Football days : $b memories of the game and of the men behind the ballEdwards, William H. (William Hanford)
General
Football days : $b memories of the game and of the men behind the ball
Edwards, William H. (William Hanford)
Football
I recall an incident in a Princeton-Carlisle game, when the game was
being fiercely waged. Miller, the great Indian halfback, had scored a
touchdown, after a long run. It was not long after this that a Princeton
player was injured. Maybe the play was being slowed up a little. Anyway,
time was taken out. One of the Indians seemed to sense the situation.
The Princeton players were lying on the ground while the Carlisle men
were prancing about eager to resume the fray, when one of the Indians
remarked:
"White man play for wind. Indian play football."
In 1915 Warner went to the University of Pittsburgh. Here he has already
begun to duplicate former successes. Cruikshank, Peck, and Wagner are
three of Pittsburgh's many stars. Probably the greatest football player
that Warner ever developed at the Carlisle Indian School was Jim Thorpe,
whose picture appears on the opposite page. Unhappy the end, and not
infrequently the back, who had to face this versatile player. Thorpe was
a raider.
Billy Bull
Billy Bull of Yale is one of the old heroes who has kept in very close
touch with the game. He has been a valuable coach at Yale and the Elis'
kicking game is left entirely in his hands. He is an enthusiastic
believer in the game. Immediately after leaving New Haven in 1889 he
started to coach and since that time he has not missed a year. Years ago
he inaugurated a routine system of coaching for the various styles of
kicks. "My object," he said recently, "has been to turn out consistent
rather than wonderful kickers. As a player I was early impressed with
the value of kicking, not only in a general way but also in a particular
way, such as the punt in an offensive way. For more than twenty-five
years I have talked it up. For a long time I talked it to deaf ears,
especially at Yale. I talked it when I coached at West Point for ten
years and was generally set down as a harmless crank on the subject, but
I have lived to see the time when every one agrees on the great value of
this offensive kick.
"When I entered Yale I was an absolute greenhorn, but the greenhorn had
a chance then, for he was able to play in actual scrimmage every day;
now the squads are so big that opportunities for playing the game for
long daily periods are entirely wanting.
"To-day it is a case of a heap big talk, a coach for every position,
more talk, lots of system, blackboard exercises and mighty little actual
play.
"I have often wondered if things were not being overdone as far as
coaching goes in the preparatory schools at the present time. The
superabundance of coaches and the demand for victory combine to force
the boy.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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