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Don’t You Know Who I Am?

9:31 AM EDT on July 24, 2007

My sister chose not to follow me to Oklahoma State University. Instead, she enrolled at the state's other Big XII school in the Fall of 2000. Then, after dealing with her sneering at any mention of the word football all through our youth, she suddenly became one of those Sooner fans who has always irked me when the school won a mythical national championship her freshman year. Anyway, I mention this only to explain why a member of my family would find themselves in the situation that I am about to relate.

As a Sooner fan, my sister tends to hang around other Sooner fans, and one night at a bar she was approached by "some short, old black guy." Using the greatest pick up line of all time, this guy demanded that she name the top-5 quarterbacks in OU history. She listed Josh Heupel, Jason White, and then basically blanked (not being raised in the Sooner lore). This guy asked her why she would not rank Jamelle Hollieway at the top. After explaining that she would not rank him as the University's greatest signal caller primarily because she had never heard that name before, the man became a little belligerent with her and eventually walked off. Soon thereafter, my sister's fiance returned from wherever he had wandered off. He pointed to the man she had recently spoken to (she thought randomly) and informed her, "that's Jamelle Hollieway over there."

For some reason, this story recently became a little sadder to me. Life has been difficult for running quarterbacks recently. The Atlanta Falcons' Ron Mexico (sometimes referred to as Mike Vick) is currently under indictment for federal charges related to animal cruelty. Now, Oklahoma's version of Vick is in his own trouble with the law.

After his wife failed to use her turn signal (there has to be a joke in there about women drivers), Oklahoma Sooner legend and king of option quarterbacks, Jamelle Holieway found himself in the back of a police cruiser when he fumbled a bag of weed. More interesting than the fact that he was busted for possession is the way he attempted to avoid the cuffs.

Pulling a picture of himself playing for the Sooners out of his wallet, Hollieway played the "do you know who I am?" card. I understood when Michael Irvin in his heyday tried this trick when found in a room full of coke and prostitutes. I can even understand Mel Gibson busting it out before calling his arresting officer "sugartits." While I applaud Hollieway for avoiding the urge to blame all the wars in the world on the University of Nebraska, it is a questionable tactic to hinge your arrest avoidance on an officer looking the other way in honor of your exploits from twenty-two years ago. It didn't work for Billy Sims and he won a Heisman. Apparently, officers of the law are OSU fans.

In a perfect world, the ex-QB would have arranged the officers in the wishbone and run some variations of the triple option next to the flashing lights of the cruiser. Instead, the best he could come up with was an autographed photo? I'm sure The Boz would have at least demonstrated how he smuggled urine in to drug tests if he had been in the same situation.

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