Like the Seattle Seahawks ripped off Texas A&M with the “12th man,” designation for their home crowd, the Arizona Cardinals are “borrowing” from the Michigan State Spartans in nicknaming their secondary “the no-fly zone.” And by borrowing, I mean stealing of course.
In the video interview below, shot a couple weeks ago at the 2014 ESPYs, Arizona Cardinals DB Patrick Peterson talks about how they will have a no-fly zone nickname this season. Coincidentally, inspired by the Seahawks themselves, who go by the “Legion of Boom” nickname.
By definition a no-fly zone is a designated area over which aircraft may not fly without risk of interception, especially during a conflict.
So it’s a clever nickname for teams that have a stellar secondary, like the Cardinals (Peterson, Antonio Cromartie, the Honey Badger Tyrann Mathieu, Tony Jefferson/Deone Bucannon) and the Spartans (Trae Waynes, Kurtis Drummond, Darian Hicks, R.J. Williamson)
I asked MSU Coach Mark Dantonio about the no-fly zone origin, by including the natural obvious pun at Big Ten Media Day. Here’s the transcript:
Q. How did the No-Fly Zone nickname take off? Pun intended.
COACH DANTONIO: “Well, it sort of took off — sort of took off a little bit. Darqueze Dennard came in one day and sort of coined it. Darqueze has gone on now. He’s with the Bengals. And it just sort of took.
He made up some T-shirts himself for our secondary, for our players in the secondary, and it just sort of took off.”
You can see the shirt below:
Now the No-Fly zone nickname, which took on a life of it’s own, refers to the unit as a whole, but has also been applied to former Spartans Corner Darqueze Denard, the first round pick of the Cincinnati Bengals, and the winner of the Jim Thorpe Award for the best defensive back in college football last year. Denard was about as dominating as possible last year, and both Waynes and Drummond could be first round NFL picks this season.
Drummond talked about what it means to now be the leader of the No-Fly zone at Big Ten Media Day.
“Making sure you’re pulling the best and expecting the best out of your teammates, setting the bar, that’s really all the No-Fly Zone is, setting the bar for us to chase and achieve,” he said.
So who started it a year ago? Darqueze Dennard? That’s where Wikipedia attributes the origin. Not to Peterson and the Arizona Cardinals.
“He kind of got the credit for it, but it was elaborate decision. Me, him and R.J. Williamson, but he was a No-Fly Zone on his own. It worked out for him,” said Drummond.
Paul M. Banks owns The Sports Bank.net, an affiliate of Fox Sports and Yahoo! He’s been a guest on news talk shows all across the world. He’s also a special contributor to the Chicago Tribune RedEye edition. Banks has been featured in numerous media outlets including NFL.com, Forbes, Bleacher Report, Deadspin, ESPN, NBC, CBS, the History Channel and more. Follow him on Twitter (@paulmbanks)