University of Alabama at Birmingham athletic director explored having a live komodo dragon at games

AL.com:

"So, I thought the same thing coming here. How cool would it be to get a komodo dragon? As luck would have it, within my first couple of weeks, someone from the Birmingham Zoo was here for a meeting. Introduced, and I said, ‘Oh my gosh, I can’t believe you’re here. I’ve got this idea I want to share with you. What do you think having a komodo dragon?”’

"And they looked at me like I was crazy.

"They said, ‘You understand this is basically like an alligator?’ I said, ‘No, I didn’t. I thought it was more like a large iguana.’ They said, ‘No, it’s a meat-eating carnivore and it’d be like having an alligator here.’

"I said, ‘Oh, OK, well maybe you could bring it, it could be in a cage? Because LSU and Memphis, there’s a lot of people who have tigers like that.’

"They said, ‘Well, what about the spit?’

"I said, ‘I don’t understand.’

"They said, ‘They spit at their prey and the spit causes paralyses. So, you know, they can go and eat it.’ I said, ‘So this is a bad idea is what you’re saying?’

“Children getting spit on and paralyzed, and eaten, potentially, by the komodo dragon. I thought it seemed like a great idea, but apparently it’s not as good of an idea as I once thought.”