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This one goes to eleven

By Drew Roberts
Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

It doesn't take Encyclopedia Brown to realize that Boise State is cooking up something for Kellen Moore at their annual Spring Game. The real question is, could it be something as big as retiring the G.O.A.T's number. Follow this trail of breadcrumbs and tell me if there's any other logical explanation.

First, Bryan Harsin tweeted what amounts to a Save the Date for the Broncos' Spring Game back on February 19th. A tweet with a curious hashtag:

Remember, at this time Brett Rypien (via an instagram picture of his locker nameplate) had all but confirmed he was wearing #11...so either Harsin was handing him the keys to the Bronco offense a tad prematurely...didn't understand hashtags and pound signs aren't interchangeable on twitter, or he's hinting at something.

Here it is again, a week later:

Even in twitter-speak...this hashtag makes no sense in this context. It would be like me saying "My birthday is on August number fifteen" (it is, by the way...I like cake). Harsin is too social media savvy for this kind of sloppy hashtagging. I might expect such work from a twitter noob like Pete "have you compared academics?" Kwiatkowski...but not Harsin. Something is afoot.

Then, as Spring Camp opened on Monday, we learned that Brett Rypien had been drummed out of his #11 jersey (the jersey number he'd worn throughout his record-breaking high school career) and was no longer wearing the Moore digits, or even the Williams-Rhodes digits, but rather the Thompson-esque #4...and SWR had vacated the jersey in favor of the now Bryan Douglas-less #1 uni. George is getting suspicious.

The proverbial cake was taken, however yesterday...when a press release from the athletic department informed us of the following:

Juniors (ages 2-18) wearing a No. 11 jersey earn free admission at the gate, and the first 3,000 fans at the gate will receive a free 2014 Bronco Football Season in Review DVD.

No, not the DVD silly...the jersey part. This is too many 11-centric clues to be a coincidence...this year's Spring Game will go to eleven.

Now the question is...how much will go to eleven? Will Kellen's jersey be raised to the rafters (so to speak) to give Jim McMillan's #12 jersey company? Frankly, I can't think of one more deserving than the Prosser kid...and that includes McMillan (no offense, Jimmy Mac). Sure, there's a finite amount of jersey numbers to go around...but we can double up (just ask Tanner Vallejo, Terrell Johnson, Blake Renaud, Jeremy McNichols, Brett Rypien, Darian Thompson, Kaleb Hill, Troy Ware, etc). If the tea leaves are being read correctly, Kellen's about to get his due...and I couldn't be happier.

Your turn

Are you drawing the same conclusions as our junior detective league (yes, I believe we were the first to propose such a scenario on the twitters yesterday)? Is Petersen's no-jersey-retirement policy something you'd like to see continue? Is there anyone more deserving than our Kellsy? Let us know what you're feeling in the comments