It’s important that we start here first. Toward the end of a discussion of the matter we are about to INVESTIGATE, Dallas Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy uttered these words: “Probably don’t think I have much personality, but I do have a little bit.”
Correct, Mike. I don’t think you have much personality and I think using a commercially available powder with a semi-funny name meant to ease chafing and sweating in delicate areas as a motivational tactic for your team shows that you do only have “a little bit.”
Hold on one second, let me back up a bit. If you want the straight details on all of this, please read USA TODAY’s Jori Epstein, who does an excellent job of covering all things Cowboys, including this story.
Aight. So. This is where we’re at in an NFL season that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense in so many ways. The Dallas Cowboys could go on a long winning streak, make a push deep into the playoffs, might even win the whole thing …. and we’re going to have to remember this as some sort of turning point.
WTF.
I can hear the Ghost of John Facenda saying it now: “But then everything changed,” ORCHESTRAL MUSIC INTENSIFIES, “when head coach Mike McCarthy told his team about” DRUMS BOOMING, STRINGS DEAFENING “mystical monkey butt powder.”
That may actually be the best thing about all of this. The whole product idea is that you DON’T have a monkey butt after using it, but McCarthy just drops “anti” so that it appears maybe the powder gives you monkey butt? Is made of monkey butt?
Epstein also reports that McCarthy urged reporters to buy this stuff by saying, “It’s expressive in the cure.” I’ve spent a good 12 minutes trying to find a way that these words placed in this order could convey any sort of meaning.
They don’t.
This team is winning the Super Bowl. Book it.
Here’s McCarthy explaining his thinking, per Epstein:
“I highly recommend it, if anybody has never used it,” McCarthy said. “I don’t want to get into my personnel hygiene here, but ‘RAW,’ Red Ass Week, was the topic. We made an emphasis based on correcting what went on last week. I thought our players did a great job with it. Just had some fun with it.
“Another way to focus.”
Football locker rooms are, without question, the weirdest place in sports. You’ve got somewhere in the vicinity of 70 men — between the active roster, the practice squad and any injured players lingering around working their way back — who make up any given team. A few of those guys are stars playing on big contracts, mostly set for life. A bunch of them make decent money but will probably be in the league only a few years. A third of them are just hanging on to the dream, making what they can while desperately trying to stick in the league.
So, yeah, finding one message to reverberate with and motivate all of those people is tough. And perhaps something as silly and straightforward as saying “we got our butts kicked so now we need some of this powder” can work.
Or maybe the Cowboys played the Atlanta Falcons, and the Atlanta Falcons are a putrid football team a lot of the time.
Anyway, I promised you an INVESTIGATION into what this stuff is and, well, it’s:
- Cornstarch
- Kaolin
- Sodium bicarbonate
- Powdered calamine
Alrighty. So that’s two things you’ll find on the baking shelf of your pantry (sodium bicarbonate is baking soda), some clay powder and calamine powder.
Seems useful enough, sure. Worked some hot summer jobs in my day — cleaning a baseball stadium for a few summers, running a machine in a factory another — and don’t think I ever felt the need to powder down there, but I can see how this might work out for some people.
There’s a baby version, too; but seriously parents, just put a thin layer of Desitin or Boudreaux’s Butt Paste on there for each diaper change, it’s plenty. No reason to mess with powder.
Also, there’s “Lady Anti Monkey Butt Powder,” which has some extra fragrance added. The company’s official website promises a “New Look” for that product, because apparently women don’t want to purchase something that is advertised to them with a large red monkey rear end. Who knew.
I considered buying some of this for my wife, because all of life is content and I was going to record her reaction and share it here.
But I don’t want to sleep in the shed for the next 10 days, so I didn’t.
[mm-video type=playlist id=01f09m93q11d4tbgfy player_id=none image=https://ftw.usatoday.com/wp-content/plugins/mm-video/images/playlist-icon.png]
[listicle id=1261997]
