCLA in the head-to-head, but Oregon will always be my team now. For that, I will be forever grateful to Mario Cristobal. He took a lost program, wandering the wilderness without Chip or Mariota, and gave it stability. He instilled the team with an identity outside of its Nike uniforms, and for the first time since Vernon Adams, I enjoyed watching this team again. For all my snarky photoshops and Twitter cynicism, I really have nothing to complain about.
But then, complaining when we have nothing to complain about is what makes us human. For all the stability, for all the culture, Utah took one look at the Ducks newfound identity, their very being, and spit all over it. Twice! In the face of those two games the vaunted physical identity of the last three years sounds like all talk. Losing the first game of the year to a Bo Nix miracle, okay. Losing to ASU in a close game on the road, fine. Losing to the Beavers was not fun, and disappearing against Iowa St. was tough to stomach. And losing to the refs in Palo Alto was frustrating. But the last two losses of Cristobal's stint at Oregon took the wind out of their sails. It felt like the whole "most physical team in the west" thing had run its course. Even if he hadn't left, you could feel a rebuilding year on the horizon.
If it was about the money, I'd probably be upset. Mario built this team around physicality over flash, grit over glamour (again, at least on paper) - so for him to leave with $$$ eyes would be a real slap in the face. But he's going home, and he's getting back to his family. He made the right decision. I just wish he never had to. And for a few years at least, I'm really gonna miss him.
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