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It's East Dillon versus Dillon this week and the Panthers get devious. Unable to trash East Dillon's field again with Buddy keeping watch 24-7 this year, they take the battle to the internet, setting up a website to release the supposedly-sealed juvenile delinquency arrest records of a number of the Lions players. Vince is worried that his thuggish past will make him unattractive to college recruiters, which is just the most naive thing I have ever heard! But, we'll go with it. Meanwhile, his father has taken over the reins from Coach Taylor dealing with the recruiters. Coach is pissed, clearly thinking that Ornette doesn't have his priorities (which seem to focus a lot on "TV time") straight when it comes to his son. In a chilling scene, Ornette, smile wide eyes dead, tells Coach to step off and focus on bossing around all the other "bitch ass parents:" he's got Vince's future in hand.
The Big Cat Clash game ends up in the Lions favor, but it looks like Coach released something in his boys when they played Kingdom, because it's all penalty flags and poor sportsmanship on the field again. Billy thinks it's just kids having fun but oldsters Coach and Crowley take it a lot more seriously.
In relationship land, Julie continues to mope around the house despite her parents best efforts to make home as uncomfortable and nagging as possible. And Billy gives Luke some advice re: Becky: ignore her and she'll come to you. So Luke goes all tough, and Becky plays right into his hands. Of course he makes it all super charming, finally breaking character to ask her "Do you like it when I'm nice to you?" but even he knows that Billy's ass-backwards emotional manipulation had a dash of genius alongside its whiff of booze.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!Open at the end of Lions practice. Jess buzzes around Coach like a busy little bee, asking for a recommendation to get a spot on staff during Baylor's Summer Football Camp. Coach, distracted, bobbing and weaving, tells her to just write her own recommendation and put on his desk for him to sign. Jess wonders if that's "legal" and Coach just sort of busily says yes and leaves her behind. Meanwhile, Buddy has driven up onto the field in his SUV, with assorted other vehicles following. A bunch of guys hop out and Buddy calls to Coach asking if he's got an outlet out there. Coach is confused so Buddy exposits that it's Rivalry Week again and they're not going to let the Panthers vandalize their field again. Buddy is carrying a portable fan around like he's The Jerk. Coach yells across to "Colonel," a wiry African American man, wondering what he's going to do with that shotgun he's carrying. Buddy assures Coach they won't let anything happen. Coach lowers his voice and demands that the shotgun get gone.
Coach walks into an outdoor barbecue joint to join... JASON STREET!!! Jason passes across a little snapshot of his son Noah and What's Her Name, mentioning by-the-by that it was hard to convince her to have the kid but now that they do, she can't wait to have another. Coach interrupts to ask "Wait, now, you made it legal?" and then gives the kid a sympathetic hard time about him not telling Coach about any of that first. Scott Porter is still doing a bang-up job playing this part; they way he holds his hands and continues to use his wrists to compensate for his immobile fingers caught by the camera. Coach gives him a little red hat for his son and Street jokes that the Streets look better in blue. Then Street tells Coach about his promotion-- he's now a full-fledged sports agent. Coach, who has the nicest, softest eyes in this scene, tells him that he did good. Street tells Coach that people are talking about him, he gets a phone call a day about Coach, and he needs to know if Coach would be interested in college coaching. Coach tells him that he's happy where he's at, he loves his team, he loves his school, his wife is happy, they've almost got one daughter out of the house (snerk) and the other coming up, "I've got no interest right now."
Jess and Vince walk into his apartment talking about her recommendation conundrum. They open the door and find Ornette and Regina making out. Jess teases, "Oh, suki suki!" but as Ornette runs back to the bedroom to get something her face falls and Vince tells her that his father has moved back in. They follow Ornette, and he gives Vince a bunch of presents -- hats and shirts and shoes from TMU. Jess tries to keep a neutral face, Vince thanks his father but tells him that he can't take them, Coach would be upset about it. Ornette leaves the room and Jess tells Vince that she's not so sure about Ornette moving back in. Vince tries to assure her that he's doing much better and making Regina so happy. Jess nods, and they head back out to the kitchen for pork chops.
Out on the Lions field, Buddy and his crew sit around on folding chairs shooting the shit until Buddy calls their attention to the radio playing in the background: "Looks like 6 and 0 isn't the only record the East Dillon Lions have." Buddy gets Coach on the phone ASAP and we watch as Coach turns on the radio in his truck to catch Slammin' Sammy talking about some website that just went up listing the criminal records of many of the Lions players. "He's got a team full of violent criminals."
Credits. Open on the Lions gathered around a computer looking at LionsHater.com. Weird animation leads the viewer to a page full of mug shots, the most hilarious of which is third from the left -- Hastings Ruckle as a, like, 11-year-old. Tough! Luke can't believe it, Tinker wonders what he's worried about, he doesn't even have a record. Vince points out that their records are supposed to be locked up. Tinker clicks through to his own page, and Luke wonders aloud what the hell he was doing breaking in to a pawn shop. Tinker shakes his head and says it wasn't even his idea, it was his cousin's. Hastings, in the background, shakes his head and walks away. Which is like what he's doing in EVERY SINGLE SCENE he's ever been in. Joe R and I have been discussing how very blue-balled (okay, that is my term, not his) we have been feeling, waiting around for our intellectual jock story line. Sigh.
The Panthers booster meeting in the back room of the Applebee's. There's no Joe McCoy to bear my wrath but there is some awful man telling an off-color story about some woman who had her skirt tucked into her panties by accident. Ugh. Remember when Tami Taylor marched into one of their meetings and told them what was what? Well this time it's Coach, and he comes barreling in to ask "a simple question": who released the records on his players? They play dumb and Coach reminds them that the players are just kids. They play dumb some more but Coach just tells them to "shut it down." If they want to go after someone, they should go after him, not his players. He takes his leave, nodding at Mac (who looks sheepish and ashamed) as he leaves.
Tami is on the phone with someone at Burleson College, trying to explain that Julie was just overwhelmed, but doesn't want to lose all her work from the semester. Julie comes out looking for a dad-prepared "tofu scramble." Tami is curt with her, saying that there's cereal for her. Julie pushes it a bit, "Great. Cereal." When Tami asks what she's doing today, all she can come up with is "answering a few emails and doing some stuff." So Tami tells her that she needs to take Grace to school and pick her up. Julie starts complaining, but Tami cuts her off, telling her that if she's going to be living there, she has to help out, and also figure out how to pay her father back for the car. Tami gives her ten minutes to leave with Gracie, and Julie slumps and mopes.
Lions practice. The kids are distracted, Coach calls them to huddle up. He tells them that he knows they are thinking about the website. He tells them that the release of that information is criminal and whoever did it will be punished. Vince says it doesn't matter who did it, the information is out there now. Coach tells him that he knows they are all pissed, he's pissed, too. But that whoever did it did it to blind them with anger and he's asking them to not let that happen. He asks the kids to focus. Then: "Friday: what do you say we punish?" The kids murmur in retribution-y excitement. They break up and Coach asks Vince for a word. Vince, through his helmet, asks Coach if he really thinks that any colleges are going to want Vince after this. This is seriously like the most naive statement ever. Coach tells him the records won't matter, but Vince thinks that now all anyone will ever see in him is "a thug." After School Special out!
Billy has Luke lifting a car fender in his back yard, yelling at him that "real men don't use weights." Becky comes out of the house with Stevie on her hip. Luke looks at her and smiles big: "Hey Becky. You're looking good." She goes back in and Billy is like "Really? That's your game?" Luke tells Billy that Mindy told him to go for it. Billy reminds him that "my wife is a woman, dumb ass. She doesn't understand how men work." He says that the first rule is that if you like a chick, you have to ignore them. Then he asks Luke if he knows how he got Mindy. Luke is willing to hear the story, and so Billy tells him all about how he went into The Landing Strip a bunch of times and got a lap dance from every girl EXCEPT Mindy. And that by doing so, he had Mindy BEGGING him to let her take him into the "Champagne Room." But Luke is barely able to keep up with the story because he's way back at "Ms. Riggins works at The Landing Strip?!" Billy tells Luke that he's got to let the woman know that "they can't get this. This doesn't come for free. They gotta earn...THIS" vaguely and off-camera gesturing at his crotch. Luke shifts his glance from face to crotch, and basically this is a great scene. Luke closes it down by asking, with a grin, whether "Ms. Riggins" still works at The Landing Strip. Billy sends him back to his fender benches.
Coach dwells on the website when Tami comes into the kitchen. She tells him to stop wallowing, that even if the material on the website is rough, they are still his boys and he's doing a great job with them. She sort of sighs and then says "Let's have a barbecue" which is a miracle, because Tami Taylor does not like to suffer all these boys coming in her house clogging her toilets. Coach is surprised by her offer, and she sort of sighs some more "Barbecues build morale, right?" But then Tami gets inspired and realizes that she can put Julie in charge of a lot of the annoying barbecue logistics and declares, as the phone rings, that maybe they should do it just for that. Coach answers the phone and it's a guy from fake Shane State in Florida calling about an opening they have on their staff. Coach tells him that he's not interested in assistant coaching jobs and this guy says he's not offering that. He's offering a Head Coach position. Coach is taken aback for a moment but then reiterates his position that he's not interested. The guy persists, saying that he thinks Coach is the best high school football coach in the country. Coach tells him that he's caught him at a bad time, and the man says okay, but he's not done bugging him about this.
Vince throws the football through a tire strung up out back of his apartment complex. His father comes out, smoking. I love Smoking Ornette. BAD GUY, you guys. He SMOKES! He comes out and asks Vince what's on his mind, and Vince tells him that he's pissed that he's worked so hard, but now TMU probably just deleted his number overnight. Ornette takes out his phone and rattles off some numbers. "Area codes" he tells his son. Turns out he's got hos in different area codes. Where hos=colleges interested in Vince. Alabama, Florida, Oklahoma. He's been talking to these schools all day. They don't care about Vince's record, not since Ornette told him that he's got an offer from TMU. But, wait! Vince doesn't HAVE an offer. Ornette says it doesn't matter, they don't know it. They're coming to watch him play this week, "see that canon of yours." Show them a sixty-yard arm and he'll get a scholarship. Vince says he doesn't make the play calls, and doesn't know if he'll get a chance to throw like that. Ornette reminds him of a time when he was little and they went to the park and Vince insisted on climbing a tree. But once he got up there, he was too scared to come down. Ornette asks if he remembers what he said then and Vince does: "Don't worry, son, I ain't gonna let you fall." And now Ornette repeats those words back to his son. He won't let him fall.
Commercials. Tami buzzes about the house shouting about how they are going to have 300 people in their house and everyone needs to pitch in. She tells Julie to go shopping for food that afternoon, and that she'll be taking care of Grace and setting up. Julie nitpicks her duties but Tami holds firm. Meanwhile, in the kitchen, Coach is going through the fridge, horrified when he pulls out a container of Fage yogurt: "Who eats this stuff?!?"
Over at the Playgirl Ranch, Luke hits tires with sledgehammers, holds a tank of propane over his head, wheels a wheelbarrow full of bricks around all while Billy wears Stevie in a Baby Bjorn on his chest, covering the child's head when he takes sips of beer. Billy whips up a nasty looking shake for Luke to drink, which Luke does, but not without grabbing an unblended piece of spinach out of his mouth and nearly gagging it all up while he does. Billy tells him that he used to make these shakes for Tim, and that the difference between Tim and Luke is that Tim LIKED to hit people and Luke does not. Luke protests and so Billy takes him over to a punching bag set up with the image of a Panther player -- Tommy Larkin -- on it. He gives Luke the players stats and tells Luke that come game day he's got to go for this kid and lay. him. out. Luke starts punching and punching until Billy has to run off to go get his baby. Which: heh.
Lions practice. Ornette watches his son and talks talks talks to Jason Street on the sidelines, worrying over how nobody is getting to see his son's canon arm. Jason politely hmms and yeses him. On the field, Jess runs over to Coach to ask about the recommendation but he pushes her concern aside to ask about Vince. Coach Taylor, you may be a molder of men, but you are FAILING YOUR GIRLS. He asks her about anyone getting in touch with TMU on his behalf, which is just a shitty thing to ask Jess. She stays loyal to Vince and says she doesn't know what he's talking about. Over on the sidelines, Ornette continues talking his kid up to Street. Ornette asks what school gets kids to the pros quickest, which school he'd get TV time at. Street kind of quietly mutters to Vince about finding a school he's comfortable at, not worrying about TV time. Coach calls over for Vince to get back on the field. "I need my quarterback." Ornette takes offense at this statement, and uses his verbal prowess to spin around Coach -- "Oh, okay, YOUR quarterback. Can you let him air it out a bit? Throw that 60-yard bomb? You the Kingmaker. You the masterMIND." Meanwhile, Jason Street has started wheeling onto the field toward Coach. He gets there and says quietly: "You know you got a problem there, don't you?" and Coach, hands on hips, "I sure do" and damn this plot line is just really interesting to me. Shot through with so many issues regarding class and race. These white men doing what "we" think is best for Vince, paternalism at work; Vince's father, grasping at autonomy, trying to articulate what he thinks is best for his kid, which is not an upstanding-John-Cougar-Mellancamp vision of sport and manhood and citizenry but rather a too-obvious grab for money and success, unleavened by the wholesome narrative white people like to lay over top. And, really, even though he is obviously Evil Cigarette Smoking Man, do we really blame Ornette here?
Barbecue at the Taylor's. Coach works the grill, people mill about, the players wear shirts and ties. The Deacon calls everyone to prayer, quotes James Russell Lowell (which, what? Lowell in Texas?!). He asks for focus on Friday and strength for the community. "Lions say 'Amen'" Becky says hi to Luke but he ignores her to go talk to Julie about college, which she stutters about a bit. Out front of the house, Vince and his family and some other folks hang out while the little boys run around with Ornette and Vince. Regina and Jess talk about father and son, Regina with some seriously rose-colored glasses on about their relationship. Ornette's phone rings and he takes it around the side of the house, clearly talking to a recruiter. He hangs up as Coach approaches, his hair kind of lamely "finger guns," which doesn't bode well for this conversation. Coach broaches the subject of Ornette having contact with scouts. Coach reminds him that they had agreed that everything would go through him. Ornette says that is not how he remembers it and so Coach asks him to please let him know how he DOES remember it. Ornette starts blinking rapidly, which is like a surprisingly intimidating move, and slowly rubs his ear, saying that he remembers listening to what Coach had to say, but that nobody put him in charge. "You the coach. This is my SON." Ornette tells Coach to just go ahead and "be the coach, boss all these little bitch-ass parents around" then turns and fixes Coach with his eyes, "But that ain't gonna fly with me." He switches tones on a dime, brightly declaring that he's going to go get some pie. Does Coach want any? No? Okay, then. He loves that brisket. And saunters off, while Coach is stuck there speechless, with some seriously deflated hair. In the background we notice Vince noticing their tense interaction.
Tami gets in bed, moaning with tiredness, and then cuddles up with Coach. She tells him that she's not going to the game on Friday because she is going to drive up to Burleson College to pick up Julie's books and assignments. Coach is outraged that she would do this, why doesn't Julie do it herself? Tami says she can't get Julie to do anything, she barely leaves the house. They talk at and over each other, Tami saying she won't let Julie miss her first semester of college, Eric declaring he thinks "that damn kid is climbing back in the womb again!" Tami settles back down and Eric suggests that while she's there she should tell them they've got an employee messing around with students. Tami reminds him that "it takes two to tango" and Eric asks her to please not even talk about that, he doesn't want to think about that. She nestles in and Eric thanks her for setting up the barbecue. He kisses her on the head. "Thanks for all you do. Thanks for our two beautiful daughters. Thanks for doing the laundry." They start to make out a little and Coach's hair goes all question mark/exclamation mark: "Hey, you wanna fool around?" Tami mutters, "sure".....right before she passes out asleep.
Commercials Tami wanders into Head T.A. Derek Bishop's office. She asks if he's the professor, and he tells her that he's the TA, Derek. Tami's face goes a bit stunned and she hesitates before quietly asking to pick up an independent study for Julie Taylor. She can barely look at him. He asks her, with way too much solicitation if you ask me, how Julie is doing and Tami's mouth is tight, "She's fine." Derek flutters around gathering materials to hand to Tami and she leaves with a very punctilious "Thank you very much." And, lord, as much as we want to see Tami Taylor unleash the rage on this doofus, it is so right that she doesn't. Even if she is picking up assignments for Julie like she's a second grader stuck at home with the chicken pox, Julie IS an adult, and her mom can't go around raging at people on her behalf. But what restraint that probably took Tami.
Game time. Luke walks toward the locker room amidst fanfare. Deacon asks him what he's going to do to Tommy Larkin and Luke turns around and talks some trash that he probably doesn't mean to be adorable but: well it is. "I'm gonna rip Tommy Larkin's head off, chew up his bones!" Aw, Luke Cafferty! He passes by Becky and says "Hey, Rally Girl." She stops and is like "What did you just call me?" and all he says is "Stadium's that way" not even bothering to listen when she says she isn't going to the game. Becky shifts her weight back and forth as he walks on.
Announcer exposits about all the bad blood between the Lions and the Panthers. Camera catches kids up in the stands wearing black and white prison stripes. On the sidelines, Street rallies the Panthers by shouting "We the only team in Dillon!" while Coach rallies his players by saying they are about to leave it all on the field. Game starts and the first play we see finds Luke Cafferty seriously laying Tommy Larkin out. Larkin is down, injured, and the Lions act kind of poorly on the sidelines, shouting and celebrating when sportsmanship calls for sober consideration of the other player's pain. The coaches try to restrain their boys, but they have let something out that they can't quite control. play, Luke sacks the quarterback and the teams get shove-y out on the field. Ornette is up in the stands talking up his kid to a scout when Vince takes a snap and then runs it all the way in for a touchdown, to everyone's delight. The Lions overcelebrate on the sidelines. snap, Luke runs it into the endzone. More plays, more monster hits, more mixing it up on the field, more flags being thrown. Crowley asks Coach -- who has been standing aside, very un-Coach-like -- if he's going to do anything about this, prompting Coach to go yell some at his players. Billy, grinning, tells him to relax, the kids are just having fun, and Crowley turns to him and growls, "I am not talking to you. NOT talking to YOU."
The score is 31-7 Lions with just about 20 seconds to go. Coach sends Vince out for the last play of the game, telling him to take a knee and run the clock out. Vince runs out and catches his father pointing his finger at him from the stands. The team at first takes their Victory formation to take a knee, but Vince changes it up at the last minute. He takes a snap and throws the ball all the way downfield to Hastings who catches it and runs it in for a very unnecessary final touchdown. Coach watches in dismay, the announcer talks about the chip Eric Taylor has on his shoulder, Ornette celebrates in the stands, the scout talks about what a nice throw that was. And as the kids celebrate and Tinker shouts at the Panthers to get off his field, and Crowley shouts over to him that "this isn't who we are, Eric," Coach's hair is at a loss, like he suddenly found himself at a party full of people he despises, a bunch of cokeheads and braggarts.
Commercials. Lions locker room. Major celebrations while Eric full-out YELLS at Vince about his father orchestrating that bad-faith final touchdown and Vince breaking down and yelling back that yeah, so what if he did? His father is looking out for him. Vince joins the chanting celebration while Coach and his hair (which looks like a cartoon character, pointing right and left simultaneously) slam the door to their office behind them.
Outside, Luke signs an autograph for a kid and then sees Becky walking by. "Hey, fours!" he calls, because she is wearing a shirt with his number, "44" on it. She comes over, smiling and gives him a hug which he doesn't really respond to. She finally asks him, "What are you doing?" and he replies that he's going to Buddy's, maybe catch a keg somewhere. But she's like, no, why are you acting weird toward me? He plays dumb and she mimicks him tough-talking at her. She says that she figured it was just testosterone pumping before the game, but... She says that he's usually friendly and call her by her name and that is all it takes to crack Tough Luke Cafferty. His puppy dog ways come right back as he asks, "Wait, you like it when I'm nice to you?" and she's like "YES!" He explains that someone told him that if he liked her, he had to ignore her to get her to like him. "Becky, I hate acting this way toward you. I really like you." She tells him that she really likes him, too and then leans in for a kiss, which he breaks by smiling and laughing, "It totally worked." Which, yeah, it totally did. Chalk one up to the Surprising Wisdom of Billy Riggins.
Tami comes home to a sad Julie on the couch. Julie quickly says that she cleaned the kitchen. Tami quietly thanks her and then puts all of Julie's books down on the coffee table in front of her. A big World History textbook (for her American History course?), TWO MLA handbooks, and a copy of Washington Square. Hell yeah on this last one. Julie asks if Tami talked to Derek and Tami just murmurs in response. Julie wants to know what he said and Tami just tells her "You need to study." And we understand, again, that Tami can only take care of some of the logistics now. The emotional instruction she has to press pause on for a while, let Julie figure things out on her own.
Crowley and Coach listen to the radio in his office after the game. Lots of people calling in to say that Coach should be ashamed of himself, letting that game go the way it did. Crowley keeps listening as Coach just packs up his stuff to leave. Eric asks is Crowley is going to Buddy's for a beer and he says no, he doesn't feel like celebrating. Eric leaves the fieldhouse only to catch a glimpse of Ornette and Vince talking to a scout in the parking lot. Coach watches from afar, completely cut out of the equation. Ornette glances his direction, wanting to keep it that way. Vince glances in his direction, torn about having to choose between father and father figure.