Riley part 2

     Lloyd and I looked at each other. We looked back at the mud-spattered guy. I shrugged at Lloyd. He was slowly shaking his head.
     "Hi," I said, as I stood up, holding my and out. "We're --"
     He took my hand and shook it with a firm, direct shake. None of that overlapping hand Ive got you trapped stuff. And none of that eww, I don't really want to touch you but I feel I have to shake your hand stuff, either. Solid hold, firm grip, two pumps, break.
     "The guys I was told to meet with," he finished my sentence. "I was at a meeting, earlier this week, in a San Francisco hotel, and was told to await further instructions."
     I moved over to the other side of the booth, so Lloyd and I could both face him. He sat down opposite. On quick scan he seemed pretty relaxed, the bike ride hadn't shagged him out, so he was in OK shape. His eyes were lively, but direct. They sparkled with that light that hints at intelligence, but not dazzled, which hints at madness. his movements were fluid as he sat down, I was just guessing, but there seemed an air of athleticism about the way he moved. He just vibed 'pleasant'. I couldn't come up with any other word. It was very odd for me. The best way I could describe it is that he was a guy who you would want to find you after you had taken a thrashing for getting too close to a secret. If he found you, say, lying in a gutter, the rain pissing down on you like God trying to say 'I told you so', while you ooze blood into the city's storm drains, he'd be the guy to not only call 911, but give you his coat and wouldn't think twice about using his shirt to apply pressure to that one cut that just won't stop.
     The waitress showed up. "Can I get you fellas anything?' she asked, oh so perkily.
     "We're good," I said and Lloyd looked a little dejected.
     "Amber, I'll have a coffee, one sugar, no cream. Let these gentlemen order something and put it on my bill, ok?" the new guy said.
     "Sure thing, Coach." She looked back at us.
     "Two coffees, one as black sin and one with cream and about 5 sugars. Thank you," I said.
     Lloyd seemed happier.
     Amber turned to put our orders in. She had a quick, light gait, and I didn't mind watching her go. "You know Amber?" I asked.
     "Sure, Corvallis only has about 55,000 people. I've been here a long time. Her dad and I played on the State championship football team, in high school."
     "And she called you 'Coach'," I stated with a hint of question in my voice.
     The new guy laughed, "Well, why wouldn't she? That's what I do."
     Lloyd started snapping his fingers in rapid succession. We both looked at him, he had a wild, crazed look in his eyes, like he was startled by the klieg light that just switched on in his head. "Your Mike Riley. Head Coach, Oregon State. 93-80 in college, 14-34 in NFL, 40-32. two Grey Cups in the CFL."
     "Whoa," I said. "Wait a minute. You mean to tell me that we came all the way out here, to the soggiest pine forest in north America--"
     "Well, actually the Olympic, in Washington --" Lloyd interjected before I cut him off with a hand gesture.
     "Not to interview Scott Frost, but to interview Mike Riley. What the fuck?"
     Riley's eyes narrowed and he turned his full attention to me. "You will keep your voice down, son," he said evenly, but with enough edge to tell he was serious. "There is absolutely no call to use that off-color language. Here comes Amber, with your coffee, now."
    Amber placed three china mugs on the table. I took a sip of mine, hoping that the bitter acidity of industrial-grade coffee would scrub the bad taste from my mouth. It didn't. It did more than that. This was good stuff. I took another sip and let the black magic cast its spell on my palate.
     "Kenya AA?" I asked Amber.
     "You're good," she said and flounced off to the other tables.
     "Back to the business at hand," I said. "This is not going to go over well, with the investors."
     "Why not?" Riley asked.
     "They want a 'splash' hire. A big name. A proven commodity to elevate the brand," I said.
     "I see," Riley said. "And who would the investors consider a 'splash' hire?  Besides Scott Frost, obviously."
     "They've been floating names around like, Jim Tressel, Jon Gruden, Dan Mullen, Mack Brown, Gary Patterson, among others."
     "I see. Do the investors understand that Tressel would be, um, problematic, shall we say?"
     "I know. He's under a show cause penalty from the NCAA until 2016, he'd have to sit out five games. He left Youngstown State before allegations about his quarterback could surface. Maurice Clarett completely threw him under the bus, and according to him, the extra benefits at OSU in the 2000's made Oklahoma's cheating in the 70s and 80s look like playing Monopoly with house rules."
     "And the other names?"
     "Gruden's not leaving his sweet Monday Night gig to jump into college coaching. Never was a college coach and won a Super Bowl. He doesn't need the hassle. Dan Mullen would be a lateral move at best, with not much of a track record to back it up. Patterson would break the bank with the buyout we'd have to pay TCU. Mack Brown flamed out with the most resources and deepest high school football talent in the country at his beck and call."
     "Which brings us back to Frost, right?" Riley asked.
     "Yep. Feel good story. Former Husker great returns home to guide his alma mater to the championship promised land. We'd get him cheap, too, less than the 3-million we were paying. And, since he's a former Husker, he'd get more leeway to grow into the job."
     "You do realize he's only been the O.C. at Oregon for two years, right?"
     "Yeah."
     "And you do realize, that Marcus Mariota has been the quarterback for those two years, right?"
    "Yeah," I said, as Lloyd nodded in agreement beside me.
    "And that he didn't create the system he runs, the guy who created it is in the League, now."
     "Yeah."
     "So, knowing all of that, would you put 15-Million dollars down to see if he could succeed, knowing what you know about how the fans treated him the last time, he was there."
     I thought about the stories I had heard about Frosty. Him becoming a pariah when Bill Walsh lured him out to the Farm. His struggles to run Bill's West Coast Offense, he understood it, he just didn't have the physical tools to make it work.
     Then I thought about how the fans and players treated him when he came back. 'Too good for us', 'turncoat', 'traitor', were barbs hurled at him. He was the 'other guy' according to some in the whole Lawrence Phillips debacle. When he finally got on the field, things didn't go as planned. Safety first in the 19-0 loss to Arizona State, all Scott's fault. Getting booed, at home, during a game against Central Florida, when things weren't going as well as the fans wanted. Having to get things ironed out with four new offensive linemen who didn't gel until later in the season. All on Scott.
     That all changed when Matt Davison got lucky with the 'flea-kicker' and a soul-crushing Blackshirt defense treated Peyton Manning like a piñata at a party for burgeoning sociopaths.
     Scott allocated, Scott endorsed, Scott lobbied for the voters to name Osborne National Champ. All was forgiven, all was forgotten. Scott went away to play in the League, stayed in long enough to get an NFL Pension and then started working his way up the coaching food chain.
     "Hello," Riley said. "You seemed to go kinda blank, on me, there. You ok?"
     "Yeah," I said. "I'm fine. I was just mulling over some of the points about Frost. I know a bunch of folks, back home, that would love to have him come back. I wouldn't if I were him. So Lloyd, what are supposed to do, now?"
     "We're supposed to text the contact, and they will give us the password to set up the laptop."
     "I texted 'he's here' to the minion. Less than a minute later, I got the reply. it read 'NOMOBO408'.
     Lloyd is good. I showed him the code. He smiled his smile like he has been up to something that nobody knows about and he's not willing to discuss yet. He scares me, sometimes.
     Lloyd powered up the laptop and set it up for Riley to see. Riley waved at the webcam, once, and proceeded to type away at the keyboard. His face showed various amounts of interest and engagement. Looking serious at times and at one point his eyes nearly bugged out of his head. Mine would too if somebody offered me nearly 3 large to do what I was already doing, but for a better company.
     This went on for about a half hour. Finally he turned the laptop around to us. "I'm done, I guess I'll be seeing you around...in Lincoln. Good luck, fellas."
     He paid the tab and moved off, nodding at a few people as he left. The screen was red with white letters on it. It read, "Press any key to continue." I looked at Lloyd, he shrugged. "Something bad will happen if you press a key, but we can't take it back to the office. They want it turned in."
     I tapped the 'N' key. The sound file of R2D2 screaming filled the place and turned some heads. I caught whiff of ozone and saw wisps of smoke curling from the laptop. "You tech guys are a riot," OI said to Lloyd. He had his 'I'm impressed' look on.
     We gathered our stuff, and made for the trek home, a drive to Eugene and commercial hops all the way home. The news would precede us to Lincoln. I had a feeling it was planned that way.

Down and Out in Corvallis, part 1

     Eichorst sent a minion to retain us. Well, me, and I elected to bring Lloyd along. I knew I was going to need back-up and probably a level head in order to get the payment that had been offered. I won't go into details, but I now understand how much fun you can have when your athletic budget is 83 million dollars. Yep, 83 mega, and that's only good enough for 7th in the Big Ten, but I digress.
     We were tasked with securing a location out of the way, but in public, in Corvallis Oregon, with a candidate for the head coaching gig, so Eichorst could conduct a Skype interview with him. We were given a laptop computer with built-in web cam, externally secured and password protected. The minion said that the password word be texted to us, when the meet was a go. Lloyd guessed the password on the way out there, but that's another story.
     Getting to Corvallis is hard, really hard. It reminded me of Marlowe trying to Find Kurtz in "Heart of Darkness". Maybe not quite that bad. I proposed pulling a D.B. Cooper and parachuting into the town square. Lloyd said no.
     I proposed renting a helicopter in Eugene and swooping in blaring 'Ride of the Valkyries' a la "Apocalypse Now".
     Again, Lloyd said no.
     We flew into Minneapolis, first, then Salt Lake City, then Eugene and rented a car. I don't know why the smoke watchers think they can divine anything from trying to track private plane movements to determine where someone might be going to conduct interviews. If I was an AD and wanted to stay invisible, I'd fly commercial. From the air, the University of Oregon campus looks like a giant 'swoosh', but again, I digress.
     It was raining. Big surprise. The rain gave everything that freshly scrubbed look, but was cold. Everyone had on hats and rain jackets. People in Corvallis wear rain jackets the same way people in Chicago wear North Face gear. It's like there's an ordinance or something.
     I felt like I would have been quite at home wearing a trench coat and fedora, smoking, letting the rain drip off the brim of my hat. I would have stood out, unfortunately. Nobody smokes in Corvallis.
     My phone buzzed and I checked the minion-sent text. It was just a number, a 541 area code. I called it. "Hello," said a quiet, measured voice on the other end.
     "Hi," I said. "I'm calling to set up that meeting."
     "Oh. I see," said the quiet voice. "I have a place in mind. I have to bike over, so it will take me about a half hour to get there."
     "Just give me an address, and we'll find it."
     The Snug Bar was our location. We could see the Trysting Tree golf course across the river. I'll give Corvallis props for creative naming.
     Lloyd and I settled into a booth in the basement of a building really close to the river. So close that Lloyd was nervously checking the wall for condensation. I texted the minion to tell him that the meet was on. He texted back to let him know when the contact was in place.
     Lloyd leaned forward, "You know, this is a lot of elaborate maneuvers to set up a meeting with...Scott," Lloyd caught himself.
     "I know. Think about it though. Everyone back home is assuming it's going to be Tressel, who is not coaching, right now, because he got busted. If we want him, than winning truly has become the most important thing."
     "Agreed," Lloyd said. "It's like DUI's. Multiply the number of times you've been busted for it by ten, and that's the number of times you've actually done it. Busted at Ohio State, busted at Youngstown State, the NCAA would love to nail Nebraska, so no thanks, Sweatervest."
     "The other name that is popping like water in a skillet is Frosty," I said. "I fully expect the fair-haired, fair-complected lad from Wood River to come through that door, any second."
     "Do you think he's ready to have the keys to dad's Cadillac?" Lloyd asked.
     "I'm warming to the idea," I said. "He's smart, he got into Stanford and Bill Walsh thought he could handle the West-Coast offense. He handled the mental part, fine, he just didn't have the physical tools to execute it. He's played both offense and defense. He's coached both offense and defense. He's got the Osborne DNA that a lot of Huskerfans are demanding. He's only been an OC for two years, and I think that you could sit in the press box and call plays for Marcus Mariota and look pretty good doing it."
      "Then why are we here, instead of up in Nike-town?" Lloyd asked.
     "Maskirovka, baby," I replied. "Oregon probably wants to retain him, and would start a bidding war, if they found out. Plus the fish-wrappers would want to break the 'scoop'."
     "Oh," I exclaimed. "What's your guess for the super-secret password? Any inclination?"
     "The first one I'm going to try is 'NOMOBO408'."
     I looked up to see an older dude, well, not that much older than me, but older, slowly approaching the booth. I tilted my head at him, questioningly. He was about six foot, lantern shaped jaw, kind of weathered. He wore water resistant track pants that had water and mud splattered on them, like he had been biking. His eyes were dark but lively. He vibed, nicest dude...ever. I was uncomfortable. I'm used to dealing with the sleazy, the criminal and the nutjobs. This was a strange experience.
     "What can I do for you...sir?" I felt like I had to add the 'sir'.
     "Well, I hope you are the right fellas, I'm here to talk to someone about a job."
     "A job in Lincoln, Nebraska?" Lloyd asked.
     "Yep. I'm Mike Riley, and I'm supposed to talk to someone about the Nebraska football job."
     More to come.