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By Randy Gardner

Every weekend I  think about what I am going to write about on Monday, some weekends it is pretty tough to come up with ideas and others I have enough for about  four columns.

Most of the time when I am in a conversation, I spend listening to others and their opinions about things that affect the sports world and our everyday lives in general. You can learn so much by being a good listener.

I always tell prospective broadcasters that being a good interviewer is not about asking questions, it is about listening and reacting to answers.

That advice was passed on to me and I try to pass it on to as many others as I can because it follows us in almost every avenue of life including our children and our marriages.

A lot of times, I will throw out a topic, mostly controversial ones and just listen to everyone’s  opinion and boy do they vary.

Like this past weekend, I threw out the topic of Lauren Silberman, she is the first woman to be in an NFL combine. She is a former soccer player and tried out for the NY Jets in a regional combine as a kicker. As you can imagine, I heard the gammet on this topic from, good for her for going after her dream to the NFL stands for “ not for ladies” , remember I did not say that, I am just passing quotes on from the public.

I stand mixed on the subject. If any person male or female can do a job in any field, they should be given the opportunity to try it. The only thing I worry about though is getting hurt by a  300 pound lineman looking to take someone’s head off. Remember, she had never kicked in an organized football game at all.

I am a former soccer player and have kicked 50 plus yard field goals just goofing around with my longest being 53 but in no way would I even be close to that with a helmet, pads, and defensive players coming to block the kick!  I would be scared to death.

All of this has to be taken into consideration. Unfortunately, she hurt her leg on the first kickoff attempt and the ball went under 20 yards. Her second attempt was the same. From me to her, I give her congratulations on going after her dream because all of us that can kick field goals must stand together as I have heard from many coaches in football that they look at all field goal kickers at any level as head cases. That’s not very nice, look at most  games, the kicker either wins or loses a game for a team.

Finally, good luck to Head Coach John Parker and the new Missouri Monsters indoor football team as they kick off their season at home at the Family Arena Friday night. Indoor football is a great family sport and you wont be disappointed by the action on the field. Join the Monsters and cheer them on.

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