If you built the perfect NFL quarterback, you’d definitely start with Peyton Manning’s brain. You’d then pick Cam Newton’s body and the escape artistry of RG3. When you needed some fourth-quarter intensity, Tom Brady is the logical choice. Throwing accuracy: Aaron Rodgers. Arm strength: Joe Flacco. Overall toughness: Ben Roethlisberger. Golf game: Tony Romo. All in all, that would be a formidable quarterback, one that every football fan could get behind.
But what if you went about building the perfect dad? Where would be the best place to find the qualities that define the world’s greatest dad?
Why, television, of course, the place I gain the majority of my wisdom.
Let’s start with the best of the best, Andy Taylor. The widowed sheriff of little Mayberry, Andy always brought pearls of wisdom to the entire community but especially to his son Opie. Ron Howard, aka Opie Taylor, was fortunate enough to have a pair of stellar TV dads, as he also played the son of Mr. C (Howard Cunningham) on Happy Days. Like Andy, Howard was another calming influence. His middle-class values steered the family down a righteous path even when Fonzie moved into the garage apartment. He was stern yet fair and never pretended to be his kids’ best friend.
Teaching lessons through humor was the way Heathcliff Huxtable led his family on The Cosby Show. The good doctor dealt with plenty of tricky family situations, but he always helped his kids understand that hard work and never giving up were keys to success in this world. The natty sweaters never hurt either.
Dealing with a blended family is always a challenge, but has any dad handled it better than Mike Brady? Sure, his front yard was made of Astroturf and his architectural designs all looked alike, but he was always involved in his kids’ lives.
While building the perfect dad, one must take into account the less-than-perfect dads. Lazy, degrading, crude, Al Bundy was pretty much a pathetic dad on Married with Children. But Bundy is Father of the Year compared to Tony Soprano, the cheating, lying and killing New Jersey crime boss dad. Sure, Tony did at least try to talk through his problems with a shrink, but that was barely a speed bump as he ran his mafia family with more love and care than his real family. Anthony Cooper actually rivals Tony Soprano, but most folks reading this have no clue who he is. Geeky Lost fans (guilty as charged) remember Cooper as the father of John Locke. All he did was con his son out of a kidney and then paralyze him by pushing him out a high-rise window. No Father’s Day card for you.
Cartoon dads certainly count when analyzing the good and the bad. At first glance, Homer Simpson seems to define a bad dad. After all, he chokes his son Bart on practically every other episode. But in the end, Homer shows that he’d do anything for his family. Including working at a nuclear power plant to pay the bills. That’s gotta be worth something.
Since we started this thing talking about football, how could we forget the ultimate dad head coach, Eric Taylor from Friday Night Lights? Coach Taylor balanced coaching high school football in Texas (talk about pressure) and raising a teenaged daughter (talk about pressure). Not always perfect, Taylor managed to win on and off the field. And in the last episode he even chose to leave the Lone Star State to allow his wife to follow her career dreams. I’m still reeling over that one.
All of these good dads deserve a spot in our world’s greatest dad creation. Or we could simply pick one dad that embodies the whole package. Loving. Hard-working. Supportive. And, yes, a bit crazy. No, I’m not referring to yours truly – the world’s greatest dad would be Phil Dunphy from Modern Family. Whenever my son and I head upstairs to play video games or I take to the tennis court with my daughter, I always think of Phil. I, too, am a kid at heart who wants my kids to stay exactly the same age forever so we can play and play and play. And while I realize that’s not in the cards, my inner Phil Dunphy prefers to block that out.
Rudy lives in Flower Mound, works in Fort Worth and plays everywhere in between. He has one wife, one daughter, one son, one published book, one obsession with sports and 20 million observations on marriage and children. Follow him on Twitter: Manifesto10.
