It's been seen a thousand times: the sitcom's male chauvinist, who believes that women are primarily complainers with severely low pain thresholds, agrees to wear a pregnancy suit, as long—he'd say—as the females in his life shut up about how hard it is to have a kid.
Then, as you know, the socially conscious producers of the show see to it that he throws out his back, begs the women to forgive him and delivers a well-put monologue about the error of his ways.
Here in Madison, two members of UW's football team encountered an equally surprising ""mile-in-my-shoes"" experience, even though the lesson learned, and the perspective gained, wasn't quite Pilates material.
Junior Andy Crooks and sophomore Travis Beckum each played linebacker in high school, and were recruited to play there, but it doesn't appear that either will record a tackle this season. Then again, they may be all right with that. After all, it's not really something an offensive player should worry about.
Indeed, the former linebackers are now on the glory side of the ball, each playing tight end; the position that was nothing but a nuisance on the end of the line, always impeding the outside blitz.
Crooks showed promise at linebacker his freshman year, but for whatever reason fell out of favor with the coaches, and didn't play as much as expected in his sophomore season.
""Coach [Bielema] called me up to his office, and he told me it was something worth thinking about,"" Crooks said. ""He asked me how I felt about it and, you know, I didn't really play that much last year, so I thought it would be a good switch.""
The move for Crooks was an obvious one for the coaches. He was too good not to play; it was just a matter of where to put him. When it came to Beckum's position change, the logic was the same—he had too much talent to be on the bench. The difference between the two, however, was that Beckum came up with the idea himself.
""I mentioned something to [Coach Bielema] last year, right after the Iowa game, about transitioning to play tight end. He kind of thought I was joking at first,"" Beckum said. ""But then he realized I was serious and said we would talk about it after the season.""
Voila. Suddenly, the Badgers, who lost last year's tight ends—Owen Daniels and Jason Posciak—to graduation had depth at one of the most demanding positions on the field.
Said tight ends coach Bob Bostad, ""I think they were excited to have a chance to get on the field because that's what most of these kids want to do, is just play football.""
And play football they have. They are both seeing more playing time than they had prior to their position change, but the opportunity to play has been accompanied by the burden of adopting the offensive mindset and ditching the defensive one. The pregnancy suit, if you will.
The art of run-blocking, in particular, has been a humbling experience.
""I think a lot of people underrate how hard it is to block,"" said Beckum. ""You just can't run into people like you can on defense. You have to have your head, your shoulder-pads and your hands in the right spot.""
""Blocking is probably one of the hardest things,"" Crooks said. ""There's so much to it, even though you watch a game, and it doesn't look like it's that hard.""
Tight ends coach Bob Bostad acknowledges that Crooks' size has made him the more advanced blocker of the two, but that Beckum's athleticism has, to this point, made him a greater threat in the passing game.
But with Beckum leading the team in receptions and yards in the season opener and Crooks catching John Stocco's only touchdown pass last week, the tandem is producing despite of their inexperience.
""You have to give them a lot of credit for absorbing the information, retaining it and putting it to use out there on the field,"" Bostad said. ""I've been really impressed with how they've handled it.""
And most importantly, they have learned something.
""I always thought, when I was on defense, that the offense didn't run as much as we did,"" Beckum said. ""But just running the routes is actually a lot of work.""
Crooks added, ""Now I realize how hard it is block, to run crisp routes. I definitely have a new respect for the offense."" Roll credits.
