without question.

I am 41 years old and will turn 42 the same day Brigham Young and Marilyn Monroe get a year older. I was 8 the night of the Miracle Bowl. I wasn't at the stadium as my pops had lost faith in BYU's bowl performances. We know how that night ended and it includes many of the greatest stories of the greatest BYU athlete of all time. My pops never missed another BYU bowl game that was played in SoCal the rest of the time he lived there.

I am not sure if the younger generation of BYU sports fans truly appreciate the greatness that was Jim McMahon. We could go through the statistics ad nauseum, but in my opinion there has never been as dominating a college qb as what Jim McMahon did as a junior. His greatness is beyond compare with any other BYU player, IMO. I mean that and yes I understand how much Luke Staley dominated in 2001. There is not a BYU football player, to include his greatness Tyler Detmer, worthy to carry Jimbo McMahon's jock.

Saying all that, let me tell you why I adore Jim McMahon....I believe it was Ralph Waldo Emerson who said: "to thine own self be true, and it will follow as the night follows the day, you will never be false to anyone." Now those of you blessed few who are serious students of my distinguished and without equal posting history know that "false" is not exactly something that upsets me, but I digress.

To me the greatest Jim McMahon moment was the event OxCoug described earlier where Jimbo essentially told Lavell to take his punt team and cram it right up his anal sphincter. He said I ain't quitting even if you are. We know how the story ended. Jim put BYU football on the map. But it was more than just his stats. Without the complete package that was Jim McMahon there is no BYU football and the BYU fanbase is based upon BYU football. The mixture of his personality and athletic greatness brought BYU so much legitimacy in the landscape of football that it was Jim who made BYU a household name. Lavell set the atmosphere but it was Jim McMahon who brought it home. In my opinion it has been an enormous travesty that it has taken this long for BYU to recognize itself. God bless BYU and its inflexible standards. The wankers amongst us will always love the BYU. Guys who like to moderate sports message boards to track down double entendres will love BYU. Folks attracted to being hall monitors can beam that our wonderful standards have been upheld and BYU is not to blame for society's consistent slide toward's Gomorrah. God Bless us all. From my book, he was BYU football and being BYU football he should have been in the BYU Hall of Fame, in the most prominent place, a very, very long time ago.

Steve Young had more pro success. Steve Young is Brigham Young's grandson. I was there and I cheered when Steve Young's number was retired. I remember the awkward feeling I got when Steve said: "Going to BYU allowed me to live my religion as a proud Latter-Day Saint." I get Steve Young and his desire to be a rock star on the EFY tour. That doesn't appeal to me but it appeals to board moderators, hall monitors and a great deal of people in my chosen and beloved religious subculture. But Steve is also the dude who wants to have the love and adoration of mammon as well. If Jim McMahon wanted to be an EFY World Tour Rockstar and the Mormon Church decided to be behind Prop 8 in California, Jim McMahon would kindly, or perhaps unkindly in a way any soldier could appreciate, tell all the Hollywood/ESPN folks to pound sand - but Steve Young wants to be a hero with the media/ESPN clique as well. Perhaps Jimbo is crude, crass and unholy...but to thine own self be true. For those of us who don't fit in, like hall monitors or even possess fully functioning brains it will be glorious when our beloved Jimbo gets the honor that he earned so long ago.