Football Cardinals

There was a brief time in the late 70's when I was interested in the St. Louis football Cardinals. They were generally referred to as the St. Louis football Cardinals because of the historically successful baseball franchise in town with the same nickname. The 'football' part distinguished which Cardinals one was referring to. Sometimes they were also called the Gridbirds which I like.

The Gridbirds of those days were competitive, high-flying and a lot of fun as coached by Don Coryell. Coryell was of the Ernie Zampesi school of aerial offensive attack. There were even a couple of years when they made the playoffs, though they had no success there.

By and large, though, I didn't ever get too attached to them, they were rarely successful and eventually, as we know, they moved to Arizona. The NFL expanded in 1976 and I began following one of the fresh franchises, the Seattle Seahawks, who, unlike the Gridbirds, have actually competed in conference title games and have been to a Super Bowl.

All that windiness aside, I think I'm pulling for the Cardinals today, even though they are division rivals of the Seahawks. I am really pulling for Kurt Warner, their quarterback. Warner, a Christian, is the former QB for the Super Bowl winning Rams team of St. Louis.

The game is on as I write and I have no idea how it will go, but I'd like to see Kurt Warner and that Gridbird helmet advance.