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Origin of Throwing Up The []_[]??

FtMyersCane said:
I was friends with Val and John Routh both. RIP Val.

Don't know about anything that really may or may not have happened before but was in the Band of the Hour and can confirm we were asked to play the Death March on third down while the cheerleaders encouraged the stands to do the U just like the video says. It was definitely the cheerleaders who popularized it.

Incidentally, we stole doing the death march on third down from Arizona who used to do it. Also our Miami U fight song was stolen from UCLA.

Feel pretty unc having been there and knowing all this.
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Keep the history alive! Any additional nuggets not covered in the video or from your post above?
 
rangerbrother305 said:
All I know is that It’s the most recognizable logo and hand gesture in college sports, and I’d argue in all of American sports.

I’ve had it thrown up at me all over the world, but the coolest was General McChrystal, then JSOC commander, throwing it up while we were on target. Everyone knew I was a diehard fan with the gear, patches and my callsign.
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gangsta post............carry on
 
mj33 said:
I invented it right before I invented the Big Mac. I didn’t get credit for that either.
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ronald mcdonald fun GIF by McDonald's CZ/SK


I knew it was you!
 
C-A-N-E-S!!! said:
Keep the history alive! Any additional nuggets not covered in the video or from your post above?
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John was an absolute character. He was a professional mascot basically, before we had student mascots. We drank with him a good bit. Pretty sure he sweated out a lot of alcohol in the Sebastian uniform. He was also the Miami Maniac (owned the copyright to it) and then was Billy the Marlin at some point. He was actually brought to Miami by Ron Fraser, he was a mascot before UM but I can't remember where.

A couple of great John/Sebastian stories: (1) 1991 Cotton Bowl, the blowout. He thought he would entertain people by pretending to brand Bevo. He had a branding iron (from god knows where) and he put aluminum foil on it to make it more visible. He pretended to sneak up on Bevo who was laying peacefully at one corner of the field. In Texas, they are pretty protective of ol' Bevo and on top of that, him getting branded by aTm was how he got his name so they weren't gonna take this branding foolishness lying down. They snapped his ropes and he jumped up ready for business. Pretty sure John ran faster than any of the players that day, he was GONE.

The other story is when we were at FSU in 1989 and he came out with the fire extinguisher to make like he was going to put out the flaming spear. He got roughed up by the Leon County deputies. What I didn't know at the time was he had accidentally discharged the fire extinguisher at one of them because he was startled and had an itchy trigger finger. They let him go ultimately. We lost that game but got our revenge in 1991, one of the wide right games. I was sitting in the end zone for that one and when both teams streamed out of the field we were so confused for a second.

John's antics are a core memory for me.
 
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First time I heard some calling Miami the U was Kellen Winslow. But I remember back in the day when the band would play the the Empire theme, people would put the U while bowing to the defense
 
CanesDynasty said:
I'll add to that.. I don't remember Miami being referred to as "The U" prior to 2004. Also, the saying "It's a Canes thing, you wouldn't understand" I believe started around our 2000 to 2003 run, but maybe it was earlier, I'm not 100% sure on that one.
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I believe you're right. I attended from 98-02. It was only ever "UM." Starting around '03, '04, NFL players in their tv introductions would say, e.g., "Andre Johnson, The U".
We never made the U with our hands. I started seeing fans do it around 2004, when the team started to suck. I actually thought it was kind of embarrassing.
 
Definitely someone from this site. They were probably multitasking. Plowing some hole and repping 225 when the idea came to them. Might have been someone from RCT though in between dunks and their 500 one night stands.
 
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