Is you wife/girlfriend a bleeding heart, save the world type?  Is her knowledge of football the equivalent of your knowledge of the cast of characters in her favorite soap opera?  If you want her to be a football fan or at least more tolerant to your football needs, a recent experience of mine may be the answer.

Before getting married my wife could care less about sports.  She basically thought that all athletes didn't deserve the money they made and were all jerks.  (keen observation) However, after passively watching NFL Primetime, ESPN's brilliant "My Wish" and the emotional pre-game weekly stories of athletes that came from nothing to be NFL stars, the Blickees First Lady's guard began to weaken.  Bob Sanders' father's emotional story involving his work in a steel mill added fuel to the fire.  Peyton Manning's all American commercials further fanned the flames.  The straw that broke the camel's back were specials on Tony Dungy after the death of his son.

As a result of Dungy and Peyton's unblemished images a Colts fan was born.  In her first year as a Colts fan she was able to follow her team through a successful Super Bowl run, something I have yet to experience as an Eagles fan.  This past year she experienced pain and disappointment for the first time as the Colts were eliminated in the playoffs. (I was able to provide my expertise in coping with losing)  Next thing I know she's telling me how she can't wait for football season.  So all is fine in the Blickees household right?  Not quite.
 

I am a die hard Eagles fan.  I think that Donovan McNabb is one of the most unfairly treated athletes in sports by the media.  As a result, my wife hates him.  You can't know how painful it is to hear some of the same things from her that I hear from my idiotic Cowboy fan friends and the extreme media.  I'm watching an Eagles game when McNabb throws a bad pass and the new football expert says, "who the f_*& was he throwing the ball too?"  When Feeley played I heard "yeah you guys need to get rid of McNabb he sucks why don't you just play that Feel guy."  This evolved into comments on his weight such as, "McNabb needs to lay off the chunky soup" and "Maybe if he dropped some weight he would play better

A ray of hope in converting Mrs. Blickees into an Eagles fan occurred courtesy of the ESPN "My Wish" episode with Big Ben and the Steelers.  (an awesome episode by the way)  You have to have tons of respect for the Steelers organization after watching this.  Basically there was a disabled kid in a wheelchair and they signed him to a mock contract culminating in his first NFL carry and TD.  Mrs. Blickees watched this and after some tear shedding the Steelers became her second favorite team and Big Ben her second favorite quarterback.

So, I figure I can make her an Eagles/McNabb fan in the same way.  I took a wild guess that McNabb has a foundation, which should probably be called the Donovan McNabb foundation.  After a quick google we find a link to that very foundation that donates for diabetes research.  Jackpot! My wife clicks on the link and . . . its broken!  Nabbs isn't helping the situation with a nonfunctional foundation website.

So we go to McNabb's homepage to see if more info about his good deeds is available there.  We're treated to an extravagant flash intro that leads to "Dononvan McNabb, the businessman, the athlete, the family man and the philanthropist."  McNabb is posing like a low budget Tyson Beckford in the background in expensive suits taking up more than half of the website.  His foundation is mentioned in passing yet all links to the website are broken with minimal mention of contributions made by the foundation or its activities.

So maybe the Eagles homepage will foster a love for the team?  I find a playground project, youth camps, and a visit to a sick children's hospital on video.  I explain to the wife, "see all those Eagles players volunteering" to which she responds, "name one Eagles player on that video."  Unfortunately McNabb, Westbrook, B Dawk and all the other big name players are missing in action.  Where fore art thou my Eagles role models?

Mrs. Blickees proceeds to show me how it should be done so off to Peyton's foundation website.  Peyton's real site is a pile of dog poo but it provides links to the Peyback Foundation, The Peyton Manning Children's hospital as well as 5 other philanthropist events.  Perfect argument for the whole "Peyton doesn't want the attention on him unlike McNabb and his $10,000 personal site an non-existent foundation website."  The foundation websites are elaborate and detailed.  This does not help my argument. 

Suffice to say, no one is Peyton Manning when it comes to public service.  Searches for McNabb, Romo, TO, Carson Palmer, Vince Young, and Big Ben all turn up nothing but maybe a youth camp here and there.  It also doesn't help that she has a crush on Peyton Manning.  Its not your normal crush mind you; her idea of Peyton whispering sweet nothings in her ear is, “hey darling,  I donated 400k to the Hurricane Katrina relief fund today.”

So the best way to convert your significant other is to appeal to her emotional side.  Create a DVR library of all the wonderful documentaries showing your teams contribution to society.  Highlight the good guys on your team and their activities. 

Unfortunately for me either the Eagles are severely lacking in redeeming qualities or they are in desperate need of some great public relations work.   Considering that I became an Eagles fan during the Buddy Ryan "Bounty Bowl" era when players allegedly were paid extra to  injure players on the opposing team, the apparent lack of community involvement is strangely part of the allure. (I can understand why you'd want to off Troy Aikman, but what did Luis Lendejas do Buddy?) I'll just give up on trying to sway Ms. Public Servant by appealing to her softer side.