Linda Holliday Reveals the Untold Story of Nike the GM Dog
Linda Holliday, on Adam Schefter's podcast:
“Well, the funny thing was, you know, all of us our are doing the draft from home. And Nantucket has very strict rules about who is coming to the island. So, I worked with Patriots IT people and I said, ‘Teach me, I’ll do lighting, I’ll do IT, I’ll do it all.'
"So, I’m doing lighting and next thing I know Bill had a couple of treats that were left over near his laptop and he stepped away from the table. And all of a sudden he looks and he goes, ‘Look, look at the table’ and there Nike was just sitting there waiting patiently and he knew his treats were there, so that’s what prompted him getting up to the table and he was just waiting patiently for the word to take his treats.”
Hearing this, the primitive, reptilian part of my brain that controls motor functions and cliches wants me to say "Find a woman like Linda Holliday." Except I won't. Because you can't. This is more like what Belichick himself said about his retired fullback. How people say you need to find "a James Develin-type," but there are no others.
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Here's Linda's guy, running arguably his most important draft in 20 years. Tasked with trying to retool his Dynasty in a post-GOAT world. In a draft unlike any other. Relying on potentially faulty equipment on an isolated island community, with disastrous results if there's a system failure.
Under that kind of pressure, with the stakes that high, a lesser woman might have cracked under the pressure. Or avoided it all together and allowed him to handle it so she couldn't be blamed. But what did she do? She rose to the occasion. She thrived. She made a flawless, successful draft possible with her polymath abilities. Lighting person. IT person. Sound person. Set decorator. And most of all, animal trainer.
That's right. She not only helped pull off the mission critical work of making sure all the tech functioned, she managed to launch Nike's career. Not since Cooper pulled Gaga on stage to sing "Shallow" has a star been born to such acclaim. To the point where Nike the Klee is now an Instagram influencer, his following going up from just over a 1,000 to over 16,000 since his star turn Thursday night.
She does it all. A strong, independent, empowered woman in her own right, who can elevate the men in her life as well, and make them better than they'd be without her. That, my friends, is the ideal partner. Don't bother trying to find another though. The man - and the dog - who deserve her most found her first.