The Parliament of Ghosts

He sat in his Minneapolis hotel room, staring at the silver trophy in the shape of an extruded star before him. It was polished to a mirror sheen, and in it he could see his distorted face, still dirty from the game. Across his reflected face were etched the words:

Pete Rozelle
Trophy

Super Bowl XXVI

Most Valuable Player

John Offerdahl

He just kept looking at it, like a fish trying to comprehend a submarine. It didn’t seem real to him. But this had been a season of unreality for him. Charles Haley had had a career year, blowing away Mark Gastineau’s record of 22 sacks by a full 7 on the season. That was amazing. Unless you looked up at the number one spot on the sack list: John Offerdahl (MIA) – 102.

102.

It was difficult for him to comprehend that number. There were so many numbers that were difficult for him to comprehend: 15-0-1, the record of the Miami Dolphins in a year they weren’t expected to go much above .500. 7, the number of sacks he had in the Super Bowl. 2, the number of fumbles he forced in the Super Bowl. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe it had happened, it was just that he didn’t believe he had done it. Nothing had made sense this season.

You would think after the first few games, after blowing away the single-season sack record barely a quarter of the way through the season, the offenses would adjust. They’d change their looks, or double team him, or have somebody fill the hole between the center and left guard he busted through every time, but they didn’t. The linesmen would fall into their blocks against the defensive ends and nose guard, and he would just slip from his linebacker position through two of them, get a yard or two into the backfield, and then cut towards the quarterback. If there was a running back, he would wait until Offerdahl was well into the pocket before even attempting a block, and all he needed to do was make a quick move to totally avoid that.

Don Shula coached entirely against the run; he trusted that Offerdahl would take care of the pass. And while sometimes a breakdown in coverage would occur quickly enough the quarterback could get the pass off before Offerdahl was in his face, the majority of the time a pass play had no chance. Which isn’t to say that Offerdahl was ineffective against the run; generally on any run up the middle he’d meet up with the fullback right in the running lane and the back would just try to push forward, making no cut, just bouncing off and running into his lead blocker again and again in hopes it would help him secure the block. But over half the time, Offerdahl would knock the lead blocker down and just stuff the run for a 1 or 2 yard loss. He had, in the offseason, become the greatest defensive player to ever play the game.

So why wasn’t he happy? Why couldn’t he feel anything at all? He kept staring at the trophy, at the blocky, distorted reflection of his face. It wasn’t like he wasn’t a good football player; he’d made the Pro Bowl every year so far, and he had the career tackles record at WMU. It was just that he wasn’t this good. Nobody was this good. He had found the peak of human achievement, and then just blown it out of the water.

John Offerdahl knew that he was a talented athlete and a good enough guy, but he wasn’t beyond the peak of human perfection. Something had conspired to do this, and he had been a part of it. Maybe not a willing actor, but he had played his role perfectly, and so had everyone else. He had free will, though, and he wasn’t going to let something control him.

As he slid the pistol into his mouth, he thought of his wife, whose name he couldn’t remember, and the restaurant he’d dreamed of opening after he retired. If it was going to happen, it wasn’t going to happen in this world. Nothing else was.

John Offerdahl, the greatest defensive football player ever, was found dead in his hotel room at 4:27 AM on January 27th, 1991 by a member of the Mighty Bombjack Show.