By Sean Sullivan Lagniappe columnist

Magical mystery fan

Did you ever wish you had super-human powers? OK, that is a dumb question; of course you do.

If you had those powers what would you do with them? I don’t mean would you use them for good or evil, I am asking what exact power would it be? Would you have the power to fly or maybe shoot lasers out of your eyes or read people’s minds or talk to the animals (which is a power I never understood since what makes you think that if you could talk to critters that they would do what you asked of them)? Or would you have the ability to turn invisible, or even shoot webs out of your wrists?

Of course it really doesn’t matter which power you would choose because everybody knows that the heroes of mythology and comic books never got to choose their own powers. Either some ancient god thought it would be fun for one of their half-immortal children to be really good at one thing or another. The same thing pretty much happened to every super hero of comic book legend, except for Super Man who is really just a space alien. They all got their super powers through no choice of their own; usually the result of some science fair project gone bad.

While my situation is more of a gift than a super-power I’m in sort of a similar situation as the previously mentioned heroes. I didn’t ask for my power, I just have it. I have known about this power since I was a freshman at the University of Alabama. It started to show itself as I watched many games from the bourbon-soaked student section in Bryant-Denny. Through my gift and repetition of certain habits on game day, I began to become the deciding factor in the day’s final score.

That gift is the ability to control the outcome of an Alabama football game. Don’t get all awestruck and think that having my special powers over the outcome of an Alabama football game is all puppy dogs and ice cream, it is quite a burden to have the hopes of a university and whole fan base on your shoulders a minimum of a dozen weekends a year.

My powers rarely operate by themselves and they usually need a growing and various list of charms or settings to be fully realized. These days I watch a lot more games from the house than I do in the stadium and sometimes the only catalyst my special ability needs is something as simple as which end of the couch I choose to sit on to make sure the Tide wins the game. Then other times what I have to go through to ensure victory is more complex and involves a maelstrom of victory-inducing decisions.

If I make my plate of nachos with or without jalapeņos slices, or which t-shirt and cap combination I wear or if the dogs are inside or out of the house during halftime or if I watch the game on the small television in the bedroom or if I need to travel across town to watch the game on a friends’ 52-inch flat screen; I do what is needed to make sure my special gift of making the Tide win is realized.

And when Dixie’s Football Pride doesn’t win… that is when my gift becomes my cross to bear. That is when the dark times come, the soul searching, the knowing that if I would have only walked around the couch backwards one more time while whistling Steely Dan’s “Deacon Blues” my team would have won and I wouldn’t have to deal with the gnawing guilt…that I let my fellow alumni down…that I let Coach Saban down…that I let myself down.

“If only I had posed one more Big Al figurine on the mantle next to the television, if only I had used my 1992 National Championship collectors mug to hold my mixed drink, if only I had tried harder to use my powers,” these are my torments and this is the pain of having my special power – the power to make Alabama win football games and then failing to apply it properly.

Luckily for the players, coaches and fans of the team, most of the time I am triumphant in channeling my power to the benefit of the Crimson Tide. I go through my tedious formulas and my game-winning habitual minutia for at least 12 weekends a year, sacrificing my normal life to give Alabama the power to win. Of course what is normal when you have the kind of “power” I do?

This year I’ve been on a roll, my attention to detail in everything I do on game day has been successful and my special gift, the one that makes me different from people without game-deciding super powers, is paying dividends.

So remember my special abilities and me when the Tide wins next weekend and if they don’t win…forget you ever read this.

Sean Sullivan is Lagniappe lagniappe columnist. Contact him at ssullivan@lagniappemobile.com.

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