Being a Miami Dolphins fans comes with few true joys these days – or, well, for the last 40 years – so it’s nice to see the team do something outside of blowing two overtime wins in the past two weeks in classic bonehead fashion. In this case, a group of Miami Dolphins cheerleaders and former players OJ McDuffie and Troy Drayton visited the 411th Engineer Brigade – the “Brigade of Choice” – in Afghanistan this past weekend.
While my favorite posts about soldiers involve them coming home, I certainly don’t have a problem with very attractive women going to visit them.
“It makes my heart happy to be here and see the smiling faces on everyone I meet,” said Samantha Ruiz, a fourth-year cheerleader with the Dolphins.
Ruiz, a native of Miami and full-time student at Florida International University said, “I met a lot of amazing people with great stories. This has been a once in a lifetime experience.” (Via Regional Command East)
And it wasn’t just great for the cheerleaders, as the troops sincerely appreciated the opportunity to meet, speak with and get pictures and autographs from these young ladies. Oh yeah, and those player dudes, whoever they are.
U.S. Army Sgt. Aaron Majors from the 411th Engineer Brigade, U.S. Army Reserve, stationed at Bagram was ecstatic to get his picture taken with the cheerleaders and get their autographs.
“It’s a great morale booster,” said Majors. “It puts everyone in such a good mood. It was well worth the wait in line to meet them in person.”
As a Dolphins fan, this makes me happy because it might mean karma points for a team that constantly makes terrible decisions both on the field and in the front office. But as someone who also once pushed through a crowd of people getting off of the Tower of Terror at Disney’s MGM Studios to take a picture with the Dolphins cheerleaders (don’t even ask about the clothes), I can only hope they provided that same kind of joy to our men and women in uniform.
(Images via the 411th’s Facebook page.)
