I feel old

I happen to be a football fan, so it was on NFL Total Access last night that I learned of the death of Bubba Smith at the age of 66. Now, I wouldn't normally post about football players, except that Smith was one of those who went into acting, being best remembered for playing Sgt. Hightower in the Police Academy movies that were low-brow but popular in the 1980s. I remember seeing the first two of them when I was a teenager, although I don't think I ever made it all the way up to Police Academy 6. For some reason, reading about the deaths of people like this makes me feel old. I mean, they were popular in the eighties, which isn't all that long ago!

As for Smith, he was by far not the only football player to go on to acting. I'm pretty certain I've blogged about the football pasts of John Wayne (USC) and Andy Devine (semipro). The Blogger search function claims I haven't blogged about Jim Brown before, which would be a good reminder to blog about 100 Rifles the next time it shows up on the Fox Movie Channel. And then there are the movies that used college football players of the day, such as Eleven Men and a Girl or The Big Game.