Investigative journalism: Being the Tree
Posted on March 7th, 2008 – 2:14 PMBy Michael Rand
Colleague Jeff Shelman points us toward this little bit of fun. Seems Pat Forde over at ESPN.com performed as the Stanford Tree at a recent basketball game. While this doesn’t constitute Pedro Gomez in a Barry Bonds dumpster type of investigative work, it is commendable still.
There are three basic rules for Tree Week:
Don’t light yourself on fire. (There is folklore about one aspiring Tree who — this being Stanford — wrote a five-page paper detailing how he could light himself on fire without actually being injured. He didn’t win.)
Don’t go to jail.
Don’t go to the hospital.
Pretty much anything else goes. This year’s Tree, Whipple, helped secure the job last spring by affixing leeches in the shape of the Tree on his back. He still has a scar on his lower back from one particularly tenacious leech.
Our question, then, is this: any secret mascot fantasies out there? Wait, let’s rephrase that. Oh, never mind.
9 Responses to "Investigative journalism: Being the Tree"
I don’t like the way the tree has it’s hand on the closest girl in the foreground. I can’t tell if that’s his hand or his wrist, and if it’s his wrist where is his hand ? I ask you that !!!
My fantasy involves a bucket of icecubes, the University of Colorado’s mascot, and a pitching wedge.
I’d just take the cheerleaders…and maybe some icecubes too..
That tree appears to be wearing Zubaz.
I think Zubaz is the officials undergarmet of mascots everywhere.
Zubaz is the official garment of clinically obese coaches everywhere…
They don’t really count as “mascots”, but my fantasy invloves the Lambeau Bikini Girls. In my fantasy, they lose the beer bellies and are somewhat attractive. Bikinis in Lambeau Field is similar to putting perfume on a pig.
Now Ty….tsk, tsk, tsk ..don’t make me hunt you down and spray you with purple paint then leave you in Green Bay. We know how to take care of wise guys like you. Remember Ed Gein ?
I think Shelmental was in J-School with me. Send him a shout-out (bastard, actually working in his intended field).
Could Forde’s article BE any longer? And anyone who’s watched Old School know mascots and fire don’t mix.
