Look at the little football ammo, omg. Them Redmong jeans too...
In the 1987 season when he was named MVP and Denver was the AFC Champs, My mom bought me a TShirt with this "Duke of Denver" deal on it. My earliest Broncos memories were beating the Browns in the playoffs in back to back seasons with "The Drive" and "The Fumble" and then getting trounced by the Giants and then Redskins in the following super bowls. I remember being extremely afraid of the Cleveland fans with the demented dog heads, so I had some pennant thing that said "Down with the Pound" and I'd wave it furiously whenever the dog men were on the TV screen. I don't particularly remember much about the Giants game other than praying aloud at the dinner table the night before that God let Denver and John Elway win. My mom glared at me and replied, "That prayer didn't make it above the chandelier, God doesn't care about John Elway."
But the real reason for this story is the Redskins Super Bowl. I had on my new lucky DUKE OF DENVER Tshirt and Denver opened the game with an 80 yard bomb to Ricky Nattiel and Denver was absolutely going to win this time for sure! Well of course they lost and I had a complete fucking meltdown that my mom was smart enough to capture with the new VHS camcorder my rich uncle had given us as a gift for Christmas that year (I went to stay at his house once and came back proclaiming that I only wanted to eat Mahi-Mahi because it was my favorite). Anyway, this was really the start of my hatred of John Elway because I absolutely loathed him with every fiber of my 5 year old being for losing and letting me down. HOW COULD THE DUKE OF DENVER DO THIS TO ME? I don't remember the video perfectly but it was a classic red faced child tantrum and I was really mad about John Elway and saying how much I hate him. I'm going to make it a goal to find that tape and upload the video to Youtube because I'm going to be a viral video superstar.
The Tshirt in question looked like this:
I ripped the T-shirt to shreds in anger a few years later when the 49ers trounced Denver in that Super Bowl when Montana threw about 72 TDs.