Mickey Duzyj

Definitely.

So as we said, Luke himself did not have a plan once he launched himself off this 10-foot wall onto the turf at Vanderbilt.

As a public service, I have created... The official Pablo Torre finds out guide to tearing down goalposts. Great. So let's start with the ingredients. First, you'll start with the goalpost, obviously. The next thing that you'll need is a crew of individuals. Third thing that we'll need is a field storming where your group can have access to this goalpost.

And the last thing that you'll need is a little bit of time. Let's just say, on average, you'll need about 15 minutes to pull this off. After you have all of those ingredients, let's talk about the anatomy of your adversary here. Goalposts generally weigh between 600 and 1,000 pounds each. This is not a small object. So heavy. Each of these goalposts has three main parts to them. The uprights.

Each of them is 30 feet tall. Those are connected to a horizontal piece in the middle of the structure called the crossbar. And that crossbar is connected to the ground by the gooseneck, which is a curved piece of metal that connects usually to some sort of base at the bottom of the structure.

So for the uninitiated, tearing down goalposts is really the supreme celebration for a college football underdog when they pull off an upset victory at home.

So generally speaking, the uprights are the lightest part, which are made of a hollow aluminum piping, weighs about 50 to 75 pounds each.

I resent that. This is, again, a public service, Pablo. The crossbar is a bit heavier. It weighs about 150 pounds. But it's really when we get down to the gooseneck. That's really where all the weight is.

So there are a lot of ways to do this wrong. Let's just cover a few basic rookie mistakes. The first mistake is thinking that the key to taking down a goalpost is the gooseneck. The durability of said gooseneck is more than what your crew can handle. Sometimes people also think that the way to do this is to unscrew it. That is also not a thing. So don't think that that is worth your time either.

Well, it is really important to know what you're doing because the clock is ticking. The move is to hoist your group up onto the crossbar. where you want to lift the whole group onto the crossbar. Maybe the most agile and strong members of your- You can hold a draft combine for this. You want to group your members into one of the far corners where the crossbar meets the upright.

So you're not trying to evenly disperse your weight across the entire length of the crossbar.

You're trying to choose one of the corners and put maximal weight on that corner. So you want people hanging on it. You want people jumping up and down on that corner. You are trying to give that corner, Pablo, the absolute business. That is going to win you just a few inches of downward tilt. At that point, move your attack to the entirely opposite corner. This is a gradual process.

And after you do that, you're going to want to rock back and forth. Oh yeah, you're seesawing this thing. Absolutely, that's the word. Seesawing. So you're going from one side to another. It's really helpful for you to deputize a field general who's on the field, who actually calls out the changes. who says, you've done enough on that corner. Shift your attack.

The hometown fans storm the field. Their own field. Their own field.

And once you get one of the corners very close to, if not down on the turf itself, that's when you shift to the next phase of this process. Which is? Getting your entire crew behind the goalposts facing midfield. And what you want to do then is get as many hands on the goalpost.

And if you have sufficiently weakened the goalpost structural integrity and you give it an epic heave, that thing will come down and glory will be yours.

That's right. And not just any tool.

So Pablo, this is the infamous and beloved folk hero known as Saw Man.

So by day, Saw Man is known as Ned Vickers, who is the president of the Sugarlands Distilling Company in Tennessee. But this man's passion, his true passion, and I would say his calling, is really to saw through a variety of goalposts with his beloved hacksaw. But he has also considered a variety of other tools.

They jump over the barricades, they get out onto the field, and they celebrate with the players and the coaches, and they just go nuts.

Wow.

And what about, this is going to seem ridiculous, but a chainsaw?

It all started a long time ago, 40 years ago, back in 1984, when our man Ned was just a wee boy, 12 years old. He and his dad were both Tennessee Volunteers fans, and they went that year to the Tennessee-Alabama game.

So Ned and his father were sitting at Neyland Stadium among the fans.

And in the fourth quarter, unbelievably, Tennessee stages this epic comeback.

In moments of great historic victory, they take the extra step and tear down their hometown goalposts.

So, yeah, very safe to say that there is nothing more important to Ned than these rare, valuable artifacts of upset glory. And so from that point forward, we're talking decades now, 40 years, he has again and again just been sawing through goalpost after goalpost, creating these artifacts for himself and others in good old Rocky Top, Tennessee.

And all of this brings us to the present or the near present. We're talking 2022. Once again, it's Alabama against Tennessee. Tennessee was the very sexy upset pick.

And they win the game on an incredible knuckleball field goal. Yet again, inspiring the Tennessee fans to storm the field at Neyland Stadium.

So actually, Ned is not there. Ned was on a college visit that weekend. And so he was just getting back into town. He said he was a mile and a half from campus at a friend's house. But he watches this whole thing unfold.

So the much-experienced Saw Man is very familiar with this dynamic and also with this milieu.

Absolutely. It is a tradition that is hard to compare with anything else in the world of sports.

What an emotional roller coaster. Absolutely. But let's not forget, there was another goalpost in the water.

In this moment, the legend of Saw Man is really born. And I want to give credit to Mike Wilson at the Knoxville News Sentinel. He originally published, reported and published this story.

So this legend starts to spread. And Ned himself, when he went back to work on Monday.

He happened to experience the legend being talked about out in the wild.

So very proudly, Ned and his family even made the photo of them sawing the goalpost that year, their family Christmas card. I have not seen this yet.

It says, you're going down. You're, Y-R, going down. And with a little felt goalpost underneath it.

So, funny enough, Saw Man's son, Eli— Saw Boy— Sawboy, happens to be a freshman at Vanderbilt this year and was actually at the Vanderbilt-Alabama game. Of course he was. That we talked about earlier in the episode with Topless Luke.

And so Sawman texts Eli and says, hey, I'm getting in the car right now. I've got my saw. He also adds, as the great father that he is, that also in the event that you need bail money tonight, mom and I were good for it.

This is where we have to talk about the existence of big goalposts. There is a company called Sports Field Specialties that is the number one manufacturer and installer of goalposts throughout college football and also in the pros. I spoke with a guy named Kevin Deventeer, who is the director of sales at Sports Field.

And he is also very charmingly the head of what is called the replacement goalpost market, which is a market that exists because of this phenomenon of goalposts getting torn down. What Kevin told me about all of this is that the goalpost costs about $8,000 to $10,000 each to manufacture and to ship to location.

Not only do they sell these replacement goalposts, but they have now come to recommend that schools actually purchase a second goalpost just to have in storage in the event that their goalposts get torn down. And the goalpost guys, big goalposts, all their executives are on a group chat together, and they watch the college football scoreboards online.

almost like tornado chasers watch the Doppler radar. And they're looking for upsets. And in the event of Vanderbilt and Alabama, apparently that evening, the executives were gleefully texting to one another about the goalposts. They're coming down. They're coming down. They're coming down.

It's go time, and suddenly they have to mobilize to make the new goalposts and rush to get them installed in time for the next home game.

Definitely, he has been. But there is something happening in the world of goalpost technology that is threatening to turn all of this upside down.

There is a new hydraulic model of a goalpost, a futuristic model that can cost up to $25,000. So we're talking more than twice the cost of a conventional.

Definitely. But what a hydraulic goalpost is, is it looks just like a conventional goalpost, but instead of it being one solid structure, at the top of the gooseneck is a hinge. And the hydraulic hinge allows for the uprights to tilt forward and lay straight down, like almost face first on the turf with a push of a button.

Pablo, I feel like you focusing on the vandalism and the destruction. I just have to say that legally. Yeah. I mean, you're coming off as a real square because this is not only a great celebration that has gone back generations. This is really a folk tradition that I've come to learn and appreciate recently.

I want you to take a look at this clip and see what happens right after the clock hits zero.

So the goalposts come down immediately. I mean, everyone's shocked. No one's seen this before. It's like watching, you know, the Death Star being operational. So what happened technically is that- That was so fast. Somewhere in the stadium, an administrator pushed the secret hydraulic button

and the goalpost immediately slammed down to the ground, and they swarmed it with security guards trying to keep the students away from it so that they couldn't rip it to pieces.

Well, there was a photo that went around after the game. And if you take a look at this photo, you can see that the hydraulic system and the gooseneck, it did function as intended. Those 30-foot uprights that Mickey was describing before have been amputated. So, despite the fact that the hydraulic component worked as intended... Clearly, that part, the gooseneck is immaculate.

And really, credit to the Georgia Tech students. They still somehow were able to snap the uprights off of the construction and still parade them gloriously around the stadium.

So all that being the case, you should know that those are blanket fees. In the event of a goalpost getting taken down, there are no punishments. At the moment, there's a loophole. Look, you have your sweatshirt. I see what you're trying to imply here. Yeah, I mean, just as a public service announcement, I will just say, for anyone interested... Why are you speaking directly into a camera?

And I'll say this to the camera.

If anyone has dreamed of doing this, if anyone wants to take our point-by-point guide and put this into action, now is the time. Change is coming. Things might not ever be as easy to do this as it is right now.

Don't delay.

So this is another great innovation that has happened, this time on the university and on the rebel side, which is that these goalposts oftentimes make their way back to the schools from which they were taken. And schools have realized that these objects are incredibly valuable, especially if you cut them into tiny little pieces and auction them off on the university website.

So in the case of Vanderbilt University, they auctioned off tiny pieces of this incredible goalpost for prices like up to $7,500 per slice.

So college administrators and law enforcement, they would agree with you. They tend to frown upon, you know, the vandalism of stadiums and so forth. This goes far beyond just a conventional celebration. Not only are these things kind of paraded around, but they are also oftentimes chopped up into little pieces and distributed among the hometown fans who are celebrating this upset.

Well, this is a capitalist society, Pablo. And, you know, they would argue that, hey, they're just doing this to pay the fines that the conferences are levying on them and also to cover the cost of the replacement goalposts. But just, you know, a cursory look at these auctions, you're realizing that the universities, if you do the math, they're actually making more money than any of this costs.

It has been. But, you know, I say credit to the universities for doing this because there is a great appetite for all of these objects. Yes, of course. And as a surprise to you, we can bring in a little something.

Thank you to Rob for unveiling. Jesus Christ. And in front of us today, feel its power, Pablo.

This is on a plate. I mean. I mean, lay your hands on that. Is this the goalpost? From Vanderbilt University that was. October 5th. Thrown in the Cumberland River. Torn down by topless Luke. It's so dirty. There it was. You know, piece of four-inch aluminum pipe lent to us by Vanderbilt Boosters, who retained some of the slices. Perhaps they will auction them off at a later time.

But just to give you a sense of, again, the totemic power of this object.

Unfortunately, Pablo, you cannot have that.

I do have another surprise for you. And, you know, to honor, again, this underground folk tradition, I have a gift for you that you can keep. And it's a gift on behalf of myself and also on behalf of Big Goalposts.

Producers? We can bring this one in. You know, we can leave this one for the moment.

So what you have there, Pablo, is another slice of a goalpost. This is the very top of an upright. And I will say that, you know, for a variety of reasons... Some legal. I can't fully disclose. Yeah, where is this? Where'd you get this? Where this game used upright came from. But let's just say that I myself got something out of this as well in the form of my new Christmas card design.

Good.

Another tchotchke for your shelves, Pablo. And let me be the first to tell you, happy holidays.

Let's really start this story talking about when the great and number one seeded Alabama visited Vanderbilt University.

To get inside this great upset that happened, we reached out to a young man named Luke Rickers, who's a student at Vanderbilt.

And he's such a diehard that he stays to the end of every game. He says, because Vanderbilt historically not a great football power.

Most of the time when they're losing, most of the fans clear out of the student section, which for Luke and his close buddies is a great opportunity for him to weasel down to the front row right next to the field so he can take in what is usually some pretty mediocre football action.

Well, historically, Vanderbilt has been killed by Alabama by probably an average of 50 points.

But unbelievably to Luke and to everybody at the stadium, the game went very, very differently than the usual contest between Vanderbilt and Alabama.

Vanderbilt's been playing football since 1890. They've never had a top five win. Top five.

Yeah.

So this is an unthinkable story that's unfolding.

So Luke is sitting there and, you know, he's sitting front row at this point. The unthinkable miracle has happened. And he said to himself, I want to be one of the first students on the field. He's standing at the top of this like 10 foot wall. He's just adamant that he's going to get on that field.

Luke told me that there was no plan.

Once they got the goalpost down, they started to parade it around, and then everyone is thinking, okay, let's try and get this out of the stadium, right? On the side of the field that it was taken down, there was a tunnel, and they tried to march the goalpost out of that tunnel. It ends up being too big, but they slam it into the top of the tunnel. It takes a chunk out of the tunnel.

They say, we got to back up. This is not going to work. Where are the security guards at this point? At this point, the security has pretty much given up hope of stopping the mayhem. So the students, they're like, okay, we got to backtrack. They're like, okay, we're gonna try and get it out the totally other side of the field.

They're able this time to get it out of the stadium and suddenly they're out with this giant goalpost just out on campus. Where are they trying to go? So Luke says that even though there was no coordinated plan, the hive mind seemed to want to take this giant goalpost, almost as if the goalpost itself was a giant divining rod, and take it towards water.

If anyone has dreamed of doing this, if anyone wants to take our point-by-point guide and put this into action, now is the time.

A three-mile walk from campus down Broadway into what is the Cumberland River in downtown Nashville.

You know, it's very in vogue to have a minimalist aesthetic. Right, Marie Kondo. Yeah, I'm totally against that. I am clutter core to the core. I like to collect objects. Yes. And having them around me or on me or in my pocket, it just, I don't know, it makes my life feel richer.

So good.

Luke talks about it almost like he had an out-of-body experience. Everyone's chanting, in the river, in the river. There's a real, almost a hysteria that has taken over everyone. So as he's watching this thing quickly sink into the Cumberland River, he tangibly feels the adrenaline leave his body. And he kind of comes back to his senses.

And as he does, he kind of takes a look around him and he realizes that his comrades, they're starting to get arrested by police.

There seems to be some sort of unspoken magical energy that comes from carrying a physical piece. I mean, we're talking about an artifact that diehard fans would regard as something that could live in a museum.

Not only has this phenomenon existed, this practice existed for more than a century, but... But that there is also this shadow war that's been going on between the kind of rebellious practitioners of this art form. The lukes of the world. Yeah. And these larger forces that are really trying to squash this practice from happening.

And I was really put onto the dynamics of this through one of the master practitioners of this rebel art.

This man's name, Pablo, is Saw Man.

You know, it's very in vogue to have a minimalist aesthetic. Right, Marie Kondo. Yeah, I'm totally against that. I am clutter core to the core. I like to collect objects.

So as we said, Luke himself did not have a plan once he launched himself off this 10-foot wall onto the turf at Vanderbilt.

And having them around me or on me or in my pocket, it just, I don't know, it makes my life feel richer.

As a public service, I have created... The official Pablo Torre finds out guide to tearing down goalposts. Great. So let's start with the ingredients. First, you'll start with the goalpost, obviously. The next thing that you'll need is a crew of individuals. Third thing that we'll need is a field storming where your group can have access to this goalpost.

And the last thing that you'll need is a little bit of time. Let's just say, on average, you'll need about 15 minutes to pull this off. After you have all of those ingredients, let's talk about the anatomy of your adversary here. Goalposts generally weigh between 600 and 1,000 pounds each. This is not a small object. So heavy. Each of these goalposts has three main parts to them. The uprights.

Each of them is 30 feet tall. Those are connected to a horizontal piece in the middle of the structure called the crossbar. And that crossbar is connected to the ground by the gooseneck, which is a curved piece of metal that connects usually to some sort of base at the bottom of the structure.

So generally speaking, the uprights are the lightest part, which are made of a hollow aluminum piping, weighs about 50 to 75 pounds each.

I resent that. This is, again, a public service, Pablo. The crossbar is a bit heavier. It weighs about 150 pounds. But it's really when we get down to the gooseneck. That's really where all the weight is.

So there are a lot of ways to do this wrong. Let's just cover a few basic rookie mistakes. The first mistake is thinking that the key to taking down a goalpost is the gooseneck. The durability of said gooseneck is more than what your crew can handle. Sometimes people also think that the way to do this is to unscrew it. That is also not a thing. So don't think that that is worth your time either.

Definitely.

Well, it is really important to know what you're doing because the clock is ticking. The move is to hoist your group up onto the crossbar. where you want to lift the whole group onto the crossbar. Maybe the most agile and strong members of your... You can hold a draft combine for this. You want to group your members into one of the far corners where the crossbar meets the upright.

So you're not trying to evenly disperse your weight across the entire length of the crossbar.

You're trying to choose one of the corners and put maximal weight on that corner. So you want people hanging on it. You want people jumping up and down on that corner. You are trying to give that corner, Pablo, the absolute business. That is going to win you just a few inches of downward tilt. At that point, move your attack to the entirely opposite corner. This is a gradual process.

And after you do that, you're going to want to rock back and forth. Oh yeah, you're seesawing this thing. Absolutely, that's the word, seesawing. So you're going from one side to another. It's really helpful for you to deputize a field general who's on the field, who actually calls out the changes. who says, you've done enough on that corner, shift your attack.

And once you get one of the corners very close to, if not down on the turf itself, that's when you shift to the next phase of this process. Which is? Getting your entire crew behind the goalpost facing midfield. And what you want to do then is get as many hands on the goalpost.

And if you have sufficiently weakened the goalpost's structural integrity and you give it an epic heave, that thing will come down and glory will be yours.

So for the uninitiated, tearing down goalposts is really the supreme celebration for a college football underdog when they pull off an upset victory at home.

That's right. And not just any tool.

So Pablo, this is the infamous and beloved folk hero known as Saw Man.

So by day, Saw Man is known as Ned Vickers, who is the president of the Sugarlands Distilling Company in Tennessee. But this man's passion, his true passion, and I would say his calling, is really to saw through a variety of goalposts with his beloved hacksaw. But he has also considered a variety of other tools.

Wow.

And what about, this is going to seem ridiculous, but a chainsaw?

It all started a long time ago, 40 years ago, back in 1984, when our man Ned was just a wee boy, 12 years old. He and his dad were both Tennessee Volunteers fans, and they went that year to the Tennessee-Alabama game.

So Ned and his father were sitting at Neyland Stadium among the fans.

The hometown fans storm the field. Their own field. Their own field.

And in the fourth quarter, unbelievably, Tennessee stages this epic comeback.

So yeah, very safe to say that there is nothing more important to Ned than these rare, valuable artifacts of upset glory. And so from that point forward, we're talking decades now, 40 years, he has again and again just been sawing through goalpost after goalpost, creating these artifacts for himself and others in good old Rocky Top, Tennessee.

They jump over the barricades, they get out onto the field, and they celebrate with the players and the coaches, and they just go nuts.

And all of this brings us to the present or the near present. We're talking 2022. Once again, it's Alabama against Tennessee. Tennessee was the very sexy upset pick. Give me Tennessee. Thank you. And they win the game on an incredible knuckleball field goal. Yet again, inspiring the Tennessee fans to storm the field at Neyland Stadium.

So actually, Ned is not there. Ned was on a college visit that weekend. And so he was just getting back into town. He said he was a mile and a half from campus at a friend's house. But he watches this whole thing unfold.

In moments of great historic victory, they take the extra step and tear down their hometown goalposts.

So the much-experienced Saw Man is very familiar with this dynamic and also with this milieu.

What an emotional roller coaster. Absolutely. But let's not forget, there was another goalpost in the water.

Absolutely. It is a tradition that is hard to compare with anything else in the world of sports.

In this moment, the legend of Saw Man is really born. And I want to give credit to Mike Wilson at the Knoxville News Sentinel. He originally published, reported and published this story.

So this legend starts to spread. And Ned himself, when he went back to work on Monday.

He happened to experience the legend being talked about out in the wild.

So very proudly, Ned and his family even made the photo of them sawing the goalpost that year, their family Christmas card. I have not seen this yet.

So, funny enough, Saw Man's son, Eli... Saw Boy... happens to be a freshman at Vanderbilt this year and was actually at the Vanderbilt-Alabama game. Of course he was. That we talked about earlier in the episode with Topless Luke. And where was Saw Man? So Saw Man was not there. Saw Man is watching the game on TV.

It is caught.

And so Sawman texts Eli and says, hey, I'm getting in the car right now. I've got my saw. He also adds, as the great father that he is, that also in the event that you need bail money tonight, mom and I, we're good for it.

This is where we have to talk about the existence of big goalposts. There is a company called Sports Field Specialties that is the number one manufacturer and installer of goalposts throughout college football and also in the pros. I spoke with a guy named Kevin Deventeer, who is the director of sales at Sports Field.

And he is also very charmingly the head of what is called the replacement goalpost market, which is a market that exists because of this phenomenon of goalposts getting torn down. What Kevin told me about all of this is that the goalpost costs about $8,000 to $10,000 each to manufacture and to ship to location.

Not only do they sell these replacement goalposts, but they have now come to recommend that schools actually purchase a second goalpost just to have in storage in the event that their goalposts get torn down. And the goalpost guys, big goalposts, all their executives are on a group chat together and they watch the college football scoreboards almost like tornado chasers watch the Doppler radar.

And they're looking for upsets And in the event of Vanderbilt and Alabama, apparently that evening, the executives were gleefully texting to one another about the goalposts. They're coming down. They're coming down. They're coming down. Yeah. It's go time. And suddenly they have to mobilize to make the new goalposts and rush to get them installed in time for the next home game.

It says, you're going down. You're, Y-R, going down. And with a little felt goalpost underneath it.

Definitely, he has been. But there is something happening in the world of goalpost technology that is threatening to turn all of this upside down.

There is a new hydraulic model of a goalpost, a futuristic model that can cost up to $25,000. So we're talking more than twice the cost of a conventional.

Definitely. But what a hydraulic goalpost is, is it looks just like a conventional goalpost, but instead of it being one solid structure, at the top of the gooseneck is a hinge. And the hydraulic hinge allows for the uprights to tilt forward and lay straight down, like almost face first on the turf with a push of a button.

I want you to take a look at this clip and see what happens right after the clock hits zero.

So the goalposts come down immediately. I mean, everyone's shocked. No one's seen this before. It's like watching the Death Star being operational. So what happened technically is that- That was so fast. Somewhere in the stadium, an administrator pushed the secret hydraulic button

and the goalpost immediately slammed down to the ground, and they swarmed it with security guards trying to keep the students away from it so that they couldn't rip it to pieces.

Well, there was a photo that went around after the game. And if you take a look at this photo, you can see that the hydraulic system and the gooseneck, it did function as intended. Those 30-foot uprights that Mickey was describing before have been amputated. So, despite the fact that the hydraulic component worked as intended... Clearly, that part, the gooseneck is immaculate.

And really, credit to the Georgia Tech students. They still somehow were able to snap the uprights off of the construction and still parade them gloriously around the stadium.

So all that being the case, you should know that those are blanket fees. In the event of a goalpost getting taken down, there are no punishments. At the moment, there's a loophole. Look, you have your sweatshirt. I see what you're trying to imply here. Yeah, I mean, just as a public service announcement, I will just say, for anyone interested... Why are you speaking directly into a camera?

If anyone has dreamed of doing this, if anyone wants to take our point-by-point guide and put this into action, now is the time. Change is coming. Things might not ever be as easy to do this as it is right now.

Don't delay.

Pablo, I feel like you focusing on the vandalism and the destruction. I just have to say that legally. Yeah, I mean, you're coming off as a real square because this is not only a great celebration that has gone back generations, this is really a folk tradition that I've come to learn and appreciate recently.

So this is another great innovation that has happened, this time on the university and on the rebel side, which is that these goalposts oftentimes make their way back to the schools from which they were taken. And schools have realized that these objects are incredibly valuable, especially if you cut them into tiny little pieces and auction them off on the university website.

So in the case of Vanderbilt University, they auctioned off tiny pieces of this incredible goalpost for prices like up to $7,500 per slice.

Well, this is a capitalist society, Pablo. And, you know, they would argue that, hey, they're just doing this to pay the fines that the conferences are levying on them and also to cover the cost of the replacement goalposts. But just, you know, a cursory look at these auctions, you're realizing that the universities, if you do the math, they're actually making more money than any of this costs.

It has been. But, you know, I say credit to the universities for doing this because there is a great appetite for all of these objects. Yes, of course. And as a surprise to you, we can bring in a little something.

And in front of us today, feel its power, Pablo. Oh, my God.

I mean... I mean, lay your hands on that. Is this the... Goalpost. From Vanderbilt University that was- October 5th. Thrown in the Cumberland River. Torn down by topless Luke. It's so dirty. There it was. You know, piece of- Oh my God. Four inch aluminum pipe lent to us by Vanderbilt Boosters. who retained some of the slices. Perhaps they will auction them off at a later time.

But just to give you a sense of, again, the totemic power of this object.

Unfortunately, Pablo, you cannot have that

I do have another surprise for you. And, you know, to honor, again, this underground folk tradition, I have a gift for you that you can keep. And it's a gift on behalf of myself and also on behalf of Big Goalpost.

You can bring this one in. You know, we can leave this one for the moment.

So what you have there, Pablo, is another slice of a goalpost. This is the very top of an upright.

And I will say that, you know, for a variety of reasons— Some legal. I can't fully disclose. Yeah, where is this? Where'd you get this? Where this game used upright came from. But let's just say that I myself got something out of this as well in the form of my new Christmas card design.

So college administrators and law enforcement They would agree with you. They tend to frown upon, you know, the vandalism of stadiums and so forth. This goes far beyond just a conventional celebration. Not only are these things kind of paraded around, but they are also oftentimes chopped up into little pieces and distributed among the hometown fans who are celebrating this upset.

Good.

Another tchotchke for your shelves, Pablo. And let me be the first to tell you, happy holidays.

Let's really start this story talking about when the great and number one seeded Alabama visited Vanderbilt University.

To get inside this great upset that happened, we reached out to a young man named Luke Rickers, who's a student at Vanderbilt.

And he's such a diehard that he stays to the end of every game. He says, because Vanderbilt historically not a great football power.

Most of the time when they're losing, most of the fans clear out of the student section, which for Luke and his close buddies is a great opportunity for him to weasel down to the front row right next to the field so he can take in what is usually some pretty mediocre football action.

Well, historically, Vanderbilt has been killed by Alabama by probably an average of 50 points.

But unbelievably to Luke and to everybody at the stadium, the game went very, very differently than the usual contest between Vanderbilt and Alabama.

Vanderbilt's been playing football since 1890. They've never had a top five win. Top five.

Yeah.

So this is an unthinkable story that's unfolding.

So Luke is sitting there and, you know, he's sitting front row at this point. The unthinkable miracle has happened. And he said to himself, I want to be one of the first students on the field. He's standing at the top of this like 10-foot wall. He's just adamant that he's going to get on that field.

Luke told me that there was no plan.

Once they got the goalpost down, they started to parade it around, and then everyone is thinking, okay, let's try and get this out of the stadium, right? On the side of the field that it was taken down, there was a tunnel, and they tried to march the goalpost out of that tunnel. It ends up being too big, but they slam it into the top of the tunnel. It takes a chunk out of the tunnel.

They say, we got to back up. This is not going to work. Where are the security guards at this point? At this point, the security has pretty much given up hope of stopping the mayhem. So the students, they're like, okay, we got to backtrack. They're like, okay, we're going to try and get it out the totally other side of the field. They're able this time to get it out of the stadium.

If anyone has dreamed of doing this, if anyone wants to take our point-by-point guide and put this into action, now is the time.

And suddenly they're out with this giant goalpost just out on campus. Where are they trying to go? So Luke says that even though there was no coordinated plan, the hive mind seemed to want to take this giant goalpost, almost as if the goalpost itself was a giant divining rod, and take it towards water.

A three-mile walk from campus down Broadway into what is the Cumberland River in downtown Nashville.

So good.

Luke talks about it almost like he had an out-of-body experience. Everyone's chanting, in the river, in the river. There's a real, almost a hysteria that has taken over everyone. So as he's watching this thing quickly sink into the Cumberland River, he tangibly feels the adrenaline leave his body. And he kind of comes back to his senses.

And as he does, he kind of takes a look around him and he realizes that his comrades, they're starting to get arrested by police.

there seems to be some sort of unspoken magical energy that comes from carrying a physical piece. I mean, we're talking about an artifact that diehard fans would regard as something that could live in a museum. Not only has this phenomenon existed, this practice existed for more than a century,

But that there is also this shadow war that's been going on between the kind of rebellious practitioners of this art form. The Lukes of the world. Yeah. And these larger forces that are really trying to squash this practice from happening. And I was really put onto the dynamics of this through one of the master practitioners of this rebel art.

This man's name, Pablo, is Sawman.