I saw a post on CNN's web page last week about old alums from rival high schools in the Lehigh Valley getting back together to settle an old football score.

The official story goes: In the fall of 1993, Phillipsburg (NJ) and Easton (PA) played to a 7-7 stalemate in their regular season-ending game, which has been held every Thanksgiving for more than a century.

Guys from the two blue collar towns, which are just across the Delaware River from each other, have been beefing over who should have won all these years.

Only a few players from that game ever suited up again after high school. And since, as Al Bundy taught us all, life after high school football is never as good, a tie was a lousy way to end things.

So, the old teams had reformed and were going to go at it once more.

That's a story line that will make millions of lousy old high school players weak in their already feeble knees.

So I started reading articles about the game from the Lehigh Valley papers.

The real story, alas, isn't anywhere near as heartwarming. Turns out the event was totally controlled by Gatorade. The sports beverage marketers conceived the idea, which is brilliant, for their Mission G advertising campaign.

And by the time the game was played yesterday, before 10,000 fans in Easton, damn if Gatorade hadn't taken things way too far.

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Driver Matt Kenseth, after winning the Daytona 500 by rainout, told a TV audience through tears that the victory was "a G moment."

I wasn't familiar with the phrase, but ran to Google to confirm that "G Moment" is a trademark of a sponsor.

Turns out it's from Gatorade.

Kenseth's plug was seamlessly delivered with the rest of his victory speech. He wiped away the tears and took a pull from a bottle of orange Gatorade.

It was brilliant and douchebaggy, all at once.

And, besides, Kenseth's pitch wasn't nearly the hardest to watch speech of the day. That award goes to the pre-race prayer delivered by some clown named Dr. David Uth, a preacher from Orlando.

Anybody who wants to work up some anti-Christian fervor should check out Uth's work, while remembering this is a sporting event that calls itself "The Great American Race."

Talk about a pulpit bully.

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