This story also appears on Yahoo! Sports.
The “Occupy Wall Street” movement protesting economic inequality and corporate greed, now entering its second month, has become a comedic gold mine.
It’s already been parodied on “Saturday Night Live” and spawned the hilarious “Occupy Sesame Street” spinoff, which claims “99% of cookies are consumed by 1% of monsters.”
Now college football fans are getting in on the fun with “Occupy Herbstreit.”
Named in honor of ESPN college football analyst Kirk Herbstreit, the website spread like wildfire across the blogosphere after it debuted last Thursday. It features a man amid the Wall Street chaos pictured hiding behind signs that simultaneously poke fun at college football and the economy; they look like they belong behind the set of ESPN’s “College GameDay” instead of parading through lower Manhattan.
“Notre Dame thought Charlie Weis was too big to fail,” reads one.
“What is the difference between Cam Newton & Enron? Only one can survive a SEC investigation,” says another.
[Related: PHOTOS: Top 10 best "Occupy Herbstreit" signs]
So just who is the fan behind this movement whose head is meticulously covered by posters in each picture?
Well, that remains a mystery.
Referring to himself with the alias of “Shane,” the self-proclaimed “lost GameDay fan” says he works on Wall Street and wants to keep his identity a secret out of fear of reprisal from his employer.
“It’s pretty much a guerrilla operation,” Shane said earlier this week while at work. “We are in and out of taking our pictures in like 15 minutes. I recruited one of my friends from work who takes the photos and also helps me with some sign ideas.”
The idea started as just a joke among a close circle of friends. When Shane and his buddies realized they were onto something big, he crashed the protests last week to stock up on photos for a Tumblr website.
The operation has made a 12-hour-a-day job even more hectic, especially when Shane switches from his work clothes into a college football shirt for the photos.
“I don’t want to say that it’s like Superman tearing off his business suit and he’s got his Superman chest underneath, but it kind of is,” Shane said. “I’ve got to wear it in that day, I’m wearing the Texas shirt. I get out of work, I take off my (dress) shirt, take a picture with the Texas shirt and put the (dress) shirt back on.
“Unfortunately, there’s no phone booths that I can change in,” he deadpanned.
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