Oh, To Be An Athletic Coach (Cont.)
Screen 2 of 6This was late in May of the year 1934--less than ten weeks before football practice was to begin. Since I had already registered for six weeks of summer school work in chemistry and Education at Western Kentucky State Teachers College, I was to have barely four weeks to learn what I could about football, baseball and track. Quite an ambitious program for the summer, I realized later.
My first call for help went to Thurman Anderson, a lifelong friend who had just completed playing four years of college football at a small school in Danville, Kentucky called Centre College, whose "Praying Colonels" had astounded the athletic world in 1921 by defeating the mighty and highly successful football team of Harvard University. Thurman was not a member of the famous Centre team of 1921, but he had been an outstanding football player at that school from 1930 to 1934. So I felt sure he could be of great help to me.
In response to my request, he agreed to give me--free of charge--a two weeks' "quickie" course in the "theory and practice of football" (this was Thurman's description of what was to come) . He suggested we conduct this "coaching school" in our home town of Bowling Green, Kentucky, during the last two weeks of July.
With this arrangement settled, I began my preparation. Even before I left Virginia, I started working on football plays. My long-time fascination with mathematics--geometry in particular--was chiefly responsible, I suppose, for the very complicated plays I designed and set down on paper: all sorts of reverses--single, double and even triple reverses; hidden ball plays, "sleeping end" deceptions; and "statue of liberty" fakes were all quite prominent in my planning. I figured the opposing team could not stop the play if they did not know where the ball was. I gave very little attention to plays designed to go straight through the line. They were too simple, it seemed to me. (I learned later, however, that complicated plays are successful only if the offensive line is strong and skillful enough to keep the opposing linemen out of the backfield while the tricky maneuvers are being carried out by the ball carriers and passers. This became quite obvious in our regular season games. With but few exceptions, we had so many defensive linemen in our backfield--quite often they were there even before the ball arrived--that practically none of our "fancy" plays ever worked. As a matter of fact, not very many of our so-called "simple" plays worked either.)
In addition to working on these intricate plays, I read about some of the "football greats" in the 1920's: Red Grange, the "Galloping Ghost" of Illinois; Knute Rockne's famous "Four Horsemen" of Notre Dame and others. I also digested several "how-to-do-it-yourself" books on football coaching. And when I joined Thurrnan later that summer in Kentucky I thought I was ready for the high quality instruction I felt sure he would offer.
In spite of all our efforts, however, this class with but one teacher and one student was not as helpful as I had hoped. Thurrnan spent most of the time on what he knew were the practical and necessary things: blocking and tackling. And when he demonstrated these techniques with his well developed 185 pounds against my scant 130, the results were not too favorable for me. The black and blue bruises on my body didn't go away for several weeks--a not very comfortable feeling, but it did give me greater sympathy for the boys on my team when they were shaken up physically.
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