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Loading ...Red Shirt (n) – a stock “cannon fodder” character in fiction, particularly in Star Trek (the original series)
yeaahhh…nnaaahhh.
Red Shirt (n) – a term referring to delaying a college athlete’s participation in order to lengthen eligibility.
Ask any former or current Varsity football player about the coveted Red Shirt and you’ll be instantly met with a smile. After all, there’s no better way to spend freshman year than learning from the upperclassmen on the football field while partying and doing tons of work off the field in the process.
Flashforward five years. College is over, you’ve retired your jersey in your parents’ living room, and the glory days of killing it in your frat house have long passed. To make matters worse, the recession has forced you away from the Center of The Universe – “New York City” – and back home to suburban Maryland. After all, being a highly recruited athlete can’t always land you a job in a shitty economy. You begin to wonder if you made a mistake not following your blockhead friends into the sick world of finance before The Dow plummeted.
That’s when you remember that you’re not losing. You’re just Red Shirting … all over again. Instead of making mistakes on the field, you’re sitting in front of the couch at your parents’ house, eating free meals, studying plays and watching old footage (Facebook). Instead of dropping passes (read: failing miserably at the bar), you’re waiting patiently in the wings to replace your washed out teammates.
You’re taking some time off to make yourself stronger and fitter in the long run, all while taking some “practice snaps” at your parents’ basement or NYC friends’ common areas. So don’t despair, you’ll play again soon enough.
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