Led Zeppelin – "How Many More Times" (1969)

Now I've got ten children of my own

I got another child on the way
That makes eleven

[NOTE: Led Zeppelin was notorious for "borrowing" from other musicians without giving them credit.  "How Many More Times" contains elements borrowed from not one, but several other musicians – but that doesn't disqualify it from being inducted into the 2 OR 3 LINES "GOLDEN DECADE" ALBUM TRACKS HALL OF FAME.  Following is a lightly-edited version of my original Father's Day, 2012 post about "How Many More Times."]

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Today is Father's Day, so 2 or 3 lines is saluting of one the most prolific fathers in history: Antonio Cromartie.

Cromartie is a defensive back for the New York Jets.  More importantly for our purposes, he is the father of ten children by eight different women who live in a total of six different states (California, Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, North Carolina, and Texas).

Here are Antonio's baby mamas and their offspring:

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What explains this kind of behavior?  To answer such questions, I like to turn to the experts – namely, the scientists on the staff of Men's Health magazine, who had this to say on the topic of male monogamy (or the lack thereof):

Why is monogamy so tough for men? . . .

Blame it on biology.  According to Darwin, life is just DNA working like mad to reproduce itself.  Our sex drive is the vehicle for spreading our genes.  We're in thrall to a biological imperative, hard-wired to want anybody who might carry our double helix down the line.

Aha, cry the women.  We have DNA, too.  How come we don't mount anything with a blood pressure?

Darwin has an answer women hate: Women are more finicky because they've only got a few hundred eggs in a lifetime.  Can't afford to waste one on a loser.  Since we have a billion sperm in a nanosecond and remain fertile till we die, there's no need to hold our fire.  We've got tons of ammo.

When someone who really knows his stuff takes the time to explain things in plain English, a science lesson can be almost fun.

I appreciate the way Men's Health doesn't do a lot of preaching – they realize that a leopard can't change his spots, and refuse to play the blame game.

All men wrestle with the call of the wild.  Some will argue this proves all men are pigs.  Wrong.  It proves all men are brothers.  Those thoughts about Myrna at the FedEx place don't make you a bad guy.  They just make you a guy.  Are we clear on that?  Lust is not a virtue.  Lust is not a vice.  It's just a fact.

How can you argue with science?  Tell it like it is, Men's Health!

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I hope you understand now that Antonio Cromartie isn't a bad man – he's just a normal guy trying to live up to the Darwinian imperative.  Of course, he is an NFL star, which may partly explain why he was able to spread his seed over a broader geographical region than Johnny Appleseed. 

(John Chapman – better known as "Johnny Appleseed" -- planted apple seeds in only four states: Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois.  For religious reasons, Chapman objected to grafting apple trees.  Apple trees grown from seeds usually produce sour apples, but since many early settlers grew apples in order to make hard apple cider and applejack, they didn't really care.)

Like the singer of today's featured song, Cromartie can say "I've got ten children of my own."  He can also say "I got another child on the way – that makes eleven" because his wife is pregnant.

In fact, Cromartie's wife, Terricka Cason, is pregnant with twins – so that makes eleven and twelve, doesn't it?

As this photo demonstrates, when you are pregnant with twins, you are PREGNANT:

Mr. and Mrs. Cromartie

"Identical twins run in my family," Cason tweeted recently.  Terricka apparently knows as much about biology as she knows about keeping her legs crossed – fraternal twins may run in families (sort of), but identical twins do not.  Identical twins are a completely random event, so the fact that a mother has identical twins doesn't mean that any of her offspring are more likely to have identical twins than you or me.  (Well, more likely than me, because I'm a male.)

Once the twins are born, Terricka will have borne four of Cromartie's children, making her the leader in the clubhouse.  (None of the other mothers have more than two children by the redoubtable Mr. Cromartie.)

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Cromartie's seven baby mamas have become friends.  A TV production company recently came up with the brilliant idea of doing a reality show about Cromartie, his wife and baby mamas, and the ten children.  The baby mamas were all for it, but the fertile footballer wants no part of it.  I can't imagine why.

One of the baby mamas is Rhonda Patterson, a corporate attorney and former Miss Black North Carolina who says that Cromartie cancelled their wedding a week before the ceremony -- when she was six months pregnant.  I can only imagine what the young lady's parents had to say to her.

Baby mama Patterson wrote a book about the whole thing.  (You know what they say about a baby mama scorned.)

Did I mention that Cromartie is only 28?  By my calculations, he'll end up with a couple of thousand kids if he keeps going at this rate.

Thanks to my friend Kerri Griffin, the creator of the "Naptime Huddle" blog, who first brought Mr. Cromartie's off-field exploits to my attention.  Click here if you'd like to read what Kerri has to say about the legal problems of professional athletes who father children out of wedlock.

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"How Many More Times" is the final track on Led Zeppelin's eponymous debut album, which may be the G.O.A.T. when it comes to rock albums.  

The song runs about eight and a half minutes, but the album jacket says it is 3:30 -- apparently Jimmy Page thought radio stations might play it if they didn't know how long it really was.

Click here to listen to "How Many More Times?"

And click on the link below to buy the song from Amazon: