COMMENTARY\To want to be a Packers-backer cheesehead, not a blockhead.

Byline: Art Thiel Seattle Post-Intelligencer 

I want to be a cheesehead.

I want to be a cheesehead because that's what they call the fans of the Green Bay Packers. Green Bay is in Wisconsin, where there are lots of dairy cows and, eventually, cheese. Dairy cows produce other things, but I don't want to be called that. Although, in this job, I have.

I want to be a cheesehead because the Packers are playing in today's NFC championship game against the Dallas Cowboys, who are to the national sports scene what cigarette butts are to ice cream.

I want to be a cheesehead because I want to revel in the demise of the Cowboys. It's not that the Cowboys are bad folks - compared with some of the old Raiders teams, these guys are a misdemeanor act - but the franchise under owner Jerry Jones has come to symbolize all the arrogance, corruption and selfishness that used to be blatantly obvious only when Don King entered the room.

I want to be a cheesehead because the Packers uniforms are exactly the same as Packers uniforms of the 1960s, when they were synonymous with success, back when I didn't know what synonymous meant. Back before black and teal were cool.

I want to be a cheesehead because the Packers are the NFL version of the Mariners - a team from nowhere that suddenly could do no wrong.

I want to be a cheesehead because the Packers haven't done squat since the last championship of Vince Lombardi in 1967, which is a decade before the Seahawks even began thinking about not doing squat.

I want to be a cheesehead because the Packers had the highest ratio of best annual slogan - The Pack is Back - to worst annual results. Until now.

I want to be a cheesehead because the foam headgear would be not only a handsome accessory for my wardrobe, it is a proven safety device. One of the fromage chapeaus last month actually saved a guy from serious injury in a crash of a small plane. Frank Emmert Jr. appeared on "The Tonight Show" and has become a minor celebrity because he said he "cheddared" to think what might have happened had his hat not absorbed some of the impact.

I want to be a cheesehead because the Packers are led by quarterback Brett Favre, who is as incapable of a spiral as he is unlikely to finish a 100-yard dash in his lifetime. He is the anti-Aikman, the NFL's most valuable player, and the role model for every workman whose jeans are slung too low in the back.

I want to be a cheesehead because I want to enjoy seeing Favre have a great game, then read every sports section in the country Monday morning with three-inch headlines that say, "Cheese Whiz."

I want to be a cheesehead because ex-Packers almost never become good network broadcasters, which says a lot for them.

I want to be a cheesehead because the Packers are the only major pro sports franchise in America that is community-owned. The Packers threatening to move to another city would be like your nose threatening to move to the back of your head.

I want to be a cheesehead because it evokes the names of Bart Starr, Jim Taylor, Jerry Kramer, Willie Davis, Herb Adderley and Ray Nitschke, guys with more than a standard share of knuckle hair and less than a standard share of teeth.

I want to be a cheesehead because Lambeau Field will never, ever have artificial turf.

I want to be a cheesehead because if the Packers continue their upward track, they could host the NFC championship game next season in a blizzard like the one that hit the East this week. It will be the most entertaining sports event in world history.

I want to be a cheesehead because I like to hear the late John Facenda, doomsday voice of NFL Films, say, "On an afternoon of bitter cold, with the earth frozen deep, Vince Lombardi gathered around him men harder than the weather to demand of them a greatness . . ." Any other scene, any other team, and it's overblown dramatics. With the old Packers at Lambeau Field, I buy it.

I want to be a cheesehead because the team is in Green Bay. Not Milwaukee, or a real city. Green Bay, fergawdsakes. The franchise has been around so long that the name is a fixture in the mind. But think about it. This is like the Magic Johnson-led Lakers playing Yakima, Wash., for the NBA title.

I want to be a cheesehead because I don't want the sport turned over to the likes of Jones and his helmeted equivalent, Deion Sanders, who are good at what they do and bad about letting everyone know.

I want to be a cheesehead because otherwise, if Dallas coach Barry Switzer wins, the new sports trend will be:

I want to be a blockhead.