NY Giants Fans - Mark Bavaro and Jerry Barca

An author I work with is coming through our town on Thursday night at Words Bookstore to talk Giants and sign his book, BIG BLUE WRECKING CREW: Smashmouth Football, a Little Bit of Crazy, and the '86 Super Bowl Champion New York Giants. Mark Bavaro, former Giants tight end (and a man deserving of the Hall of Fame! Ha, discuss among yourselves...) will be there for what should be a lively talk. Here's the link: http://wordsbookstore.com/category/events/ Come by and support local bookstores and authors and the fact that Giants fans need a little positive reinforcement right now!

Phil McConkey was in some ways Bavaro's opposite: small, a special teamer/backup, loquacious and involved with all types of off-field activities. He married a local woman and his mother-in-law lived near them in Bergen County.

One spring, McConkey's mother-in-law asked him for some help. A kind, quiet young man had been attending morning Mass daily. He helped with things like collections and held the door for the small group of communicants, made up nearly entirely of elderly women.

A few of them got together and naturally assumed that the man's casual clothes and daily mid-morning availability signaled that he was jobless. They wanted to repay his kindness and maybe help him get started in life. McConkey's mother-in-law volunteered that Phil's local celebrity and connections might be just the break the man needed.

McConkey wasn't sure what to expect from the young man or if he could help, but he accompanied his mother-in-law to Mass one weekday morning. She nudged him when the young man entered the church in his usual casual clothes. McConkey took one look and replied, "He's not unemployed. That's Mark Bavaro."

That's a great story! There's a hilarious one in the book about McConkey, Simms, and Billy Crystal out at dinner...