Thank You, Arian Foster

Rivers' exquisitely crafted note of gratitude to Wade Phillips gave us an idea. For the next several days, we'll periodically be posting entries thanking various people who had a hand in making the Texans' 2011 season as enjoyable as it was. The season's over, which blows, but there's a lot to appreciate, and it's a loooooong offseason, so let's do take a minute to say thank you.

Arian,

I know you're probably pretty tired from the long and grueling season you just finished, and I sure hope you're taking some well-deserved rest. In honor of the Texans' first ever playoff season, the BRB staff has decided to take turns thanking someone associated with the season. You know, just to let them know how much we appreciate them.

When it was my turn to choose someone to thank, I chose you. Seemed like a natural choice, after all, since you've been such a big part of the Texans' success this year (and one of the few bright spots last year).

Problem was, I had a hard time figuring out exactly what to thank you for. I mean, what single thing that you did this season was so awesome that it needed thanks? There are many reasons out there for thanking you. After the jump, I'm going to list them.

For starters, here's a big, hearty thanks for playing your ass off as a starter on a minimum contract. Instead of holding out of camp and going down the CJ2YPC route, you didn't complain. You worked hard. You played hard. You succeeded. And you did it at one of the most injury-prone positions in football for the same amount of money that CJ2YPC spends on a root canal and filling.

I'm warming up here. How about a nice merci beaucoup for being a free spirit in a game that is filled with military metaphors? What's even better about this is that you're not a free spirit in the Terrell Owens "I love me some me" sense. You're a free spirit in a more positive sense. It has to be hard to keep your sense of individuality among the rigors and drill instructor sensibilities of the NFL, and much more so when you are operating on a completely different plane from most people around you. When you would be more at home in a place like Taos or Berkeley than Texas. But you make it work, and it's impressive to watch. I love that thing where you tweeted your MRI photo and told fantasy players to get a life. So thanks for that.

And for this:

I've saved the most complicated and difficult part of this love poem for the last. It's a problem that I've had when thinking about how you play the game for some time now. The problem boils down to this: I don't think I have the vocabulary to describe how exactly you run. I've heard all kinds of comparisons: Davis, Allen, Craig, etc. But that doesn't describe your running style at all. You know those two white-dreadlocked twins from The Matrix that can move through walls and stuff? Sometimes I have that image in my head when you hit the hole.

Sometimes, I try to look for metaphors or similes but they end up all screwy: Arian Foster runs like a homesick angel running to heaven. Like a burning ember from a campfire reaching for the heavens on a cool fall evening in the countryside. Like that scene from The Shawshank Redemption where Andy Dufresne locks himself up in the warden's office and broadcasts an aria from Le Nozze Di Figaro for the whole prison yard to hear and everyone stops for a minute, convinced that for one fleeting moment there is beauty in this world and a person's soul can be free. Like a James Joyce novel that may be complex and dense but ends up taking you somewhere amazing. Like the poetry of e. e. cummings.

See what I mean by screwy metaphors? It just doesn't work.

So for now, I'll just say that Arian Foster runs like poetry. I'm afraid it will have to do until I find the right words.

And thank you for that.

Namaste,

tehGrindCrusher