Lions Adventure 2025: Battle
Great running back units get nicknames. Last year the combo of Jahmyr Gibbs and David Montgomery nicknamed themselves Sonic and Knuckles. It resulted in my favorite subtle running gag all year: announcers clearly not knowing who Knuckles is.
Sometimes it’s easy to forget you live in a bubble and some of your knowledge doesn’t translate to large amounts of other people. I’ve known who Knuckles is for most of my life. I played the Sonic games when I was a kid. Knuckles was always my favorite character because he was a grumpy hardass who was also stupid. But Knuckles is what I would call Video Game famous. If you like video games and play games as even a light hobby/pastime, you know who Knuckles is. Even with the popularity of the recent Sonic movies, Knuckles remains a subculture character. Sonic does not have this problem. Sonic broke through to the mainstream pop culture sphere of influence. My mom knows who Sonic is. He’s not as famous as Mario, but he’s there. If you ask a boomer who never touched a video game to name video game characters, chances are high Sonic is one of them. Also Pikachu, Mario, Donkey Kong, and possibly that Zelda guy with the sword.
You could hear this all year in the announcer’s booth during Lions games. The commentators would mention the Sonic and Knuckles moniker, and you could hear that slight hesitation in their voices when trying to explain it. They knew Sonic, they knew his gimmick was speed…but who is Knuckles? I guess he’s the “tough” guy? It felt the same as when an announcer has to do a plug for a show and just reads the advertising copy they are handed and you can tell they’ve never even heard of the show. Knuckles was beyond them. It gave me joy to hear these people try to understand the youths, despite Knuckles being over 30 years old.
So I’d love to hear them try to explain Rouge the Bat.
I assume my selections for player matches will cause arguments, so come at me with who is what character. Nobody is allowed to argue with Penei Sewell as Big the Cat.
How much time did you spend thinking on which player is which character?
I guess I’m a Lions fan now…. Does that mean the Curse of Bobby Layne is Sega’s mismanagement, or Ken Penders?
Also, if Sonic was real, Al Davis would rise from the grave to make 20 Ricky Williams trades to draft him.
Now I’m curious if Dave is familiar with this masterpiece:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IMC0uZY2iH0
“and possibly that Zelda guy with the sword”
You just got at least twenty hits put out on you with that crack.
But what about Metroid? Surely people know him, too.
Goff feels more like a Tails to me.
This is timely. My son was just playing with his grandma, and she referred to his toys as “Sonic and Red Sonic with Dreads.”
Shadow as Jameson Williams seems like it should have been a layup after his gun charge last year
Not to be that asshole (just kidding, I love doing this), but the striping on their foreheads is inaccurate; the helmet stripe was changed before the 2024 season.
“Chronological pedantry. Five yard penalty, automatic first down.”
Also Jahmyr Gibbs wears number 0 now, boy I sure hope somebody got fired over that blunder.
While I’m sure he won’t become a household name with adults at Sonic’s level, the Sonic movies are likely raising Knuckles’ profile considerably among the average American.
I brought out the Sega Saturn a few months back and played Sonic R and my 4 year old, who has never played a Sonic game nor seen any of the movies, recognized Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles and called them by name (in Sonic R, with its crude 1st generation polygon graphics, no less!). Osmosis through having friends at daycare who have seen the Sonic movies and/or played the games, I guess…
Gaming as a whole still feels like a distinct subculture. It may always be that way given its expense and time/skill investment relative to other media. Take Pikachu; how many people would know Pokémon is specifically a video game series as opposed to, say, the TV show? TV lends itself a lot better to osmosis.