John will be remembered and thought of as one of the premiere songwriters of the mid '60s era, ... Joe Butler and myself (they played together a long time before the Spoonful,) were unique as the rhythm section. We were very tight. Our original guitarist had a very unique style.

Almost all the English bands.

It's a hard-working group that definitely wants to repeat, but they know the focus has to be on one game at a time. They saw the reality of that in our first scrimmage when our quarterback went down.

While we may not have been considered the best musicians on the scene, the combination of John's songs and the core of the rhythm section made us so strong.

We made a few critical mistakes, but we never gave up. No disrespect to Shepherd Hill, but our kids know our league schedule begins with Hudson. You never want to walk away with a loss, especially on opening night, but we'll find some positives in this one.