Prep Football: The Gridiron Grump stalls out on playoff drive

Road to State — Following Naselle to the State semifinals proves tricky

The Gridiron Grump for Blast Zone Media

This dispatch is coming out a little later than the boss would have preferred this week, but I promise I have a good excuse. You see, I’m writing to you from a rest stop that’s been doubling as my neighborhood overnight after another unfortunate mishap for your favorite grumpster.

I don’t know if it was a wapiti, or a chupacabra or a sasquatch or what, but who/whatever it was that I ran over with the recently renovated Winnebago stood its ground like Jack Strange at linebacker. Or maybe it was more like William Anderson on the line, forever refusing to give an inch for the Naselle defense.

Whatever it was that I hit when my eyes started to get droopy in the witching hour near the summit of the mountain pass, it left me stranded like the time I tried to drive the entirety of the ocean front property on the Long Beach Peninsula at high tide.

I know you are all sad to hear about my headlong run in with a mythical character (a lot of people have been saying I hit a tree, but I’d never admit to it), however, the biggest disappointment of the deal is that I’m left with no working transportation and no way to get to Moses Lake to see Naselle football battle three towns at once in the State semifinals. Turns out, nobody wants to pick up a hitchhiker who won’t put out his cigar and insists on inspecting every piece of roadkill for salvage prospects.

That’s right, I was lucky enough to finally draw a game day assignment from the BZM braintrust this week and all I had to do was drive nearly all the way across the not too bad state of Washington in order to make it happen. Specifically, my task was to cover the Comets of South Pacific County as they try to punch their ticket to the State championship game at Husky Stadium.

Naselle will play Wilbur-Creston-Keller today (Saturday) at Lion’s Field in Moses Lake at 1 p.m. And there ain’t no way in the Winlock I’m getting there on time now while my radiator gurgles liquid fire like dragon’s breath and this matted fur keeps flying out of my air vents. But fear not, because we’ve found a local scribe who can handle the task at hand, probably much more eloquently than I ever could, to be honest. His name is Byrne Bennett (@Byrne_Bennett on Twitter/X for you brave souls), and sources say he’s got a penchant for putting his pen to work.

But just because Byrne gets to be the man on the ground for BZM doesn’t mean I haven’t been burning the midnight blubber to be prepared for the job I thought I’d have.

So, now that you know how I got here, let’s learn a little bit about the Comets and the Wildcats, where they’ve been, where they’re trying to go, and how they plan on getting there. And if you’re going that way, too, I could use a ride.