TUESDAY, APRIL 29, 2008- "A complacent satisfaction with present knowledge is the chief bar to the pursuit of knowledge." Basil Liddell Hart, military historian

*********** Don Faurot is by all accounts the inventor of the split-T, from which modern option football derives. He first used it at Missouri in the spring of 1941, and in 1941 the Tigers lost only their opener, 12-7, to Ohio State, and their final game, 2-0, to an 8-1 Fordham club in the mud. In between, they ran off eight straight to finish 8-2.

And then World War II intervened, and Coach Faurot found himself coaching a service football team. Coaching with him - and learning the ins and outs of Coach Faurot's new system - were young coaches named Jim Tatum and Bud Wilkinson. Working with the Master, they learned his offense well.

When the war ended, they would go their separate ways, Tatum and Wilkinson to Oklahoma, where Tatum was head coach, and Faurot back to Missouri. Tatum soon moved on to Maryland and - running the Split-T - won a national championship. Wilkinson succeeded Tatum at Oklahoma and - running the Split-T - he won three national championships.

Coach Faurot, ironically, never enjoyed the level of success that his "students" did.

In an interview years later, he confessed that in the early stages, his running game was so successful that he didn't develop much of a passing game.

In fact, he said, "I never threw a pass from the quarterback spot the first three years. The halfbacks did all the throwing, and we always had a left-handed boy at right halfback so he could throw it going his way. If you wanted to rhrow it quick, you lateralled quick; if you wanted a longer pass, you let him get a bit deeper."

*********** Oregon State placekicker Alexis Serna is one of the better ones in this year's group of seniors, and he will probably find a spot with an NFL club.

But although he is a keeker, he takes justifiable pride in his ability to tackle.

In fact, as the Beavers' kickoff man, he missed only two tackles in his four-year career.

One was against Cal's Marshawn Lynch, Bill's 2006 first round draft choice. The other was against Oregon's Jonathan Stewart, this year's first-round pick of the Carolina Panthers.

"Those guys were beasts," he said.

*********** Photos from the Southern California clinic on Friday ---

The Southern California clinic, held in Santa Clarita and hosted by the Santa Clarita Wildcats organization, was a great success. You have to hand it to coaches who are willing to sit inside on a glorious Saturday morning, but at least they were able to spend the afternoon out on the field at Golden Valley HS, watching Coach John Torres' 12-year-olds perform like veterans.

*********** All over the country, restaurant chains are being hammered by the tightening of the economy. But you would have a hard time convincing me that In-n-Out Burger is feeling any pain.

Its stores totally company-owned (no franchises), In-n-Out Burger is found only in California, Nevada and Arizona, plus one store in Utah. As a result, In-n-Out Burger is developing the sort of "Damn! We can't get it where we live" cachet that Coors Beer once enjoyed. No one, it seems, can visit their part of the country without coming away raving about In-n-Out burgers.

On my recent trip to California, d etermined to finally try it out for myself, I checked one out in Valencia. The burgers are made to order, right in front of your eyes, from fresh ingredients.

Trust me - they are worth a 1,000-mile trip.

*********** Hi Coach Wyatt, Are you missing the sunny SoCal weather yet? Hope the clinic went well. I was scheduled to come down and see you but everyone flaked out on me. I am hoping to see you @ the clinic in May.

After spending a great deal of time (and money) visiting 4 schools in Oregon my son realized that the best fit for him was a D3 school in Thousand Oaks, Ca. called Cal Lutheran. He is looking to major in Communications and Youth Ministries. Selfishly my wife and I couldn't be happier. We will be able to see all of his games and travel up to Tacoma when they play Pacific Lutheran in Sept. The whole recruiting experience was an adventure. In the end Jacob realized he is more of a California boy than he thought. Thankfully it actually came down to the education aspect that sold him on Cal Lutheran(imagine that concept)! It is a great location(about an hour west of your clinic site), they were co-champions in the SCIAC conf. and they offered the type of degree he wanted.

I was shaking my head in regards to the youth coach that wrote you about his HS coach wanting him to run his stuff. You were on the money with your response. Teach kids to block, tackle and love the game. The rest takes care of itself.

We were fortunate to have 2 players from our HS team earn all CIF, we had the Pac 7 League MVP and several all league and all county selections. Almost all of the awards were to players that played youth football and ran your system of the double wing. Our 3 running backs from the Raiders accounted for an All County Def. Back, Offensive Player of the Year (1700 yards) and the All CIF, Pac 7 Player of the Year. All while starting on the team that ran that "smoke and mirrors" offense.

More importantly it transferred into a 9-3 team that went into the 2nd round of the CIF playoffs.

Hope to see you in Lathrop.......

Best,

Mike Norlock, Atascadero, California (Yes, I am missing the sunny California weather already. It's nice to be home, but that climate down there sure is seductive! Coach Norlock, by the way, refers to his son, Jacob, who was one heck of a runner as a middle-schooler. In terms of executing my offense by the book, the Atascadero Raiders of 2003 - I think it was - were one of the best youth Double-Wing teams I have ever seen. HW)

*********** Michelle Wie has never won a professional golf tournament. In fact, she generally avoids competing on the LPGA tour, instead providing a sort of freak show boost to attendance at men's tournaments through something called sponsor's exemptions (basically, you put up the money, you can get a player into the tournament).

Meanwhile Annika Sorenstam is considered to be one of the best women's golfers in the world.

Last year, Michelle Wie's earnings greatly exceeded Annika Sorenstam's.

*********** A Black Lion for a blue-collar city...

Army Fullback Mike Viti, the Cadets' 2006 Black Lion, has signed a free agent contract with the Buffalo Bills.

“I’m just extremely fortunate to get this opportunity,” he said. “I think it’s a good fit. (Buffalo) told me I’m the only rookie fullback they are bringing in. I just look forward to going in and competing.”

At West Point, as one of four regimental commanders, Mike supervises two battalions and eight companies of cadets, amounting to some 1,000 students, or one-fourth of the entire student body.

*********** Saturday night, while socializing at John Torres' house in Castaic, California following my Southern California clinic, a parent of one of the players on Coach JT's team mentioned that he'd been doing some construction work at the home of one "Mr. Abbey," a prominent real estate developer/owner/investor who, the parent told me, had once "played some pro football."

The name hit me right away - could it be Don Abbey, who'd played football at Penn State? (I am a long-time Nittany Lions' fan.)

Bingo. One and the same.

Mr. Donald Abbey was CEO of The Abbey Company, headquartered in Long Beach. His football background was clearly not a part of his professional resume, so it took a bit of digging (nothing like Good Old Google), to determine that Mr. Abbey had, indeed, played football at Penn State, and although drafted by the Dallas Cowboys, had chosen instead to go to graduate school. Following service in the US Navy, he got into real estate in Southern California and in 1990 founded the hugely successful company that bears his name.

On my return home, I dug into my collection of college media guides, and the 1969 Penn State guide told me more about Donald Abbey the football player...

Don Abbey (fullback, 6-3, 240, South Hadley, Mass) was entering his senior year. He'd lettered on the 1967-68  teams (and would go on to do so in 1969 as well,  as the starting fullback).

A little more research revealed that he played a key role in Penn State's rise to football prominence.

To use a real estate analogy that Mr. Abbey might appreciate, in 1967 he was in on the ground floor of the great dynasty that Joe Paterno would go on to build at Penn State,   part of an unusually talented group of sophomores that Coach Paterno shoved into duty in the second game of the season, after Penn State had lost its opener to Navy, 23-22.  

In that second game, the Lions upset Miami, 17-8, and after losing a close one to UCLA (17-15) out on the coast the next week, they didn't lose again in Abbey's three years there, going 30 straight games without a loss (there was a 17-17 bowl game tie with Florida State).  In all, Penn State was 30-2-1 in his three years of varsity ball (no freshman eligibility then). 

Among his teammates who made various All-America teams and/or went on to pro  careers were John Ebersole, Gary Gray, Jack Ham, Franco Harris, Dave Joyner, Warren Koegel, Ted Kwalick, Lydell Mitchell, Dennis Onkotz,  Bob Parsons, Charlie Pittman, Mike Reid, Steve Smear and Charley Zapiec. And Don Abbey, who was drafted 7th by the Cowboys in 1970, along with future Cowboys' greats Duane Thomas, Charlie Waters and Pat Toomay.

I signed two of Don Abbey's teammates - Gary Gray and Dave Joyner - to play in the World Football League.

In those days, Coach Paterno loved to refer to his Penn State football program as his "great experiment," aimed at proving that it was possible to field a big-time football team without compromising a university's principles. He would do it with the kind of people who would play first-rate football but get an education and go on to achieve and contribute well beyond the football field.

To a great extent, he was successful. Now, nearly 40 years later, he can certainly point to Don Abbey as proof.

(Of the two players I signed, Gary Gray became vice-president of an investment firm, and Dave Joyner an orthopedic surgeon in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.)

*********** I found some great lessons for coaches in an address by Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates on April 21, 2008, to the graduating class at West Point Herare some excerpts...

One thing will remain the same. We will still need men and women in uniform to call things as they see them and tell their subordinates and their superiors alike what they need to hear, not what they want to hear.

Here too Marshall (General George C. Marshall) in particular is a worthy role model. In late 1917, during World War I, U.S. military staff in France was conducting a combat exercise for the American Expeditionary Force. General Pershing was in a foul mood. He dismissed critiques from one subordinate after another and stalked off. But then-Captain Marshall took the arm of the four-star general, turned him around and told him how the problems they were having resulted not from receiving a necessary manual from the American headquarters – Pershing’s headquarters. And the commanders said, “Well, you know, we have our problems.” And Marshall replied, “Yes, I know you do, General…but ours are immediate and everyday and have to be solved before night.”

After the meeting, Marshall was approached by other officers offering condolences for the fact he was sure to be fired and sent off to the front line. Instead Marshall became a valued adviser to Pershing, and Pershing a valued mentor to Marshall.

Twenty years later, then-General Marshall was sitting in the White House with President Roosevelt and his top advisers and Cabinet secretaries. War in Europe was looming but still a distant possibility for an isolated America. In that meeting, Roosevelt proposed that the U.S. Army – which at that time was ranked in size somewhere between that of Switzerland and Portugal – should be the lowest priority for funding and industry. FDR's advisers all nodded. Building an army could wait.

And FDR, looking for the military's imprimatur to his decision, said, “Don't you think so, George?” And Marshall, who hated being called by his first name, said, “I'm sorry, Mr. President, I don't agree with that at all.” The room went silent. The Treasury secretary told Marshall afterwards, “Well, it's been nice knowing you.” And it was not too much later that Marshall was named Army chief of staff.

I should note at this point that in my 16 months as secretary of Defense, I have changed several important decisions because of general officers disagreeing with me and persuading me of a better course of action. For example, at one point I had decided to shake up a particular command by appointing a commander from a different service than had ever held the post. A senior service chief persuaded me to change my mind.

On trips to the front, I've also made it a priority to meet and hear from small groups of soldiers ranging from junior enlisted to field-grade officers, and their input has been invaluable and shaped my thinking and decisions as well. All in senior positions would be well-advised to listen to enlisted soldiers, NCOs, and company and field-grade officers. They are the ones on the front line, and they know the real story.

More broadly, if as an officer - listen to me very carefully - if as an officer you don't tell blunt truths or create an environment where candor is encouraged, then you've done yourself and the institution a disservice. This admonition goes back beyond the roots of our own republic. Sir Francis Bacon was a 17th century jurist and philosopher as well as a confidante of the senior minister of England's King James. He gave this advice to a protégé looking to follow in his steps at court: “Remember well the great trust you have undertaken; you are as a continual sentinel, always to stand upon your watch to give [the king] true intelligence. If you flatter him, you betray him.” Remember that. If you flatter him, you betray him.

In Marshall's case, he was able to forge a bond of trust with Roosevelt not only because his civilian boss could count on his candor, because once a decision was made, FDR could also count on Marshall to do his utmost to carry out a policy – even if he disagreed with it – and make it work. This is important because the two men clashed time and again in the years that followed, ranging from yet more matters of war production to whether the allies should defer an invasion on the mainland of Europe.

Marshall has been recognized as a textbook model for the way military officers should handle disagreements with superiors and in particular with the civilians vested with control of the armed forces under our Constitution. So your duties as an officer are:

* To provide blunt and candid advice always;

* To keep disagreements private;

* And to implement faithfully decisions that go against you.

****************************************

Here at West Point, as at every university and company in America, there's a focus on teamwork, consensus-building and collaboration. Yet make no mistake, the time will come when you must stand alone in making a difficult, unpopular decision, or when you must challenge the opinion of superiors or tell them that you can't get the job done with the time and the resources available – a difficult charge in an organization built on a “can-do” ethos; or a time when you will know that what superiors are telling the press or the Congress or the American people is inaccurate. There will be moments when your entire career is at risk. What will you do? What will you do?

These are difficult questions that you should be thinking about, both here at West Point and over the course of your career. There are no easy answers.

But if you follow the dictates of your conscience and the courage of your convictions while being respectfully candid with your superiors while encouraging candor in others, you will be in good stead for the challenges you will face as officers and leaders in the years ahead.

Defend your integrity as you would your life. If you do this, I am confident when you face these tough dilemmas, you will, in fact, know the right thing to do.

*********** Before heading up to Orono for this weekend's UMaine Parent's Banquet and Spring Game, I logged on to read your Friday "NYCU" segment.  The opening story struck me right between the eyes -- the middle school coach who doesn't run the same system as the varsity.  Your reply was:  "As you well know, my belief is that the best thing you can do for him is send him kids who love the game and know how to block and tackle and compete and know what a high school coach will expect of them."
 
I couldn't agree more. Varsity staffs tweak and change their systems every year. In fact, our head coach switched from the Wing T to a more Pro Style system in MID-YEAR, when my son was a senior. (It's actually more of a grab bag series of plays than a real offense ... but I digress.)  I can see asking everyone to use similar terminology (even that's a stretch).  But beyond that, I think it's a total fabrication that running the varsity offense is necessary for lower grades.  The coaches have these kids virtually year-round, anyway. If they can't teach their terminology and formations in a few weeks, either it's too convoluted or they're lousy teachers.
 
Teach young kids to be football players, and they'll learn and succeed in any system.

Mike Brusko, Zionsville, Pennsylvania (When we read about programs that are integrated from top to bottom, they are usually places where the high school coach has been there - and been successful - and been doing pretty much the same thing - for a long time. I think that a greenhorn high school coach fails to realize that before he starts to makes demands on his middle school and youth coaches, he first has to earn that right.

I tell middle-school and youth coaches who come under that sort of pressure from a demanding high school coach to ask him,  "If I switch what I'm doing to what you're doing, what assurance do I have that you'll be running the same thing next year?  Or, for that matter, that you'll even be here in a couple of years?" HW)

*********** The son of the deputy mayor of the little town of Battle Ground, Washington could use a good spanking. Actually, it's probably too late. He's 18 years old, and undoubtedly, like most people his age, has never felt a swat on his rear end.

Not so very long ago, he sent an e-mail to the town council denouncing the newest member of their group, a black man. He was intemperate in his tone, and signed the e-mail "A N--- Hater." He also referred to the mayor as an "N--- lover."

There were no threats, but he is being charged with "Cyberstalking" - which in Washington is a gross misdemeanor, described as corresponding via the Internet with language meant to "harass, intimidate, torment or embarrass."

Sheesh. "Torment?" To think of the a**holes I could have had thrown in the clink If I'd only known.

I have a feeling that the brat in question will go free, because it does seem to me that he will be found to have certain First Amendment protections. Since according to our courts those rights include such boorish behavior as begging on public streets, stripping, and publishing magazines extolling the desirability of man-boy love, they almost certainly will extend to his racial insults, however ugly we may find them to be.

Oh, if only I were king, how much easier things would be. For most of us. I would find the kid guilty of grossly bad manners and uncivilized behavior, and sentence him to a series of spankings, retroactive to include all the ones he deserved - and missed - since he was three years old.

*FRIDAY, APRIL 25, 2008- "The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery." Winston Churchill

*********** A successful middle school coach writes...

********** A successful middle school coach writes...

The new (high school) head coach met with me for about an hour to discuss some of the new stuff they will be running on offense.  It is about as far away from what we do as you could get.  He was very kind to point out that he doesn’t expect us to run his stuff but encouraged me to learn about his system and gave me some handouts that showed his formations.  I doubt I’m switching over to his offense, but I hope the other middle school that feeds the high school does.  That should make it easier for us to beat them.  Have a great summer. 

As you well know, my belief is that the best thing you can do for him is send him kids who love the game and know how to block and tackle and compete and know what a high school coach will expect of them.

*********** I think it's called killing the goose that lays the golden egg...

In recent years, Oregon football has crashed the big time.

Ducks' games at Autzen Stadium have become a tough ticket, and big donors have opened their checkbooks, following the lead of Nike founder (and Oregon grad) Phil Knight, once called by another Pac 10 coach (UCLA's Bob Toledo) "the best owner in college football."

One of those big donors recently became Oregon's AD, and one of this first acts of business was to announce that Oregon was going to restart its long-defunct baseball program. Either the Ducks couldn't deal with the fact that the only major national title won by an Oregon school since World War II was won by the hated Oregon State Beavers - in baseball - or the new AD simply loves baseball.

Whatever, along with the new baseball program came the need for a place to play. And the simplest solution - at the time - seemed to be to build it in the parking lot of Autzen Stadium.

Uh-oh. Maybe the big money guys, sipping bloody marys up in their luxury boxes, don't understand tailgating, but down there in the parking lot is where hardcore Ducks' fans tailgate. It's a major event of their social calendar. Many of them have been doing it since the days before tickets were hard to get, and now the new baseball stadium is going to wipe out more than 400 parking spots.

So here's the Duck AD's solution to the problem: Turn a negative into a positive. The peasants want to tailgate? It's going to cost them - $3500 for a car, $5000 for an RV.

Let them eat cake.

*********** An aspiring offensive coordinator wrote...

I have a good QB. I have good wing backs.I will have an athletic B back.I want to be able to pass, to put the ball down the field, to complement running game. I think I should establish this from tight first. Do you agree? If so how can I counter the “But we are too bunched up” remarks.

Yes, you should first teach it all from “Tight.”

The very thing that makes this an effective passing offense is the fact that we are bunched up - and the defense had better bunch up, too.

If they don't, we pound them with our powers.

If they do, we sweep them and we throw over them, because there is a lot of field to attack.

But... if you are still hearing remarks like that, it is obvious that you are surrounded by knuckleheads who simply can't let go of their ingrained thinking, and are never going to consent to running the Double Wing the way it needs to be run.

My recommendation is that you back off and suggest they run something else. If I were an animal breeder who bred champion dogs, I wouldn't let them go to people who wouldn't appreciate them and take care of them. These guys don't deserve to be Double Wing owners because they don't appreciate it and they won't take care of it.

*********** Internet humor, attributed to the Manitoba Herald...

'The flood of American liberals sneaking across the border into Canada has intensified in the past week, sparking calls for increased patrols to stop the illegal immigration.

The actions of President Bush are prompting the exodus among left-leaning citizens who fear they'll soon be required to own a gun, hunt, pray, work for a living, and agree with Bill O'Reilly.

Canadian border farmers say it's not uncommon to see dozens of Sociology and History professors, lawyers, animal-rights activists, Hollywood actors, and Unitarians crossing their fields at night.

'I went out to milk the cows the other day, and there was a Hollywood producer huddled in the barn,' said Manitoba farmer Red Greenfield, whose acreage borders North Dakota.

'The producer was cold, exhausted and hungry. He asked me if I could spare a latte and some free-range chicken. When I said I didn't have any, he left. Didn't even get a chance to show him my screenplay, eh?'

In an effort to stop the illegal aliens, Greenfield erected higher fences, but the liberals scaled them. So he tried installing speakers that blare Rush Limbaugh across the fields. 'Not real effective,' he said. 'The Liberals still got through, and Rush annoyed the cows so much they wouldn't give milk.'

Officials are particularly concerned about smugglers who meet liberals near the Canadian border, pack them into Volvo station wagons, drive them across the border and leave them to fend for themselves.

'A lot of these people are not prepared for rugged conditions,' an Ontario border patrolman said. 'I found one carload without a drop of drinking water. They did have a nice little Napa Valley cabernet, though.'

When liberals are caught, they're sent back across the border, often wailing loudly that they fear retribution from conservatives. Rumors have been circulating about the Bush administration establishing re-education camps in which liberals will be forced to drink domestic beer,  watch NASCAR races and listen to religious music.

In recent days, liberals have turned to sometimes-ingenious ways of crossing the border. Some have taken to posing as senior citizens on bus trips to buy cheap Canadian prescription drugs. After catching a half-dozen young Vegans disguised in powdered wigs, Canadian immigration authorities began stopping buses and quizzing the supposed senior-citizen passengers on Perry Como and Rosemary Clooney hits to prove they were alive in the '50s.

'If they can't identify the accordion player on The Lawrence Welk Show, we get suspicious about their age,' an official said.

Canadian citizens have complained that the illegal immigrants are creating an organic-broccoli shortage and renting all the good Susan Sarandon movies.

'I feel sorry for American liberals, but the Canadian economy just can't support them,' an Ottawa resident said. 'How many art-history majors and lawyers does one country need?'

*********** Shhhhh.

Friday, April 25 has been designated as this year's Day of Silence, billed as an annual day of protest against the bullying and harassment of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) students. Participating students will supposedly spend the school day in silence, supposedly to represent the silencing of LGBT students.

You probably thought I'd say it was a great waste of educational dollars, but you'd be wrong.

My take? Finally - a way to get them to STFU, if only for one day.

*********** I read your bio http://www.coachwyatt.com/about.html, in which you talked about getting into coaching and education at 38 years of age.  Having an Ivy League pedigree and then just shooting out at right angles to a whole different career, plus with a family, must have taken some courage.  This prompted me to ask a question.  I am 42 years old.  I have a PhD in physics and engineering and make a large salary at a major semiconductor company's research lab.  My three sons began football a few years ago.  After watching - what I perceived to be - some awfully inept coaching of my first son, I decided to coach my second son's flag football team and took them to an 8-1 season.  The next year I moved with the same boy to Pop Warner Mitey Mite youth football; our team after struggling early went 5-4.  We ran a Single Wing offense and Wide Tackle 6-2 defense (started as Goal line 6-5 but needed the lone safety back to stop the long breakthrough).

My question.  I would like to switch into teaching and coaching football, but I'm not sure of where to start.  I taught some night classes at a local community college last spring to see how that went; I liked it.  My fear is supporting my family on a teacher's salary.  What level of teaching?  I probably could teach at college level, but my football coaching experience would probably more likely be at a lower level.  Any words of advice?

I wouldn't say that my move from the marketing field to coaching took courage as much as blind faith in the future. Believe me, there were long stretches where I was pretty hard on myself for what I'd gotten us into.
In your case, it would seem possible to make the move to teaching and coaching at the high school level, because I believe that science teachers are still in demand, and a school would consider it quite a bonus to be able to hire a science teacher who also wants to coach (there is also a shortage of people outside the PE who want to coach).

There is, of course, the money problem, and there are no easy answers there.

The only way you are going to make BIG money in coaching is at the very top - the NFL or college Division I - and, realistically, your late start makes that a very slim possibility. You would have to serve an "internship" as a graduate assistant in a college program, which essentially pays nothing, but the chances of your getting a graduate assistantship are equally slim, because colleges are limited by the NCAA in the number they can offer, and there are simply too many eager young guys coming out of college every year and getting into the pipeline.

I am not as familiar with the junior college level as I might be, because we no longer have JC football in the Northwest, but my impression is that they do not ordinarily have more than a few full-time coaching positions on their staffs; in fact, I gather that most JC coaches also teach, just as they would in high school.

Since there are a lot more high schools than junior colleges, I would say that if you want to teach and coach at a school, your best shot is at the high school level.

Teachers' salaries will vary greatly, depending on the area of the country you're in, but it is safe to say that a starting salary normally would be at least $35,000 in most metro areas.

With advanced degrees, the pay could be maybe 10-15 per cent more for a master's degree and another 10-15 per cent for a doctorate, and I am told that there are some places that have begun to do the smart thing and offer more money in high-demand/short-supply fields (I would think that science would be such a field).

Add to that an assistant coach's stipend of maybe $3000 (it will also vary), and perhaps an assistant position in a spring or winter sport, and it is possible to add another $5,000-6,000.

That means that it is conceivable that a person with your credentials in your part of the country might start out at in the area of $45,000 or more.

There is some time off in the summer, but you might not have as much time as you think to take on another job, depending on what your head coach's requirements are on the off-season.

These dollar figures I've given you are just general, but they are matters of public record, and you might want to contact the human relations departments at a couple of school districts in your area to find out what they really are.

You also might want to find out what sort of "education" courses are required for you to be "certified." You don't want me to get started on that nonsense, which in my mind is primarily a conspiracy between the teachers' unions and teacher training insitutions to scratch each other's backs. I have heard that in fields of high demand and low supply, some certification requirements are postponed, if not waived entirely.

I think that when all is said and done it is a quality-of-life issue. You are not going to make a lot of money teaching and coaching. But there are rewards that can't be measured, non-monetary rewards that you can't begin to match in almost any other field except perhaps the military or the clergy.

Just as with the military or the clergy, I think there is a "call" to teach and coach.

Finally, I will say this. If you can handle it financially, I don't see anything wrong with your getting in at 42. I know guys who got into it right out of college, and by 50 they were done. They'd had enough. I think that the fact that I got into coaching late explains why coaching never lost its pull on me.

*********** IN suburban Beaverton, Oregon, a school is unable to use its girls' softball field because it has been determined that the new, $100,000 dugouts lack sufficient handicap access.

*********** One day, God forbid, we may again have a draft. But if and when we do, mark my words - there will be fighting in the streets. Especially when they find out that they'll have to strip in front of other men.

*********** It's that time of the year when we began reading about this or that "Teacher of the Year." In my opinion, after years as a teacher and the husband of one, it's mostly a crock of sh--.

My suspicion is a that lot of administrative and school board and PTA ass kissing goes into "earning" those awards. With today's softie bureaucrats in charge of schools, I don't think that anyone who spends his fall afternoons coaching football is going to get one of these awards any time soon.

*********** Coach: Before I spend an hour or so reading the rule book I thought I would pose a few questions to you. All but 1 player must be set 1 full second before the snap...

This all goes back to rules makers' attempt to deal with Knute Rockne's Notre Dame shift, which was so precise that the ball would be snapped the instant his players completed their shift. Ever since, the entire team has been required to be set for one full second, before snapping the ball.

You can do a multiple-man shift, so long as the entire team is set for one full second.
Following that pause, you can snap the ball. or send a man in motion. Or shift again.

What you can't do is shift and then immediately send a man in motion. The team must have been set for a full second after the shift, or else, when the ball is snapped, you will have been deemed to have more than one man in motion.

A player may not be moving towards the line of scrimage at the snap.What are the do's and don't of presnap shifting? Can a player come out of a 3 point stance once he is set?

Backs and ends can come out of 3-point stances and shift or re-set. Interior linemen (the men inside the men on the two ends of the line) cannot. I tell them that when they put their hands down they are putting them in cement.

Can the Qb move from under center?

The QB can shift or go in motion after going under center, but you'd better check with your game officials beforehand just to make sure they agree. I shift into punt formation - my QB is usually my punter, and he first lines up under center, then backpedals to his spot 10 yards back. You can actually run most of your offense from this formation by snapping the ball either to him or to the B-Back (who is offset to a spot behind the guard to the side of the kicker's foot) as he is back-pedalling. Some people I know will occasionally send the QB in motion and then direct-snap it to the B-Back on an old-fashioned wedge play.

*********** In response to a coach who asked me to list the pros and cons of an unbalanced single wing...
While an unbalanced line will surely cause problems for defenses, so, too will a balanced line single wing. And the unbalanced line could wind up causing more problems for you than for your opponents.

One big problem with a full-time unbalanced line single wing attack is that you are totally locked in - totally committed to it - and as a result you will have to have backups at 11 completely different positions. There is no tranferrability from one line position to another, which means serious depth problems for most teams.

At least with our balanced-line system, one reserve guard can back up two positions, and the same goes for tackles, ends, and - if you choose to employ a direct-snap double-wing - wingbacks, too.

And if you play single wing, you can go to formation left without having to flip the entire team.

I find I have had a much easier time going from base balanced-line to an occasional unbalanced line than when I ran a dedicated unbalanced line and wanted to go balanced.

For what it is worth, the most successful major-college single wing offenses in the so-called "modern" era - since 1950 - were balanced line teams, Tennessee and UCLA. (General Neyland at Tennnessee chose to run a balanced-line because, one of his former players, Andy Kozar, told me, the tailback hit the off-tackle hole quicker!)

Nowadays, you could probably run a balanced line single wing and pass it off as shotgun, especially if you were to split an end, or even both ends. (I think you would have trouble doing that with an unbalanced line.)

*********** A little political satire, from scrappleface.com

Sensing an opportunity to portray Sen. Barack Obama as elitist and out of touch after his remarks about “bitter” rural Americans who cling to guns, God and xenophobia, Sen. Hillary Clinton stopped after church today at an indoor gun range, where she fired roughly 300 rounds through a handgun she said she carries concealed everywhere she goes.

Her lower lip bulging from a dip of Skoal, Sen. Clinton put her Bible in her handbag, and drew out her own Para Ordnance Warthog .45 caliber pistol.

As reporters looked on, the Democrat presidential candidate emptied one 10-round magazine after another, with fair accuracy, at a human silhouette target.

“Small town folk like us,” said Sen. Clinton, “don’t cling to God or guns because we’re bitter about the economy, as my opponent suggests. We believe in God because he’s real, and we keep and bear arms as the best insurance against tyrants who would strip our freedoms if they didn’t fear our collective power.”

As for the economy, the candidate said, small-town people haven’t been sitting on their hands since the steel and textile mills closed 25 years ago.

“We’re Americans,” she said, “We’re not a bunch of cry babies. Things change. We deal with it. We suck it up, learn a new skill, and do something else to earn the money we need to buy stuff, you know, like Bibles and bullets.”

TUESDAY, APRIL 22, 2008- "Truth is tough. It will not break, like a bubble, at a touch; nay, you may kick it about all day like a football, and it will be round and full at evening." Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

*********** Coach,
When I read your comments about the NFL possibly going into Canada, I remembered reading about the Canadian Football Act. Do you remember the Canadian Football Act from your WFL days?
Steve Tobey
Malden, Mass.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_Northmen

(I sure do.  It was designed to protect the CFL, and as a result, the WFL Toronto Northmen (whose rich owner, John  Bassett, was the one who lured Czonka, Kiick and Warfield away from the Dolphins) were forced to move to Memphis (and become the Memphis Southmen). HW)

*********** If there is anybody who could screw up Div 1-A football's post season better than the NCAA already has, it would have to be the same people who gave us Title IX, Congress. Now they want to investigate the NCAA because they have a screwed up post season that they say is unfair and violates some anti-trust law.
 
Congress says postseason is unfair: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/fb/fbc/5709673.html
 
University of Texas says that their Holiday Bowl win was a "loss":
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/spt/colleges/topstories/stories/041808dnspoutlede.37214ae.html
 
And of course some mandatory wikipedia article on Title IX:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title_IX
 
I still wonder when Kellogg's is going to sponsor a 7AM bowl game featuring two teams with a less than 6-6 record and call it the Cereal Bowl. I wonder how many people would wake up that early to watch it.

Lloyd Kempson,
Lake Worth, Texas

Hahahaha.

You have no doubt noticed that one of the congressmen complaining about the BCS represents Hawai'i, a second represents Idaho (Boise State) and a third is a Georgian. (Georgia, as everyone loyal Bulldogs' fan knows, should have played for the national title.)

From their standpoint, it's the ideal bill - it plays to their constituents,  it gets them exposure in the sports pages, and it doesn't cost a damn thing.

Unlike Title IX, whose costs continue to climb.

*********** One of my favorite drives is to go from where I live, in Southwest Washington, about 150 miles to the east, to Central Washington's Yakima Valley. I made the drive again last week.

The first hour and a half winds through the Columbia River Gorge, first where the river, before it was harnessed by dams, has carved its way through the Cascade Range, then, east of the Cascades, through the part where the river has cut its channel through the high desert plateau. In the space of just a few miles, the climate radically changes - the trees, which grow by the millions on the "Wet Side" and in the mountains, all but disappear and give way to sage brush.

Then the road swings to the north, climbing steeply up from the river to begin a twisting run through the kind of wild country that most of us see only in old Western movies. It is 50 miles with no services and little sign of human habitation, 20 miles to the top at Satus Pass, then 30 more miles through the rugged Yakama Indian Reservation, until finally descending into the vast, fruitful Yakima Valley (the people of the Yakama Nation prefer spelling it with the "a").

Here, it's no longer the Washington of wooded coastlines and snow-capped mountains, but more like California's Central Valley.

Reflecting the huge role agriculture has always played in the Valley's economy, a large percentage of the population is Hispanic. But a great many of the Hispanic people living here are third- and fourth-generation Americans. They are not immigrants. They have no intention of "going back" to any place. They are Americans. Their kids may speak Spanish at home, and occasionally among themselves, but they are Americans in every sense of the word.

And many of them play football. Not futbol, either. Football. American football.

Last week, I had a chance to work with some of those kids in the small town of Toppenish, where Jason Smith has taken over the football program. Coach Smith has been a teacher at Toppenish as well as its track coach, and when the job came open after a 2-8 season last year, he applied, and got it.

Lots of things have to happen to turn any program around, of course, and Toppenish is no exception, but based on my experience working with those kids, there is a level of talent, of enthusiasm, of coachability that gives the Toppenish Wildcats a fighting chance.

*********** A preacher calls on God to damn America... our President is called all manner of vile things by people who aren't worthy of wiping his bottom.... a week ago, Bill Maher honored the Pope's visit to America by calling the Roman Catholic Church a cult.

But. hey - this is America, and one of the freedoms we enjoy is freedom of speech, right? Why, brave Americans died on foreign shores to defend that freedom. (I personally have my suspicions about any guys putting themselves in harm's way to defend college students' right to protest.)

So why, I wonder, did CNN, which has no qualms whatsoever about attacking our President, feel forced to apologize to China because one of its commentators called the goons and thugs that run China goons and thugs, and the junk that they sell us junk?

Interesting that as much as we value our freedom of speech, a freedom which is used to justify pornographers and beggars alike, a major American corporation will roll over and surrender that right to our dear friends the Chinese, who as we all know treat all people humanely, treat the planet with respect, and would never use even the threat of armed force unless China itself were to come under attack.

(Not that it isn't a pleasant prospect to contemplate the Chinese taking out CNN. If they'd like, they can have Bill Maher, too.)

*********** It's just one of the differences between us and the Russians, but it's telling...

Danica Patrick finally wins a race and in the US it's billed as an inspiration for our little girls and a victory for women everywhere.

A Russian space capsule with three people on board lands 260 miles from its target, and the chief of the Russian space agency says it quite possibly was because two of the crew members were women.

*********** Just in case you had any doubts about the moral fibre of today's school administrators, I got this from a reader...

A couple weeks ago you had the article "The Customer Is Always Right" in your News article. I told you that I had forwarded it to a number of the teachers at my school so they could enjoy it also. I guess one of them decided to forward it to my Principal and , you guessed it, I got "called into the office" to "discuss the issue". Seems that sending that e-mail out constitutes having a "bad attitude", and the administration wants to make sure I work on changing that attitude. Sigh...

Hmmmm. If that's the way you think, there must be something wrong with you. Scary. Does this sound like the old Soviet Union and its thought control, or what?

*********** A sure sign that the Obama campaign is in trouble... Boston radio guy Howie Carr asked listeners and visitors to his Web site to decide who was the bigger snob - Obama or Kerry.

You wouldn't think there anyone alive could give Lord John any competition on that score, but Obama actually got 32 per cent of the votes.

*********** How many of us have allowed the emotions of the moment, especially after a bitter loss, to cause us to say things we later regretted saying?

I'm enjoying reading Tony Dungy's "Quiet Strength," a gift from my friend Kevin Latham, and one of the many impressive things about Coach Dungy is that he is very careful about what he says, when he says it, and whom he says it to.

Negative as it may sound, it's not a bad idea for a coach to have a statement ready in advance in the event of a loss, rather than coming off the top in his disappointment and saying something that could do permanent damage to his program.

A good example of a prepared statement is the one that General Dwight Eisenhower had ready, on the chance that the D-Day landing might not succeed:

“Our landings…have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops.  My decision to attack at this time and place was based upon the best information available.  The troops, the air, and the Navy did all that bravery and devotion to duty could do.  If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt, it is mine alone.” 

*********** Crown Point, Indiana has been in the news lately, first because it's where Hillary Clinton threw down something that looked like a shot of whiskey (an old B-girl trick), and second because last week a truckload of human feces spilled onto a road there.

Human feces. Imagine the cleanup. Imagine explaining how your car skidded out of control.

The Indiana Department of Transportation cited the driver for an unsecured load. (How do you tie down "human feces?)

*********** The concept of polygamy was once considered so odious to a Christian nation that only after the LDS Church renounced it was Utah admitted to the Union.

But we are becoming more and more a secular nation, and many things once considered odious to a Christian nation are increasingly accepted.

For example, where once there was shame attached to illegitimacy, now it is common practice for celebrities to raise children without benefit of marriage, and in many of our cities, the vast majority of children are born out of wedlock.

We routinely confer the legality (if not the sanctity) of marriage on same-sex couples, and allow them to adopt.
We even accept artificial insemination of lesbian couples (I don't even want to know if it's covered by my health plan).

As gays are fond of saying, "love makes a family"....

So can someone please tell me why we're still getting so worked up over polygamy?

And can someone please tell me why we're getting so excited about pregnant 13-year-old girls at a commune in Texas when it's relatively commonplace for 13- and 14-year-old girls in the inner city to become mothers?

***********  I have been working hard and studying the system.  I have two questions I was hoping you could help me with:
 
1.  The color system is a great way to communicate the basic set plays and quarterback steps.  As a compliment to the run game, it is what we need.  I am a little confused on how you adjust or custimize the passing game.  It appears to get "wordy"  I am concerned about accurately communicating changes to the huddle from sideline.  (granted this is a run run run run first offense and from scouting their will be pregame adjustments to passes, I am still concerned)
 
Coach, it's the nature of the game that pass plays tend to be wordier.   It used to be the joke in semi-pro ball that the longer the offense stayed in the huddle, the greater the likelihood that it was going to be a pass.

Our simplest passes - our play-action passes - are easily called, because the default routes are built in.  Examples would be 47 Brown/56 Black.

It's when you want to customize by changing one of the routes that it can begin to get wordy - but Ripper 47 Brown X Post-Corner is not that long.  Dating back to the old days when almost anyone could remember a seven-digit phone number, I have always tried to stay within seven bits of info in calling a play.
 
2.  2 minute offense.  Is it best just to use the same color system in calling 2 minutes?  How have you worked the run into that system?

In all my plays, I use play cards in wrist coaches.  On all the players. Not just the quarterback.  That's how I get the plays in.   In a hurry-up situation, we dispense with the huddle and line up at the line and I call - or wig-wag - the play coordinates on their cards. Here's how my play-calling setup works:

http://www.coachwyatt.com/playgrid1.html

*********** Hugh,

How are you? It sounds like the Cannon School made a great choice. I had a very preliminary interview with them back about 8 years ago for a history teaching job. I'm surprised they have not started a football program sooner, but it looks as though they are certainly going about it in the right way.

I also enjoyed a few weeks back your mention of Dave Potter's Meet & Greet Drill. After a fairly long New England winter of discontent for me after the debacle of our football season here at Forman, I spent a lot of time thinking of ways to be a better coach and also challenging myself to grow up more as a coach. I have been taking a decidedly different approach with my JV lacrosse team this spring in truly emphasizing the bigger picture of life and how their experience on the field will help them develop into mature adults. We have yet to even mention wins and losses. And I am truly enjoying the coaching of these kids in a way that I never have before.

Many of my kids, as you know, struggle with a variety of learning problems and as such they also have very weak social skills. Early in the season I showed my assistant coach the practice plan for the day and on it was the "Meet & Greet" Drill. He initially thought it was a hitting drill. He is our Academic Dean, and a stickler for etiquette, so as you might imagine he was thrilled to know what the true nature of the drill was. So we now regularly run the drill and like Dave Potter's teams I appoint a group of kids before each game to go and introduce themselves to the opposing coach and thank them for hosting us. We have our home opener on Wednesday, so the kids will welcome the coach to Forman. I have gotten nothing but positive feedback from the other coaches, some of whom have said, "hey I want to do that too!"

I wish you safe travels in your clinic season and I am hoping to come to Providence if my schedule allows. Take care,

Sam Keator, Litchfield, Connecticut

*********** Coach Wyatt,
 
I have enjoyed your site news on Boothbay Harbor, Maine and coach Jack Tourtillotte. Jack is one of the finest men I have met in football in my 29 years coaching the game. Coach Tourtillotte gave me my copy of the Toss  book when it would cost you your first born to buy it. Our old staff at Memorial H.S. still talks about Jack and the night he enlightened them on the Double Wing at your clinic. I have also had a free private clinic one on one with Jack which was priceless at any cost. Thank you, Coach Tourtillotte, for your contributions to this great game.
 
A few days ago I spoke to my wife about the Boothbay job. She loves the area, as anyone would. Since I am not a certified teacher perhaps I could be a lobster taster. A profesional who helps assure quality control by eating large amounts of lobster. Can I sell Jack on this?
 
As you know I am a Wyatt disciple of the Double Wing and it has served me and my players very well. I have researched every bit of information from every coach that makes it available and have found your system to be number one. I'll see you in Providence!
 
John Trisciani
Head Football Coach
Trinity H.S.
Manchester, New Hampshire

*********** Once again, the Law of Unintended Consequences reveals itself...

A new law requiring employers in Europe to limit their workers’ exposure to potentially damaging noise is now being applied to - orchestras and bands.

A member of an English orchestra, told that he and his colleagues would have to wear earplugs during rehearsals and performances of certain pieces, said, “It’s like saying to a racing-car driver that they have to wear a blindfold."

When this thinking gets to the US, as it undoubtedly will, what will happen to college football coaches at places like LSU and Oregon?

*********** Was that really the Washington Wizards wearing those goony-ass uniforms against the Cleveland Cavaliers Saturday, and not the Washington Generals?

*********** The Mongols are coming! The Mongols are coming!

Police all over Oregon, but especially in the cities of Portland, Salem and Eugene, are bracing themselves for what could become a biker war, with the California-based Mongols facing a conglomeration of Oregon-based gangs.

The better-known California-based Hells Angels and the Portland-based Gypsy Jokers, Oregon's best-known and most-feared gang, have long agreed to stay out of each other's territory.

The Mongols are well known in the Golden State for their violent rivalry with the Angels, but until recently, they, too, stayed south of the border.

In my judgment (from the vantage point of my 450 cc Honda), I wouldn't expect the Oregon bikers to roll over. Not if they're all like the Gypsy Jokers.

Since the time several years ago when some apologist for motorcyclists stated that "99 per cent of all bikers are decent, law-abiding citizens," the Gypsy Jokers have worn small, diamond-shaped patches on their jackets that read "1 %er."

FRIDAY, APRIL 18, 2008- "What we want is to see the child in pursuit of knowledge, not knowledge in pursuit of the child." George Bernard Shaw

*********** Donnie Hayes, of St. Cloud, Florida, was at my Atlanta clinic in February, and he was also at the Charlotte clinic this past Saturday. At the Atlanta clinic, it was as head coach at Viera High School, but at Charlotte, it was as the new head coach of Cannon School, in Concord, North Carolina.

This is very exciting and gratifying to me. I have followed Coach Hayes' career very closely, from when he was a very successful youth coach in suburban Detroit who wanted to become a career coach, to his decision to change careers and pursue his dream, to his move to his native Florida to improve his chances of making things happen, to an assistant's job, to a coordinator's position, to a head job at a startup high school, to this...

Following an extensive search, Cannon School has hired Donnie Hayes to lead the school’s first football program, which will begin in the 2008-09 school year. Coach Hayes joins Cannon from Viera High School in Viera, FL, where he oversaw the implementation of their football program and served as head coach for two seasons. Hayes has more than 10 years of coaching experience at the high school and middle school levels, as well as experience as a college and semi-professional football player.

“We are excited to have Donnie Hayes as our first head football coach,” said Ron Johnson, Cannon’s director of athletics. “It was clear in the interview process that Donnie has a passion for developing young men both on and off the field and he has a solid blend of being a great mentor, teacher, and coach.”

In addition to his coaching responsibilities, Hayes will serve as a Middle School science teacher at Cannon. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology Education from Norwich University in Northfield, VT, and has taught science and math in Florida, where he also holds a Middle School Grades Integrated Curriculum Certification.

Cannon School decided to add football to its flourishing athletics program after several years of research and conversations both within its school community and with schools offering established and relatively new football programs. Cannon will field a team comprised of students from grades seven through nine. The boys will practice together as a single team and the Cougars will compete against 7th-8th grade and 8th-9th grade opponents, the first step in a three-to-four year plan to build a program that will grow to include junior varsity and varsity teams.

A six-member search committee comprised of teachers, administrators and board members met over three months and reviewed more than 120 applicants for the position before making a final recommendation to Cannon’s Head of School, Matt Gossage.

“We knew we wanted to hire someone who appreciates in the fullest sense the concept of the student-athlete,” said Johnson. “Donnie has a very clear understanding regarding the challenges of building a competitive football program, and he is excited to get started.”

Hayes will finish his teaching responsibilities at Viera High School before officially joining Cannon School on campus early this summer. In the meantime, he and Johnson will begin interviewing candidates for assistant coaching positions and make plans for off-season workouts to prepare students for tryouts in August.

Next fall, Cannon School will compete in the Charlotte Independent Schools Athletic Association (CISAA) conference, joining Charlotte Christian School, Charlotte Country Day School, Charlotte Latin School, and Providence Day School in 3A athletics competition.

Cannon School is an independent, nonsectarian, college preparatory institution serving more than 900 students in Junior Kindergarten through Grade 12. Cannon School is conveniently located on a 65-acre campus on Poplar Tent Road near the Cabarrus/Mecklenburg county line. It is the fourth-largest independent school in the greater Charlotte area and attracts students from Concord, Davidson, Cornelius, Huntersville, Mooresville, Charlotte, Kannapolis, and Salisbury. Cannon School is fully accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) and the Southern Association of Independent Schools (SAIS).

My wife and I briefly toured the Cannon School's beautiful campus, about 30 minutes' drive north of downtown Charlotte. Its athletic facilities - the football field is already under construction - are excellent.

Interestingly, when one of the coaches at the Charlotte clinic asked Coach Hayes what the people at Cannon School thought about his running the Double-Wing, he said that in all of his many interviews, he was never asked about his offensive or defensive system.

In other words, the people at Cannon School hired a football coach, and they trust him to be the expert in his department. What a concept!

*********** New Masters champion Trevor Immelman was in New York City following his win, and while attending a Knicks-Celtics game at Madison Square Garden, he was invited into the Celtics' locker room by coach Doc Rivers.

Immelman admitted that since he lives near Orlando he is a fan of the Magic, he said has great admiration for the Celtics' Big Three.

He said of the Celtics, "they're all golfers, and they were congratulating me."

When it was pointed out to him that it seems to be common for so many great athletes, no matter their sport, to want to be great golfers, the 5-9 Immelman said, "I'd like to be able to dunk a basketball."

*********** Maybe the cost of his divorce is getting to Michael Jordan, because the word in Charlotte is that although MJ is a part-owner of the Charlotte Bobcats, he won't appear at a Bobcats' game and sign autographs unless he is compensated.

*********** President Franklin D. Roosevelt said it best - "A day that will live in infamy."

He was talking about December 7, 1941, the day the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.

He might just as well have been talking about December 7, 2008.

That's the day the NFL has scheduled the Buffalo Bills to play a "home" game - a regular-season game - in Toronto. Canada. Toronto is about 1-1/2 hours' drive from Buffalo, and it's much, much larger. Buffalo's economy has been in the tank for years, and Buffalo continues to shrink as many of its people move elsewhere for work. Toronto, meanwhile, is one of the largest metro areas in North America.

Prediction: give it five years and Buffalo, now the smallest of the NFL markets, will be without an NFL team. The NFL would LOVE to become international, and it wouldn't let respect Buffalo's traditions stand in its way. It wouldn't be the first time the NFL screwed Buffalo - in 1950, when the All-America Football Conference "merged" with the NFL, only three teams from the AAFC were absorbed into the NFL. They were Cleveland, San Francisco and Baltimore. There was no good reason to select Baltimore over Buffalo, which had better facilities (hard to think of old War Memorial Stadium as better than anything, but it was) and far better attendance.

As for the CFL, and the effect on it of an NFL team in Toronto - if the NFL is willing to piss on the fans of Buffalo, do you think it's worried about Canadian fans?

SHOTS FROM THE CHARLOTTE CLINIC AT SOUTH MECKLENBURG HIGH SCHOOL...

SOME OF THE SOUTH MECKLENBURG SABRES WHO HELPED MAKE THE CLINIC A SUCCESS BY DEMONSTRATING THE DOUBLE-WING FOR THE COACHES IN ATTENDANCE - MANY THANKS TO THE BOYS AND TO HEAD COACH JAMES MARTIN (FAR LEFT), AND COACHES KEVIN HINSON (THIRD FROM LEFT , STANDING) AND JONATHAN WILLIS (FAR RIGHT)

*********** I had to laugh listening to Carmelo ("Don't be a snitch") Anthony apologizing for his DUI arrest. He noted that the timing was especially bad, with the playoffs coming up, "to have this happen."

Like he had no control over things - like, out of the blue, something just "happened" to him.

*********** Darren McFadden has to be tantalizing to the NFL personnel guys. He has so-o-o-o-o much ability. But, man - he's got some issues. That serious toe injury a few years ago? Turns out it resulted from kicking a guy. And although he has escaped one paternity suit, he's got a couple more hanging over his head that won't be resolved until the babies are born. No doubt in my mind. He's ready for the NBA - er, NFL.

*********** Dear Coach Wyatt:
 
As a person who  spent time in Finland, I thought you might appreciate this video of a Finnish Rock Group, "The Leningrad Cowboys",performing in Russia.  The tune?  Sweet Home Alabama!  Backup vocals courtesy of the Red Army Choir.  Crazy getups, but actually, they don't do a bad job!
 
http://www.tothepointnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3114&Itemid=76

Mark Rice, Beaver, Pennsylvania
Hahahaha!

The Finns, thoroughly westernized, take great delight in ridiculing their more culturally-backward "neighbor" to the east. The Leningrad Cowboys were a group of Finns that got their start in the 1980s as a sendup of a Russian rock 'n' roll band. They made a hilarious movie (done in Finnish with English subtitles) called "Leningrad Cowboys Go America."

*********** I'm betting Pacman Jones plays somewhere this year. I'm also betting that before the season is over he will do something stupid and vulgar, if not illegal.

*********** Hugh -
 
From the Chicago Sun-Times today. I KNOW you will appreciate the question and answers segment on holding.
 
I guess when you are going to make at least 5 million a year or more, it is okay to cheat. Granted, this kid is a stud and I would love to have him but did he really need to talk openly about circumventing the rules?
 
The question becomes...if your holding, and the referee does not see it, is it really holding? Kind of like the tree falling in the woods with nobody around to see or hear it - does it make a sound??
 
Best,
 
Bill Murphy, Chicago

 
SPOTLIGHT: JAKE LONG
6-7 | 315 | OFFENSIVE TACKLE | MICHIGAN

Q: How many sacks did you give up in college?

A: I gave up one sack this year. I've given up two in my career. This year it was Vernon Gholston at Ohio State. I take it personally. I wanted to make sure that I was perfect and not let up a sack but Vernon is a great player and he had a good move on me and I let it up. I think it was against Michigan State my redshirt freshmen year that I allowed one.

Q: Is it true you only had one penalty in your whole college career?

A: I actually got one this season. I had a false start against Northwestern, but those were my only two penalties. My redshirt freshman year I had a holding penalty.

Q: Penalty-free football, what does that speak to?

A: Discipline. I always try to play focused and disciplined, tight and sound.

Q: Are there times during your penalty-free streak that you thought, 'That was a hold and they could have gotten me there'?

A: Absolutely. I'll admit that I hold. I'll get my hands inside and hide it that I'm holding. I try to hide it so that the refs can't see it.

Q: Is that a skill? That you can do it and not get caught? Have you gotten better at it over the years, avoiding the flag?

A: I think it is a skill if you can get away with it and not get caught. I try to make sure I get my hands inside every single play so that if I do hold a little bit the refs will not be able to see it.

What a wonderful example of the value of football! Tell me football doesn't build character! Show people this when they have the temerity to ask why taxpayers should continue to subsidize it in our schools! Wouldn't it be great if all our future politicians and lawyers and doctors and business leaders could play football? What a great way to teach them essential life lessons - discipline, hard work, dependability, and it's not illegal if you don't get caught!

*********** And you wonder why Al Gore has gone into hiding...

We awoke early to catch our flight home Wednesday. It was Durham, North Carolina, and it was April 16. And we had to scrape frost off our windshield.

We arrived home to hear on the news that this past winter in the Northwest was so severe that Washington had to spend $9 million more on snow removal than budgeted.

Thursday night's game between the Triple-A Portland Beavers and the Colorado Springs in Colorado had to be postponed because of snow and temperatures in the low 20s.

And in the Portland area, they're predicting snow this weekend at elevations as low as 500 feet.

*********** In 2005, Marcus Borden, a high school football coach in East Brunswick, New Jersey, sued his school district, saying that its policy prohibiting faculty members from participating in student-led prayers violated his constitutional rights.

In July 2006, the United States District Court for New Jersey found for Coach Borden, ruling that he could bow his head and bend his knee when the team captains led the team in prayer.

But on Tuesday, three judges of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit overturned the lower court’s ruling.

Judge D. Michael Fisher wrote in his opinion that “the conclusion we reach today is clear because he organized, participated in and led prayer activities with his team on numerous occasions for 23 years.”

“Thus,” Fisher went on, “a reasonable observer would conclude that he is continuing to endorse religion when he bows his head during the pre-meal grace and takes a knee with his team in the locker room while they pray.”

*********** The word is out.

I think.

http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080416/SPORTS/804160359

The offense Army has been working on in secret this Spring is the wishbone.

I think.

It's hard for me to contain my excitement.  

If true.

If true, Coach Stan Brock has bought himself another two or three years, in the eyes of what's left of Army's fan base. They will patiently endure the growing pains of a newly-installed wishbone. They will storm the ancient fortress, high above the Hudson, if they see any more pro-I futility.

Coach Brock may not have the horses at this point to run the 'bone, but he doesn't have the horses to do anything else successfully on offense, either.

But before I get too excited, I think that the article merits a serious re-reading. Or two.

I'm not a lawyer, but I believe I can recognize hedge phrases when I see them, and the article is full of them.

It doesn't appear that Coach Brock ever quite comes out and says "WE ARE COMMITTING TO RUNNING THE WISHBONE."

In fact, if I didn't know better I would think it was an April Fool's joke.

Actually, I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that this whole "wishbone" rumor is just part of a disinformation campaign to throw Army's opening-game opponent, Temple, off track.

*********** This week's sign of the apocalypse: Below is the e-mail I received from American Football Monthly...note the A-11 videos for sale and article.  Wonder if you get a refund if they outlaw it?
 
Chad Beermann
Valley Community HS
Elgin, Iowa

Coach-

Just got my copy.

They should offer a refund on the videos once the rulesmakers recognize what has wriggled through the loophole unintentionally created by a few otherwise well-intentioned rules.

*********** Hey Coach,

I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed the clinic in Charlotte on Saturday. I came away with many practical ideas on how to improve our Double Wing for next season. I think the best way anyone can improve their Double Wing is to get a FB like the one South Meck has. Was he a specimen or what? I was blown away. I guess we can all dream, huh? (Spencer Shuey, South Mecklenburg High B-Back, is at least 6-3, 235, and quite athletic. He also plays outside linebacker. In my opinion, he is a prospect. - HW)

I included a piece of an article from the local paper about an athlete in my county because it relates to specialization:

East Rowan pitcher/first baseman Trey Holmes has signed with Pitt Community College in Greenville, N.C.
Holmes batted .263 with three homers, 15 doubles and 50 RBIs for the Rowan Legion team last summer.
An all-county receiver/DB in football and a starter for the Mustangs in basketball, Holmes has never concentrated on baseball year-round and has Division I potential in that sport.

Check out that last sentence. Concentrate on one sport year round and you won't have to sign with a JUCO, you could be D-I! I wonder how many kids have concentrated on one sport in high school, hoping it will take them to college, only to find out at the end of their senior year that they weren't good enough, and realize that they missed out on the rewards of playing many different sports and having a variety of athletic experiences. I also wonder about the selfish coaches and parents that have pushed kids down this path.

Coach, it was a pleasure meeting you and your wife and I wish you the best. Hope to see you again next year.

Thanks again,
Jim Crawley
China Grove Middle School
China Grove, NC

*********** Dick Cavett, noted intellectual/comedian, wrote about General Petraeus' use of military jargon in addressing Congress...

It reminds you of Copspeak, a language spoken nowhere on earth except by cops and firemen when talking to “Eyewitness News.” Its rule: never use a short word where a longer one will do. It must be meant to convey some misguided sense of “learnedness” and “scholasticism” — possibly even that dread thing, “intellectualism” — to their talk. Sorry, I mean their “articulation.”

No crook ever gets out of the car. A “perpetrator exits the vehicle.” (Does any cop say to his wife at dinner, “Honey, I stubbed my toe today as I exited our vehicle”?) No “man” or “woman” is present in Copspeak. They are replaced by that five-syllable, leaden ingot, the “individual.” The other day, there issued from a fire chief’s mouth, “It contributed to the obfuscation of what eventually eventuated.” This from a guy who looked like he talked, in real life, like Rocky Balboa. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

Who imposes this phony, academic-sounding verbal junk on brave and hard-working men and women who don’t need the added burden of trying to talk like effete characters from Victorian novels?

Cavett also noted General Petraeus' repeated use of the word "challenge" to describe the situation we face in Iraq...

What would the general be forced to say if it weren’t for the icky, precious-sounding “challenge” that he leans so heavily on? That politically correct term, which was created so that folks who are legally blind, deaf, clumsy, crippled, impotent, tremor-ridden, stupid, addicted or villainously ugly are really none of those unhappy things at all. They are merely challenged. (Are these euphemisms supposed to make them feel better?) And no one need be unlucky enough to be dead or hideously wounded anymore. Those unfortunates are merely “casualties” — a sort of restful-sounding word.

*********** Coach Wyatt,
 
Thank you for another outstanding clinic.  I was wondering if you could provide me with the email address of Coach Martin as I wanted to thank him for doing such an outstanding job of hosting.  Food, drink and the Double Wing is an outstanding combination and not knowing the Charlotte area, I liked not having to go out for lunch.  His team looked very sharp and his players were very polite and well-mannered.  I'll certainly be rooting (or what's the Aussie term?) for his team this year. 
 
The two DVDs I left with you were "The Program" which is kind of a "pre-season highlight DVD" that we give to all parents that are new to our team.  In 5 minutes, it tells the Durham War Eagles story, what we're about and what's important to us.  The other DVD was our "Academic Hall of Fame Presentation."  This is the DVD that we issue to each recipient of the award.  I also amended that DVD by including some clips of our "Meet & Greet" drill, as well as our "Good News" segment.  The coach that sat at my table had read your "News" about our "Meet & Greet" drill and was interested in implementing it in his program. 
 
I took a ton of notes at the clinic.  Not only was it an excellent refresher course for me, but I kept jotting notes as I said to myself, "Oh, that's a good idea!"  "Yep, I need to remember that!" "Wow, I never even thought of that!" 

Being able to watch South Meck run the plays was an education, too.  The fact that we were inside made no difference, at all.  

Now I'm eager to check out all the DVDs I brought back with me and pore through my notes.  We have our first Eagles football camp this Saturday, so I feel the season is upon us.  Sorry I didn't get a chance to dine with you and Connie before heading back to Durham.  I grumbled to Deirdre about that all the way back home.
 
Dave Potter, Durham, North Carolina

*********** So Herschel Walker's been living several lives, has he?

In case you missed the story, he's been all over TV recently, telling us about all the different personalities ("alters") he's been, over the years. The same sort of "disorder" that perps have been using over the last few years to escape responsibility ("It wasn't my client that did it, your honor - it was his alter, 'Sven'").

Now, I'm a cynic by nature. I'm the type that hears something like this and immediately thinks, "Okay - what's his angle? Why's he suddenly coming out with this?"

The dreamy-eyed idealists out there will say, "Why, to help others like him."

Yeah, maybe. Except that he hasn't even been getting professional help himself.

We cynics are more inclined to think that there's something else behind all this, and - hey! whaddaya know! Turns out Herschel's written a book about it! Who would have guessed?

*********** Had a boss, Duane, about 20 years ago who was from Philly.  He graduated  from William and Mary  around 1970. His first job as a "professional "  was  with a  large  department store  back in Philadelphia. His first office was at the rear of the warehouse. He noticed that the trash collection contract had not been bid in a number of years , so being the good new employee and to make a few points with his new boss he put the trash contract out for bids. A couple of days later he got a visit from "Mr. Tony" and two of his assistants. Mr Tony ask Duane why, was he unhappy with his company's service? Was there any problem? Mr Tony said he was keeping his assistants from using their form of "encouragement." The bottom line was Duane pulled all bids and remained loyal to Mr Tony's company.Soon thereafter Duane got in the steel business and moved with Bethlehem Steel.
Tim Brown
Jackson Tennessee

*********** Hugh, Loved the letter about DW coach friendliness. I've always made a few friends at your clinics (and gotten some job offers too). I consider it an archetype of the real "coach" that you welcome the opportunity to meet and mentor younger coaches.

I think there's something particular about the DW coach mentality as well. Even if you're a stubborn Yankee like Jack you have to be open-minded to explore and stick to the system. A lot of them are in unconventional Lakeside-type situations where you can't be a follow-the-crowd, cruise-control type, so that manifests itself in
an openness to fellow travelers.

Christopher Anderson, Palo Alto, California

*********** Coach Wyatt,
 
Are you kidding me???
 
I saw that a coaching friend of yours in Maine is actively looking for a DW coach!
 
I can’t believe it! A school that wants a DW coach!
 
Tell me a little more about the place. I hear it is beautiful up there.

Boothbay Harbor is a lobster port and a summer resort town about 1-1/2 hours east of Portland.

I have been there and I can tell you it is indeed a beautiful place.

Boothbay Region HS is the smallest school in the state of Maine playing tackle football, but it is a state power.

It hasn't aways been that way, and the major reason it is now a power is Jack Tourtillotte.

Jack  has been principal and OC for several years, and he has run my system for about 10 years.  He is a native of Boothbay, and he helped save football.  They were considering dropping the sport until he brought in the Double Wing and turned the program around.

I'll bet Jack could be talked into coaching another year or two to get a new coach started right, and I would strongly urge any new coach to make him the offer.

Give him a call.

TUESDAY, APRIL 15, 2008- "To tell a falsehood is like the cut of a saber; for though the wound may heal, the scar of it will remain." Saadi, Persian scholar

*********** A coach who presented on tackling at a Midwest clinic offered to sell some of my "Safer and Surer Tackling" videos, and he wrote afterwards...One neat story...after I spoke, and people lined up (to buy your dvd), a coach walked up and said "I had to show you this"...he held out in front of me a big, thick 'manual' on the Double Wing by (yep!) Coach Wyatt!!!!He was so excited that I had talked up your tackling system, and in the audience was his staff who are already coach Wyatt fans! You could tell they REALLY use your system as the manual was quite "worn" looking....he really got a kick out of me stressing the importance of your tackling DVD , when his program is already utilizing your Double Wing program....just thought I'd mention the "small world" story and how your awesome work helps many different coaches in many different ways....

*********** I fell in love with 47 Brown after seeing it.  Unless I am blind it isn’t in the playbook, right?   Did you diagram this play?  Is the interior blocking scramble on playside and hinge on backside?You'll find 47 Brown in the book as "43 Brown" - no difference. It became more useful to me to call it 47 Brown because I run 47 far more than I run 43. And, yes, I scramble on the playside and hinge on the backside, but as a key-breaker you could actually get away with pulling both the playside guard and tackle, or just the tackle. HW

SCENES FROM THE PHILADELPHIA DOUBLE-WING CLINIC

IT'S A PHILLY THING... Chris Galloway, of Pottstown, Pennsylvania, has been making a habit of sending me back to the Northwest with a "Pennsylvania Care Package" - pretzels (you should taste the crap they try palming off on us out on the Left Coast), scrapple (definitely a Philly thing) and Lebanon bologna, whose smoky taste is beloved by eastern Pennsylvanians.

*********** Hi Coach,First, I'd like to thank you for a really great (Philadelphia) clinic! I've told several people, that as a coach that is new to the Double Wing, I really believe I learned just as much from many of the experienced coaches that attended your clinic (during breaks) as I did from you yourself.

I mean no disrespect in saying that -- to the contrary -- it is a sincere compliment. After attending your clinic, I am not surprised in the least, that so many experienced, enthusiastic, and truly helpful coaches attend. It has all the markings of a close knit fraternity, or better, family. And everyone was willing to share
great ideas and experiences -- really awesome!Many thanks!

Best Regards,Scott McNutt
Perrineville, New JerseyHi Coach-I'm glad to hear that you had the experience that I strive to provide.  It is very important to me that newcomers to our system feel a part of the fraternity.  I learned this from a friend who owned a tavern - he judged his success by the number of new friends he was able to help people make. HW

*********** Alabama had 78,200 people at the Tide's spring game Saturday. Florida had 60,000 at theirs. And Ole Miss had 28,311 - more than they had at one of their regular-season games last year. I am boldly predicting that Army's spring game attendance will not challenge those figures.

See, Army's spring football practices have been held indoors and closed to the public as coach Stan Brock and his staff supposedly install a new offense.And now, Coach Brock has announced that next Saturday's spring game at Michie Stadium will not be a game at all, but will be - a defensive scrimmage.That should really excite the grads who make an annual pilgrimage to West Point to watch the spring game.

“We have been working hard on our offensive scheme throughout the winter and spring,” said Brock. “We’ve made tremendous strides and feel like the players have adapted very well to the changes put in place. But we’re not prepared to showcase our offensive system just yet. Fans will have to come out to watch us play Temple on August 28 to see our offense in action."

If I may offer one suggestion - after closing the doors in the faces of your most loyal supporters - do not lose to Temple.

*********** The Center for Science in the Public Interest, the nags behind the move to force smokers out into the rain at least 25 feet from the nearest restaurant door, accused the NCAA of violating its policies regarding beer advertising on NCAA basketball tournament games.

The policy calls for no more than 60 seconds of beer commercials per hour, or 120 minutes per game telecast. In actuality, though, the "scientists" (can't you see them in their white lab coats?) tabulated 200 and 240 seconds of beer commercials during each semifinal game and - gasp! - 270 seconds during the final.

What the goody two-shoes scientists fail to understand is that the more beer commercials there are, the fewer ED commercials and sleazy promos our kids will have to watch.

*********** Bob Pellegrini died last weekend at his home in Marmora, New Jersey. He was 73.

"Pelly" was born in Yatesboro, Pennsylvania, the son of a coal miner.

At Maryland, he was all-everything as a linebacker, and made the cover of the November 7, 1955 Sports Illustrated. He was voted MVP of the 1956 College All-Star Game, and in 1966 he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

He went on to become a good if not great NFL linebacker. He was the Philadelphia Eagles' first-round draft pick in 1956, and played on the Eagles' 1960 NFL championship team. In fact, it was because of an injury to him that Chuck Bednarik, who had been starting at center, wound up playing both ways in the championship game against the Packers.

In 1962, he was traded to the Redskins, and retired after the 1965 season.

I worked with Pelly in 1974, when I was player personnel director for the Philadelphia Bell, and he coached our linebackers. As a result of his years with the Eagles, Bob knew a lot of Philly people, as we often discovered to our amazement.

One time in early 1974, a little old guy came walking up to the counter in our downtown Philadelphia offices, and being the only one close by, I asked if I could help him. He said he'd like to see Bob Pellegrini.

Sure, I said. Can I tell him who's here to see him?

"Frank Palermo," he said in a gravelly voice.

Holy sh--! I thought. Frank Palermo! I thought I recognized him! Right in front of me was none other than Frank "Blinky" Palermo, the notorious mob-connected boxing manager, who'd spent a bit of time in stir for various, uh, indiscretions.

I recalled that at one time he'd tried to talk Bob Pellegrini into taking a shot at boxing.

"Wow!" I said. "Blinky Palermo!" and stuck out my hand.

He took my hand and held onto it and fixed a cold look on me.

"Please," he said, softly but very firmly. "Frank."

Yes sir, Mr. Palermo. Whatever you say, Mr. Palermo.

RIP, Pelly.

*********** Be still, my beating heart... New England Sports Network (NESN) and MSG Network are planning on co-producing the New England and Mid-Atlantic regional Little League tournaments.Next up - tee ball tryouts.

*********** Jack Tourtillotte, longtime principal/offensive coordinator at Boothbay Regional HS in Boothbay Harbor, Maine, writes...We are looking for a Football  Coach. We have an open PE/health position. I have retired as of June 20. Not sure what I will do but I have had enough of being a high school principal. There is a small chance I might be AD for one year while the transition takes place but I am not sure if I will do even that.

My last official act will be to find a football coach and of-course I would like one who is a DW man. Might be hard to find here in Maine.If you could put in a plug on the "News" that would be great. Anyone interested could contact me: Jack Tourtillotte, Boothbay Region High School Boothbay Harbor, Maine 04538 Phone 207-633-2421 or by email jtourtillotte@brhs.boothbay.k12.me.us(Take it from me - if you are a sincere Double-Wing guy who can appreciate the work that's been done here, and can understand the need not to change when there's no need to change - and wants to live in one of the most beautiful communities imaginable.... contact Jack. HW)

*********** (1) Why do I think that this may not be a guy that you'd want running your team?

A Murray State sophomore QB was charged with shoving a campus police office and taking his ticket book from him.He said he did it to win a $20 bet.

(2) Why do I think that this may not be a guy that you'd want running your athletic program?

The Murray State AD passed the whole thing off as "a prank gone bad."

*********** "YOU MAY BE A TALIBAN IF...."
  1. You refine heroin for a living, but you have a moral   objection to beer.
  2. You own a $3,000 machine gun and $5,000 rocket launcher, but  you can't afford shoes.
  3. You have more wives than teeth.
  4. You wipe your butt with your bare left hand, but consider bacon "unclean."
  5. You think vests come in two styles: bullet-proof and suicide.
  6. You can't think of anyone you haven't declared Jihad against.
  7. You consider television dangerous, but routinely carry explosives in your clothing.
  8. You were amazed to discover that cell phones have uses other than setting off roadside bombs.
  9. You've ever uttered the phrase, "I love what you've done with your cave."
10. You have nothing against women and think every man should  own at least one.
11. You bathe at least once a month whether you need to or not
12    You've always had a crush on your neighbor's goat.

FRIDAY, APRIL 11, 2008- "Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards." Soren Kierkegaard

*********** Kansas basketball coach Bill Self, on the influence of his father, himself a coach... "Coaches complain all the time: I've got to deal with this or that. But deep down, at the core, coaches like fixing things, too. That was something I learned from him - how to fix things and make positives out of negatives."

*********** How to help our economy:The Federal Government is sending each of us a $600 rebate.If we spend that money at Wal-Mart, the money will go to China. If we spend it on gasoline it will go to the Arabs. If we buy a computer, It will go to India. If we purchase fruit and vegetables, it will go to Mexico,
Honduras, and Guatemala. If we purchase a good car, it will go to Japan. If we purchase useless crap, it will go to Taiwan and none of it will help the American economy.The only way to keep that money here at home is to spend it on prostitutes and beer, since these are the only products still produced in the US . I've been doing my part, and I thank you for your help. - Former N.Y. Governor Eliot Spitzer

That is VERY funny.But while we laugh,  it has VERY scary implications, because giving "tax rebates" to people who don't even pay any f--king taxes is nothing more than running the government printing presses, which as any student of Econ 101 knows, inflates the currency.What happens to us when Arab oil shieks and Chinese clothing manufacturers refuse to accept payment in dollars, and instead require us to pay in another currency - and we discover now that it requires two or three times as many of our devalued dollars to buy the things we need? I'm betting that our government's way to "ease the pain" will be to crank out even more paper, further devaluing the dollar.To illustrate the idiocy of this farcical "stimulus"package - my brother-in-law is helping my mother-in-law prepare her tax returns so that she can receive her "tax rebate."  She is 100 years old.

*********** (Concerning the firing of the coach at Washougal High)... regardless of his win loss record, this should be an internal thing between the coach, ad, and the principal. Opening up a huge can of worms if you give parents regardless of their stature the power to hire and fire. I mean for crying out loud, does the ad have a set of stones? What kind of security is there for the home games? The ad should have a policy that if a parent wants to talk to the coach there has to be a 30 minute down time after the game to voice any concerns and even thats a stretch id have the piece of garbage wait to see me when I was good and ready then id let him have it. and the chicken shit ad has no balls. stand by your coach, protect your coach from overzealous parents.I know here at Lansingburgh regardless of how much success you have, their is always some parent with an axe to grind. the principal and the ad are the ones to blame here in my opinion.Pete Porcelli, Lansingburgh, New York (Actually, the school does have a policy - I worked under it during the first year of its existence - and it says basically that any grievance must start with the player approaching the coach. If he doesn't do that, then there is no problem. If that first step doesn't work, then dad - or mom - kid and coach will meet with the AD. If that doesn't resolve things, next step is with the principal. And then, finally, the Supe. I didn't read in the newspaper that the kid was present during any of Dad's shenanigans. Of course, a policy is only as good as the parties' willingness to implement it, and in a small town, school administrators and school board members tend to be vulnerable to political pressure - especially when it's being applied by the Chief of Police. HW)

*********** Gary Collins may be the best receiver who ever played the game who isn't in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. An All-American at Maryland, he was 6-4, 210 and fast. His hands were so good that a Cleveland sportswriter (who'd been keepijng count) told him that in his ten-year career, in which he caught 331 passes, he had just eight drops. (And as Collins pointed out, "three of them were in a sleet and ice storm.")He caught 70 touchdown passes; he averaged 16 yards per catch; every third catch was a touchdown or a first down.He was the MVP of the 1964 NFL championship game, catching five passes for 130 yards - three of them for touchdowns - as the Browns stunned the Baltimore Colts.

Oh- and he punted for five years, for a career average of 46.7 yards.

In today's game, he would have caught far more passes for far more touchdowns, but he played most of his career on a team whose offense was built around a guy named Jim Brown, possibly the greatest runner who ever played the game. And when Jim Brown was getting his 25-35 carries a game, and the Browns had another running back getting ten carries a game, that didn't leave a whole lot of touches for the tight end and two wideouts.

In a great book about the old Browns called "Brown's Town," by Alan Natali, Collins told of one episode that I found especially hilarious..."I played in the East-West Game, the Senior Bowl, what they called the Buffalo All-American Game, the Chicago All-Star Game. I didn't want to play in the all-star games. I had enough all-star games. I had signed a pro contract. I had it up to here with all-star games."

Woody Hayes coached us in the All-American Game, in Buffalo, New York. It was East against West. They only had it like five years. That was the last game Ernie Davis ever played in. I'll tell you who Woody hayes said wouldn't make pro ball because we drank beer and stayed out: Me, Lance Alworth, Bill Miller, the receiver from Miami, Roman Gabriel, Merlin Olsen, Bill Saul. He told me I couldn't catch.

"He said, 'You catch like this. You have to catch like this.'

"I said, 'I catch like this.'

"Woody coached, so I sat on the bench, got $500, never played a down. Didn't get in the game. Me. Bill Saul, Bill Miller, we never played a down, which was fine with me.

"After the game, Woody says, 'You can keep the uniform.'

"I said, 'I don't want the f--king thing,' and threw it in the garbage can, right past Woody. I was that kind of guy. Paul Warfield told me that for years after that All-American game, Woody told people in his practices, 'I don't want you to be like that prima donna receiver the Browns have.'

"Guys from Ohio State would come in and say Woody Hayes always talked about this a$$hole receiver he had in an all-star game.

"The Browns used to invite coaches out to Hiram (Hiram College, in Ohio, where the Browns held their training camps) to watch workouts. About four years later, they're there on the 50-yard line, and we're in seven-on-seven drills. I run a deep out where they're at. Woody's right there. The ball is thrown down, and I drop to one knee and stick my hand back, and the ball just stops, splat, right on my hand, then I slid out of bounds. I turned around and said, 'I never could catch.'"

*********** From Neal Boortz - Boortz.com
 
The East Wake (North Carolina) High School club marksmanship team was less than one day from competing in a statewide shooting tournament.The tournament was sponsored by the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission ... in other words, it was sponsored by the state. But then East Wake's principal came along and with the support of the area superintendent decided that students from the school could not participate because "ammo and students don't mix." The Wildlife Commission tournament, by the way, has been around for 30 years.Like most government schools, deadly weapons are banned and students are prohibited from carrying them on school trips. But the last minute decision of the principal to bar this club from competing extends that prohibition to students participating in an off-campus event sponsored by a state agency and supervised by adults certified in firearms safety.This is where state law allowing firearms education courses at schools collides with the ego of a government school principal. A woman by the name of Roxane Kolar is the executive director of North Carolinians Against Gun Violence. She says, "The school and school board should have that right ... You have to assume a school knows what's best for their school."Thusly does the wussification of America proceed.

Sent in by Lloyd Kempson, Lake Worth, Texas (Good Lord - even in North Carolina. HW)

*********** I just got back yesterday interviewing the second time at a school with a HC that said he was looking to add the option. He's been on veersite and knows exactly what I run. The principal assured me that she would recommend me to be hired. It felt like a weight had been lifted off my back, no kidding.Then I finally met the OC I was to work under.I met with a man totally focused on running the spread-gun offense. Around 10 formations... and around 20 plays... which could only be run from certain formations... Digital Scout guys will have a nice scouting report off that - I know we did at ---. Still thinking that someone was seriously thinking about running the option besides me, I kept listening and waiting. When I finally tried to interject something... or ask him to explain why he had his entire line blocking-back on inside veer (ahem, Scoop blocking isn't used in the shotgun veer... I guess because it hits so slooooooooooooooooowwwwwwww....) I was met with a set jaw, a red face, and the attitude that I needed to quite worrying about getting the QB under center and "get on board."About half-way through the session, I stood up, thanked him for his time, and told him anything further would not be necessary, and left. I did not remind him that they are 0-20 running that offense and that it had put up a whopping 47 points last season. Needless to say, I was pretty torn up. I desperately need a job, but I told the coach later that the OC and myself would inevitably butt-heads if I came on board... and that I could not sell a system to kids if I didn't believe in it. He doesn't need that on his staff and I know that better than anyone. I don't know who was more in shock - him or me for being totally blindsided. I am still totally stunned and not at all sure what the hell he was thinking. I've made fun of that very offense several times of Veersite, for crying out loud! Should I have signed-on, shut my mouth, waited for the train-wreck, and then tried to help pick up the pieces? Have I become and option-only prima-donna coach, if there is such a thing?Coach, I know you want a job, but taking this one would have been a recipe for a guaranteed flop.Recognizing a train wreck about to happen doesn't make you a prima donna.You would have been miserable there, you would not have been effective, and - worst of all - someone would have found a way to blame the train wreck on you because you never "got on board."Hang in there.

***********I first got to know Glade Hall many years ago when he was a very successful youth coach in the Seattle area. For the past few years he's been freshman coach at Archbishop Murphy High in Everett, Washington, where Terry Ennis, a Washington coaching legend - winningest coach in state history - started the program a dozen or so years ago and built it into a state powerhouse. Sadly, Coach Ennis died just before the start of last season, and Coach Hall wrote to tell me that he was the inheritor of Coach Ennis' files.

Hugh, How have you been? I trust you and Connie are doing well. You probably know Murphy hired Dave Ward from Oak Harbor as the head guy. I think it's a good fit and Dave will do well here. How I fit into this is a guess at best. He's been on vacation and has not been around to put the staff together yet. Some guys have been told others have not. He'll be back next week, so I should know more then. I'll keep you posted.
 
After Coach Ennis died he left boxes of things in his office that the family did not want. I volunteered to go through things to see what was good and what needed to be tossed. I was able to find many football related files and books from all his years of coaching. Clinic presentations, hand written game plans on every situation, notes detailing practice plans. Just a wealth of information that I'll keep and use. I also found ten out of print books that are gems from the past.
 
Simplified Single Wing Football, Ken Keuffel
Notre Dame Football- The T Formation,  Frank Leahy
You Have to Pay the Price, Earl Red Blaik (Foreword by General Douglas MacArthur) I've already started reading this one.
 
All hard covers from the day which I'll take good care of in my collection.  Coach Ennis was a real student of the game and I'm lucky enough to preserve some of what was his and keep for my son when and if he wants them. Good deal huh!

*********** It's not fair to say that Washington is a bas baseball town. But it is fair to say that Washington, D.C. is governed by fools and jackals.They were clever enough to bilk the taxpayers out of enough money to build a fancy new baseball stadium for a team that nobody except major league baseball wanted.

But to show that they are environmentally conscious, they didn't provide for parking for anyone except luxury box holders. The rest of you peasants can ride the Metro (right- in Washington, DC - at night) or park over at RFK Stadium and ride a shuttle bus over to the new Nationals' park.

OPening game in the new ball park drew 39,000. (Capacity is something like 42,000.)The second night, 20,000 rabid Natonals' fans - less than half of capacity - showed up.TUESDAY, APRIL 8, 2008- "You have not converted a man because you have silenced him." John Morley

*********** It's hard to believe that it's been 40 years since Dr. King's assassination. It was a day I'll never forget.I was working at the time in marketing for the National Brewing Company, at that time one of the largest brewers in the East. I'd spent April 4in Washington, D.C. with our Washington branch manager, Karl Anderson. Karl was a black man about my age, a graduate of Howard University, and - you had to understand the times and understand the South of those times - one of the most prominent young black men in the beer business. (Our president, Jerrold C. Hoffberger, was willing to give black men opportunities in management, even if it meant taking the chance that not all whites would appreciate what he was doing.)After a morning of calling on liquor stores, we grabbed lunch and then resumed our work. We were both taken aback when we walked into one store and the clerk, recognizing Karl, said, "Hey- your boy got shot."Karl had no idea what the guy was getting at, but once he finally understood that Doctor King had been shot, we left.We actually made a few more calls, but it was no use. Karl was in no mood to carry on, and besides, I was in some personal danger. It was getting dark out, and the word was spreading fast. The last place we stopped in was a tavern, full of angry, frustrated men. All black. "This means war!" said a big guy standing next to me, and I was smart enough to realize that, Karl or no Karl, if war were to break out, I was going to be the Enemy. We got out of there. That night, DC - and a lot of places on 14th Street, where we'd last worked - burned. And burned in my mind forever was that moment in time when a well-meaning but totally clueless white liquor store clerk said to my black friend, "Hey- your boy got shot." *********** While in Pennsylvania, current hotbed of Democratic primary campaigning, I read a column by the New York Times' Maureen Dowd in which she reported that Senator Barack Obama, while making a stop in Latrobe, Pennsylvania at a place called Sharky's Sports Cafe, had "genteelly sipped" his Yuengling Beer.Uh-oh, I thought. He's trying so-o-o-o hard to be one of the boys. (Remember his Great Bowling Adventure?) But someone needs to tell the guy that in a state where a cold beer (often accompanied by a shot of whiskey) has traditionally been what every millworker and miner looks forward to at the end of his shift (and sometimes before), he's in big trouble if word gets out that he "sips" his. One way for him to redeem himself, at least in eastern Pennsylvania, would be to head to some diner around Philly and sit down to breakfast - and an order of scrapple. Oh- and scarf it down, Barry. No nibbling. Personally, I like ketchup on mine. Heinz Ketchup, of course - made in Pittsburgh. For lunch, I suggest a hot soft pretzel, bought from a downtown sidewalk vendor who's just finished wiping his nose on the sleeve of his jacket.Of course, there's always the chance that Hillary will stumble, too. I can just hear her now, calling the morning guys at WIP sports radio and regaling them with stories about growing up a Steelers' fan - until someone reminds her that the WIP audience is 99 per cent Philadelphians. Whereupon she'll say, "Oh, wait - I misspoke. I meant to say I've always been a Phillies fan. I'll never forget when they won the Super Bowl."*********** Remember, you read it here first that most toilets in China are still "squat" rather than "sit-down" devices - as spectators and competitors at recent Olympics test events learned to their dismay.Beijing Olympics organizers are busily refitting the toilets at three major Olympics venues after receiving complaints from foreign athletes about, um, having to squat.*********** Dear Coach,
Not sure if you have ever have read the ESPN.com column "Uni Watch" written by Paul Lukas. He examines the minutiae of sports uniforms... thoroughly researched and supported with HTML web links. It's actually quite fascinating.I was reading his current column about hair styles in MLB, and discovered a past column about football helmets - "Helmet of the Future? Or just a bizarre oddity?"http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=lukas/080214&campaign=rsssrch&source=paul_lukasThe lead-in is a new helmet design, but most of the article is about the development history of the helmet and facemask.
Enjoy!
Best,
Matt Oravetz
Milford, CT (Thanks for the link.  Interesting stuff.I just happen to be reading a book of reminiscences by old Cleveland Browns,  and there is a bit of attention devoted to Otto Graham's serious facial injury that prompted Paul Brown to invent the plastic face bar. (Graham received 11 stitches inside his mouth at halftime.  With no novocaine.  Of course, he was out cold much of the time.  He played the second half.)Don't think I'd want to wear the "Gladiator" - which, by the way, was a brand of helmets sold back in the 1970s. HW)

*********** Remember The Gridiron Bash? It was supposed to be combination concert and “football celebration” taking place at some 16 different colleges the night before their spring games The original idea was for current football players at the schools to tale part by running a few plays and being recognized on the field, either before the concert or between two musical acts. Most schools nixed that idea because running plays might be counted by the NCAA as one of the 15 practices teams are permitted in the spring.Also, there was immediate concern that the players' appearances could be construed as being part of a commercial venture (the schools and the company putting on Gridiron Bash had visions of making big bucks).“There are very few ways to combine student athletes and an endeavor to make money,” said Sandy Bell, chief compliance officer at the University of Kentucky.MSL Sports & Entertainment, the New York-based promoter, announced that it had postponed the event because most schools would not permit their current football players to participate. But despite MSL's expressing surprise at schools' reluctance to let their players participate, SportsBusinessWeekly reported that several of the universities involved in Gridiron Bash said they had told MSL at least a month ago that they were concerned about potential NCAA rules violations. “The implication that they (MSL) had secured approval from participating schools, well, they had no approval from us,” said Texas A&M compliance officer Brad Barnes. “They were trying to use student athletes to promote the event and that’s just not going to happen. That ruling is obvious."Of the eight schools contacted by SportsBusiness Journal, most said they believed that NCAA rules were a convenient excuse to postpone the event, and that the real reason for cancellation was that the event was destined to be a major flop.“The ticket sales they projected to us were a little unrealistic,” said Maryland’s spokesman. MSL told Maryland to expect sales of 20,000 to 25,000 tickets. Alabama had sold the most tickets at 10,000, while Texas A&M, Colorado, Kansas State and Iowa had sold about 5,000 apiece. Others were in the neighborhood of 1,000 to 2,000.

*********** Charlton Heston was a stud. Married 64 years to the same woman. In Hollywood. Are you kidding me?He was head of the NRA, of course, but also an early civil rights activist. Media libs have been having a hell of a time trying to square his leadership of the NRA with the fact that he was a strong supporter of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., when that was not a popular thing for prominent whites to do.

*********** You will want to check out "S-I VAULT" billed as "54 years of Sports Illustrated History."It is way cool.http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/?eref=vlteml

*********** Maybe you know of a coach who's had to be escorted off the field to protect him from an irate parent. Maybe he's even had to be escorted off by the police. But who's going to protect him when the guy he needs protection from happens to be the town's chief of police?I've been sitting on this story for well over a month now, since a local reporter let me in on it. This past Sunday, it finally broke, making the front page of our local paper, the Vancouver Columbian. http://www.columbian.com/news/localNews/2008/04/04062008_Fired-coach-sues-parent-of-player-in-Washougal.cfmThe reporter, a long-time friend, had called me because I once coached there, and I know the coach.It's a pretty ugly story. Read it and tell me how you'd feel about a guy like that wearing a badge and packing a gun in your town.

*********** David Beckham scored a goal last Thursday night. No big deal, normally, except that in the seven games he's played since signing a five-year, $250 million contract last year, this was his first.

*********** Cleveland Browns' defensive back Kenny Wright led Pearland, Texas police on a quarter-mile foot chase that began in the parking lot of the police station and ended with his arrest on a misdemeanor charge of unlawful restraint, a misdemeanor charge of evading arrest and a misdemeanor charge of possession of marijuana.The Browns are reported to have offered free agent contracts to the police who ran him down.

*********** Apparently the NFL decided to be nice to the defense and give them the new Force-Out rule. Just as soon they then took away incidental face masking and made it a 15 yard penalty just like the helmet-to-helmet contact rule. (no matter how unintentional it is) They then went on to Administratively say that it was OK to have the instant replay on FG's (after the Ravens and Browns game). And finally they made the coin toss rule the same as the HS and College. (It is too bad that they didn't "steal" their overtime rules from the HS, College, or  XFL for that matter.)
Can you imagine the public outrage when a team defers its option to the second half on a windy day and the home team elects to get the wind at their backs, only to have to find out that they have to kick twice?
 
Keep up the exciting news section and God bless.
Lloyd Kempson
Lake Worth, TX(Considering that every time a college game goes into overtime the TV guys feel the need to explain how it works, undoubtedly for the sake of the pro-only fans who happened to tune in, this deferring business is probably going to take some 'splainin'. HW)

FRIDAY, APRIL 4, 2008- "As individuals and as a nation, we nowsuffer from social narcissism. The beloved Echo of our ancestors, the virgin America, has been abandoned. We have fallen in love with our own image, with images of our making, which turn out to be images of ourselves." Daniel J. Boorstin

***********Hi Coach,
 
In regards to : " Are my eyes deceiving, or do I see those boys wearing soccer equipment on their shins?
Hey! maybe we can employ this strategy to convince soccer moms football is safe. Dennis Cook, Roanoke, Virginia"
 
Yes they are. In a soccer crazed nation, we had to take some (!) parts of soccer to appease people so they would like us.Just kidding, its more a lack of proper funding which forces some players to improvize, which somehow leads to players wearing shins (dont ask me how, i just allow it as long as its foam and not rigid like skater equipment).
 
The funny thing about this being a soccer nation and us playing football , rarely does any team (including us) ever go for Field Goals and PAT's...I would say its just me , that i don't know how to coach it, but we have so many American coaches now, gotta wonder why things are so.
 
Regards,
 
Kerem Ates, Ankara, Turkey

*********** Sports and politics don't usually mix well, and by now, no one knows this better than Senator Barack Obama. A day after President Bush stood on the mound in a major league ball park and fired the ball to the catcher, Senator Barack Obama went into a bowling alley in Altoona, Pennsylvania and pretended to bowl.Emphasis on "pretended." I know he's said to be a basketball player, but after what I saw, I'm beginning to have doubts. His form, in my considered judgment, was characteristic of someone who'd never picked up a bowling ball before. Talk about out of touch with working people. And then the news leaked out somehow that he bowled a 37. A 37!?!?! Do you realize how bad a 37 is? You could roll the ball with two hands and do better than that. Hillary could do better than that.

*********** Hahahaha. And you thought there were already too many nothing bowl games, between too many unworthy teams. Hahahaha.If you can believe this, promoters of something called the Congressional Bowl in Washington, D.C., have signed an agreement with the Atlantic Coast Conference for 2008, with plans for the second team (pending NCAA certification) to come from Air Force, Army or Navy. Another proposed bowl, tentatively named the St. Petersburg Bowl was proposed. It would be televised by one of the ESPN "family of networks," the proposed game matches teams from the Big East Conference and Conference USA on Dec. 21, 2008. It would be the sixth bowl game run by ESPN along with the Pioneer Las Vegas, Sheraton Hawai'i, Bell Helicopter Armed Forces, Papajohns.com and New Mexico Bowls.

*********** Tex Maule was once considered the leading writer on the NFL. He is the one who first called the Colts-Giants NFL championshipin 1958 "The Best Game Ever Played." I came across an interview of Tex Maule, legendary writer, in PRO!, the game program when the Colts (Baltimore) met the Bengals, November 3, 1974 -

"A lot of people think that game 'made' pro football, but they've forgotten that pro football was damn big even before that. When I was with the Rams in '50 and '51, we drew over ninety thousand for a preseason game against the Redskins. In '51, I think, we had one hundred-three thousand against the Bears in the Coliseum. The Colts-Giants game may have alerted the entire nation, but pro football, in the cities where it was being played, was big even then. The 1958 game added a tremendous impetus to the popularity of pro football. But I think the thing that really made pro football the national sport is television. It is a much better game to televise than baseball because there aren't as many dead spots in it/ Commercially it's ideal because the time outs lend themselves to the commercials."

*********** I just finished watching your video "Installing the System" alot of great helpful tips and step by step instructions, Thank you. I do have a question regarding the Center QB exchange. You mentioned in the video that the QB should handle "his half of the ball" now my question is this, is the Center QB exchange the same as the traditional snap, with the Center turning the ball as he snaps it to the QB or is it a straight on snap. and the QB's hands, I know that the QB's thumbs together,but are they facing horizontal with the LOS or are they, and the QB's fingers pointing towards the ball, or defense?Could you please explain this to me?I do NOT twist the ball as the pros do. I haven't taught this for more than 20 years.I want my QB to get the ball the way I want him to handle it - pointed toward his "stones" as he pulls it in.For the last two seasons, I have used, and I have been advocating, a two-handed snap by the center, who "flips" the ball up, end-over-end so that the end that was pointing away from the center becomes the end that is pointed toward the QB when it hits his hands. The center must sit on the QB's hands, and "stay in his stance" when he snaps - that is, he should not uncock his knees, which (1) causes him to lift up off the QB's hands, but even worse (2) causes him to duck his head and makes him ineffective as a blocker.The QB keeps his thumbs together for their entire length - from the tip to the base of the palm - and (how do I put this delicately?) presses them against the back of the center's privates. There is upward pressure. His fingers are spread, and the back of the fingers touches the inside of the center's thighs. When you look at the QB from the side, you should not be able to see his hands.Hope that helps. This is all shown in "A Fine Line.

*********** Based on the promos, and based on the fact that in my considered opinion there has never - ever - been a really good football movie (sorry, "Remember the Titans" fans), I rather doubt that I'll be paying to see "Leatherheads."Bill Ward in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune writes that the story was inspired ("based on?") the story of the Duluth Eskimos, and tells us a few things about that long-lost team...In 1925, the four owners of the team, then called the Duluth Kelleys, handed the team over to its treasurer, Ole Haugsrud. He insisted on paying $1, which they all proceeded to spend on nickel beers.The 1926-1927 Eskimos played 29 games in less than 17 weeks. Only one of them was in Duluth. In one eight-day span, they played five games.The Eskimos' star attraction, former Stanford great Eernie Nevers, was paid $50,000 (a stupendous amount of money in the 1920s) for the tour. The remainder of the players earned $75 for a win, $60 for a tie, and $50 for a loss.Nevers worked for his money. Of the 1,740 minutes that the team played in 1926-1927, he played in all but 26 of them.The players took two showers after every game, one to with uniforms on to save the cost of laundering them, and then one with uniforms off. They dried the uniforms by hanging them out the train windows.Whenever they appeared in public, the Eskimos wore long white parkas with igloos on the back.When owner Haugsrud sold the team in 1929, the league gave him an option to purchase the next NFL franchise in Minnesota. When the Vikings arrived in 1960, he paid $60,000 for a small share, which at his death in 1976 was worth $2 million

***********  Few things mean more to a West Point graduate than the class ring, traditionally presented to "First Classmen" (seniors) in the fall of their senior year. The ring truly is symbolic of the storied Long Gray Line of West Point graduates; the gold in them is an amalgam of gold from class rings through the years. Back on March 31, the Pease and Curren Refinery in Warwick, RI, hosted the Eighth Annual Ring Melt.  The Ring Melt program makes it possible for West Point graduates and their families to donate their class rings or the rings of their loved ones to be included in the gold of the class rings of future graduates, and extends the symbolic link among all those wearing a West Point Class Ring into a tangible connection.The Ring Melt ceremony itself consisted of a reading of the biography of each donor while a representative of the donor - a family member, a classmate, or a West Point graduate from the local area - placed that donor’s ring in a crucible.  After the rings, along with a sample of the gold from all previous Melts, were in the crucible, the participants moved to the refinery furnace area, where the crucible was placed in a 2,300 degree flame until the rings were reduced to molten gold and then poured into a mold to produce an ingot of solid gold. Once the gold ingot cooled, a sample was drilled from it to be kept until next year’s Melt, when it will then be added to the crucible. In this way, all new Class rings include not only gold from rings donated in that particular year but also some gold from all previously donated rings.  The ingot then was given to Mike Sundgaard, West Point ’85, a representative from Jostens, the company creating the Class Rings for the Class of 2009; the ingot will be melted again and added to the gold used for this year’s rings.
 
The 24 rings donated for this year’s melt—the most ever—brought the total number of Rings in the program to 141;   Among them, this year's ring owners commanded in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, and earned numerous awards for valor, including the Distinguished Service Cross.     The West Point Association of Graduates already has received five donated Class Rings for the Class of 2010. 

*********** From Character Counts...In the 1964 Winter Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria, six-time medalist Eugenio Monti from Italy was favored to win the gold medal in the bobsledding pair event. After his team’s last run, it looked like they were going to make it.The British team, led by Tony Nash Jr., still had a chance, but before their final run, Nash discovered a critical axle bolt had broken on their sled. They were done. Without hesitation, Monti removed the bolt from his sled and rushed it up to Nash’s team. They were able to continue, and their run was so strong they won the gold medal.The Italian press viciously criticized Monti for giving up the gold, but he was steadfast. "Nash didn’t win because I gave him the bolt," he said. "He won because he had the fastest run."Olympic swimming medalist John Naber says a true sportsman, one who believes in the Olympic ideal, not only wants to win, he wants to win against his best opponent on his best day. A true sportsman is not elated, but disappointed, when top competitors are injured or disqualified.Monti won the gold medal at the next Winter Olympics, but it was his willingness to lose that earned him a prominent place in Olympic history. His act represents sportsmanship at its best: the pursuit of victory with zeal and passion, recognizing that there’s no true victory without honor.Today, with so many teams and athletes willing to cheat or behave badly to win, we need reminders of the noble potential of sports. Parents and coaches should teach youngsters that the real glory of sport is in the striving, not the winning.This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.

*********** Today's Darwin Award goes to the poor homeless schlub in Vancouver, Washington, about 5 miles from where I live, who hanged himself when he made it across a chain link fence but his backpack didn't.After a day of "Flagging" (that's begging from motorists) at an I-205 off-ramp, the guy and his girlfriend had a few, and then took a shortcut from their "place of business" to the homeless camp where they "lived."This meant climbing over the fence, where he got hung up. After his girlfriend heard gurgling noises coming from him, she ran to a nearby house for help, but by the time help arrived, the guy was dead.Did I say that the girlfriend tried to help get him down? No luck. The backpack weighed too much, no doubt because of the dozen 40-ounce bottles of beer inside.

*********** A school district near Seattle thinks it's so important for the people that head up its schools to keep up with the latest in technology that administrative employees of the district are given an $1800 allowance over a three-year period to spend on "technology" as they wish. The unusual perk is available only to district administrators, and all but 13 of those eligible have taken advantage of the district's - make that the taxpayers' - generosity. In a little under two years, they have spent more than $119,000 - on such things as iPods and flat-screen TVs. One administrator, billed as "executive director of human resources" (instead of merely a "director of human resources") purchased a $1400 monitor with district funds. But lest you think she uses it to watch "American Idol," she said the district taxpayers are getting their money's worth - she has used it to "read work materials."Here's the best - if the employees leave the district, they get to keep the items.But never forget - it's all about the kids.

*********** The NFL finally went along with two sensible college rules, allowing teams that win the coin toss to defer, and allowing for a catch when a receiver forced out of bounds would otherwise have landed in bounds. Now that the NFL has come down off its high horse and admitted that maybe there were a few things that the colleges (and high schools) do better, maybe it will turn its attention to our rules for overtime, and requiring receivers to have just one foot in bounds following a catch.The truly baffling thing to me is that after they've gone and skewed so many of the rules to favor scoring (yet still have their problems), they pass a rule allowing the defense to have sideline-to-field radio communication.What's next? Radio communications between the quarterback and the receivers?

TUESDAY, APRIL 1, 2008- "The problem isn't educating the uneducated, but rather uneducating the educated." G. K. Chesterton

*********** Senators Clinton and Obama may be locked in a fight to the finish, but they took time out recently to express their deep feelings about soccer.Senator Clinton happily recalled her high school days, when she played soccer for her school team. After it was pointed out that her school did not have a girls' soccer team at that time, a Clinton spokesperson said the Senator had "mis-spoken." Mrs. Clinton herself said, "I had a different memory. It just proves I'm human."She went on to say, though, that that doesn't change her long-held belief that soccer is the future of America, and soccer moms hold the power in our country. She promised tax breaks to ease the financial pain for families with children on elite travel teams, and a federal scholarship program to permit disadvantaged soccer players to attend college tuition-free. (The latter program appears to be a not-so-subtle appeal to the illegal immigrant vote, since research shows there are very few black soccer players and no disadvantaged white Anglo soccer players.)Senator Obama, meanwhile, intent on holding on to his male power base, lashed out at rumors attributed to the Clinton camp that he grew up playing soccer in Indonesia, and remains a closet soccer fan, despite being advised by his campaign handlers that if he wanted to "be real" he would have to give up the soccer and profess to be a basketball fan. After Fox News produced photos of Senator Obama as a ten-year-old with shoulder-length hair, playing on an elite travel team, and following accusations by his secret service entourage that he forces them to play soccer with him on their breaks, the Illinois Senator showed up for his latest defense of Reverend Jeremiah Wright wearing a Number 54 Chicago Bears jersey."Apparently the opposition will stop at nothing in their vicious smears," he said. "First it was the rumor that I was raised as a Muslim. Now it's innuendos about my being a closet soccer player. This is the sort of partisan ugliness that, as the candidate of unity, I hope to bring an end to."But then came the latest bombshell - the April edition of "Soccer Mom" magazine hit the streets this week. It named him "Every Soccer Mom's Dream," and featured a centerfold photo of the Senator, in his usual suit and tie, but with a "Manchester United" scarf around his neck.Republican nominee John McCain, meanwhile, when asked what he would be doing for America's young soccer players, said only, "Let the little jerks play football." (APRIL FOOL, GUYS)

*********** If you like women's basketball, you'll love this... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FGI7R0u3TQ

*********** Coach- (Regarding the Turkish football team) Are my eyes deceiving, or do I see those boys wearing soccer equipment on their shins? Hey! maybe we can employ this strategy to convince soccer moms football is safe. Dennis Cook, Roanoke, Virginia (Hahahaha.  If it isn't too late to save those kids from their mommies. HW)

*********** Loved your rant on customer service, Coach W.  Especially this line:  "In schools and on sports teams, some parents should simply be told to take their kids and leave if they don't like it."  We had to send just that message to the parents of a player last year on our freshman football team.  The kid played QB (which I coached) and DB.  His meddlesome dad insisted that the kid play CB, but we needed him at SS. Day before the first game, during bench drill, the kid refuses to come out when we call defense.  "Hey, Jake, you're on D," I yell from midfield.  "Get out here!"  He shakes his head. "Nope. I'm not playing strong safety."  It's totally unlike him, and I know the dad is the cause. But I have to say:  "Ok, then, you're not playing QB, either."  Needless to say, the parents make a fuss the following week. There's a meeting with the Principal, the AD and the varsity coach.  After a few minutes of back and forth, the varsity coach quietly sits back in his chair and says to the parents:  "Jake plays where his coaches tell him to play, or he doesn't play."  Never heard another word from the kid -- or the parents -- all year. -- Mike Brusko, Zionsville, Pennsylvania

*********** Hi Coach Wyatt,
 
Wanted to give you an update here about a few things:  I went to the Carolina Panthers/USA Football Coaches Clinic on Saturday.  (I was a presenter.)  It's not a very good clinic, but one of the highlights had to be South Mecklenburg High School Coach Martin's presentation of the SuperPower.  With over 100 youth coaches in attendence, Coach Martin asked how many coaches ran the Double Wing.  Less than five raised their hands.  Now this was a new situation for me. I had never been to a football clinic where the Double Wing was discussed and so few coaches either used it nor even heard of it.  You could see that many coaches were really scratching their heads on what to make of it.  Some of the questions were, "...So you pull both the backside Guard AND Tackle?" as well as, "Do you ever run a counter off of this play?"  LOL  It was strange to be in a place where so few coaches seemed to know what this offense was.  I did introduce myself to Coach Martin before his presentation.  When he told me he was going to talk about the SuperPower I asked him, "You do KNOW that these are youth coaches, right?"  I told him that the majority of them probably run either the I or a Spread.  Sure enough, Coach Martin asked the coaches how many ran the I-Formation and how many ran the Spread.  Many hands popped up. 
 
I also told Coach Martin that I would be attending your clinic on April 12.
 
I was at the Dallas Double Wing clinic and made a presentation on dealing with coaches, parents and players.  I saw on your "News" where a coach had to deal with the problem of being ignored by the head coach ("However, it seems he has no real interest in the freshman team. I have asked for meetings to discuss his system, the plays within the system, the blocking schemes, etc….I have asked how he installs the system to a new team given the fact this is a freshman team and many of the new players have never played the game and those that have probably not the Wing-T.")  Part of my presentation was on how to integrate a new youth coach into your staff.  I said that the new coach needs to be allowed to work the off-season football and conditioning camps with your returning coaches.  He should be given instruction on how to teach individual drills and then give him the opportunity to do so with the kids.  By doing this in the spring, it will help accelerate his learning in time to be ready for fall.  He needs to be CC'd on every e-mail that the head coach distributes to all staff so that he is included and kept up to speed on all football matters.  He should be given last year's game videos or DVD highlights so that he can see what the schemes look like.   In short, he needs to be included in all aspects of the program and the off-season is a great time to get him up and running.  I'd hate to be behind once August gets here.
 
Speaking of clinics and such, I spoke about our academic program while I was in Texas and at the Panthers clinic.  I've updated the material and made it more user-friendly, as well as include a DVD so that coaches can SEE what and how we implement our academic approach.  I'll send you a copy so you can see what we're doing.  Dave Potter, Durham, North Carolina (I have seen Dave Potter's work, and I am quite impressed with the great job he does in coaching winning football but, far more important, stressing academic performance and social skills. One of the things that impressed me most about his approach was teaching his kids how to "meet and agreet" adults, through use of his "Meet and Greet Drill." His kids will shake your hand, look you in the eye, tell your their names, and tell you it's nice to meet you. If you've had many dealings with kids nowadays you'll realize what a great job Dave's doing. Remember when parents did this?)

Meet & GreetPart of developing a child’s self-confidence comes from teaching him how to behave in social situations.Usually, children are far more comfortable dealing with each other in social situations than they are with adults. It’s important for players know how to speak up, introduce themselves and shake hands with adults. Often children will mumble, look down at the ground or won’t use a firm handshake when dealing with adults. We teach our players these skills. We call this drill, “Meet & Greet.” We make it a competitive drill, seeing which player can introduce himself the best. We point out the strength and weakness of each player’s performance. Our criteria is based on eye contact, a firm handshake and their ability to speak up clearly. After some initial shyness is overcome, this drill becomes as competitive and fun as any drill we do.At each game, we can then use the byproduct of this drill to test out on our competition. Before each game, I choose three players to go over to our opponent’s coaching staff and have them introduce themselves. We choose three or four different players every week so that everyone has an opportunity. We call it, “Welcoming the competition.”

*********** Famed San Francisco ad man Hal Riney, who died last week, was famous for several great ad campaigns, including the one for Bartles & James wine coolers, and the "It's Morning Again in American" ad that helped re-elect Ronald Reagan in 1984.He was known for being sparing in his praise, and he knew it - at his company's annual Christmas party, he handed out a "Hal Riney Annual Compliment" award.He was also famous for relentlessly pushing to do things ever better. One of his favorite sayings was, "Getting it right is like painting the Golden Gate Bridge - you can never stop."

*********** Burger King is reportedly planning on opening new restaurants called "Whopper Bars," where you would be able to buy as many as 10 different types of Whoppers, including the "Western Whopper" and the "Texas Double Whopper," and the food would be prepared in front of you, instead of in the back. There is also talk of allowing people to customize their Whoppers with additional toppings such as jalapeno peppers, bacon and barbecue sauce. That concept is being called - I am not making this up - "Pimp Your Whopper."

*********** Evidently a popular British TV show called Top Gear thought it would be cool to visit the South, to show its English audience what rednecks Americans are.In one episode, the show’s three hosts each drove used cars across Alabama, each with different inflammatory slogans painted on their sides: “Hillary for President” on one, “Country and Western is Rubbish” on another, and “Manlove Rules!” - in big pink letters - on the third. After a stop for gas in a small town, one of the locals asked them, “Are y’all gay, trying to see how long it takes to get beat up in a hick town?” Not satisfied with their answer, she told them she was going to go get “the boys,” who showed up shortly in the back of a pick-up and threw a few rocks at the Brits until they got the point and left town. The episode ended in New Orleans, where the three hosts intended to give away their used cars to victims of Hurricane Katrina. The first two cars were grabbed up, but not even in New Orleans could they give away the “Manlove Rules!” car.One of the hosts summarized Alabamians' priorities - "George Bush, God and Country and Western Music - in that order."Dumbass didn't even mention football or auto racing or barbecue.

TUESDAY, MARCH 4, 2008- "Never suppose that in any possible situation or under any circumstances that it is best for you to do a dishonorable thing however slightly so it may appear to you." Thomas Jefferson

*********** The Arena Football League is going to be experimenting with a special helmet containing a light that will turn red in the event its wearer suffers a concussion.

It gives new meaning to the term "Light 'em up," and considering how many young male fans are already used to watching the mountains on the Coors labels turn blue, I can envision promotions based on the number of red lights the home team can turn on.

*********** If ever there were an incongruous matchup of city and sport, it has to be the decision of Major League Soccer (otherwise known as the Oxymoron League) to locate a franchise in Chester, Pennsylvania. Chester, Pennsylvania, for God's sake! Ever been there? Rough town, to say the least. Rough as they come.

Once the home of major industries long since shuttered, Chester was a hardscrabble town even when I was in high school. And it has gone downhill since.

Now they plan to spend government funds (aka taxpayers' money) to build a soccer stadium there. On the Chester waterfront, no less. I laugh to think of all the effete suburbanites in their Priuses and Volvos driving past all the run-down projects and boarded-up buildings on their way to watch a game of futbol.

*********** Joe Daniels, wrote from Sacramento... ah yes the A-11, from Piedmont HS, in Oakland . lets just say these guys couldn't compete any other way HAHAHAHA...sad part is there are a couple of school in our area thinking about going to it..

My answer to the abomination-11 would be to assign my very best athlete to the QB, and have everyone else tackle an opponent at the line.  (Except the center, who gets protection.)

It really goes against everything I believe in to advocate deliberate violations, but if they are going to make a travesty of the game, they don't give a guy much choice.

At the very least, I will make them play tackle football. After a week of practicing against that stuff, I doubt that a defense is going to be ready for real football.

*********** Coach Wyatt, I went to News You Can Use today (Friday 2/29/08) to be vain and see my mom & dad’s greatest creation, me.  (smile)  In all seriousness, I wanted to thank you and Kevin for the Atlanta Clinic.  I kicked myself because I didn’t think to bring MY video camera to the afternoon session but I took lots of notes so I have new wrinkles to explore with the knowledge of new plays that I walked away from the clinic with.  But I will love to put my order in first for the DVD version of the plays.
 
Kevin has a very athletic team and being that I work with the QBs I couldn’t help but to admire the silky smooth composure that his starter has.  I watched his mechanics and was thoroughly impressed.  The kid has been taught well.
 
As I scrolled down and read “NEWS” I couldn’t help but read the insert from yet another coach asking you “HOW TO STOP THE DOUBLE WING”.  I think that you are getting softer as you age gracefully, that or in this election year you are being politically correct because I remember you frying coaches previously that dared ask you that asinine question.  (smile)
 
I do have one clear cut answer to the fools that ask me (us) what defense gives us the most trouble or what info can I (we) give them to stop us.  I ask them have they ever heard of the STUD 11 defense.  They usually reply “stud 11, I never heard of it.  Who runs it and how can I get info on it?  Do you know about it?”  To which I reply sure I know about it, because it will take eleven studs at every defensive position to stop the Double Wing!  I have yet to face the STUD 11.  (smile)
 
What stops most DWers is lack of execution, poor play calling, lack of defensive recognition, tinkering, lack of attention to detail, piss poor coaching, personnel in the wrong position(s) and I could go on but one that I will end on is lack of faith in the abilities of our players.  These are the things that stop the Double Wing and not one Cure All Double Wing Stopping Defensive. 
 
Respectfully & Keep Coaching,
 
Brian Mackell
Archbishop Curley & AAYFA, Baltimore, Maryland
 
*********** For a great article about Greg Gadson, former Army football captain whose bravery in battle and courage in dealing with his combat injuries was an inspiration to the Giants in their Super Bowl run (they awarded him a Super Bowl ring)---
http://www.coachwyatt.com/GregGadsonStory.pdf

*********** Back in 2006, Andy Smith, Director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center, conducted a poll for the Boston Globe, asking people who'd moved from Massachusetts to New Hampshire within the last year why they'd done so. Reason Number One: cost of living. Reason Number Two: lower taxes. Reason Number Three: Too many liberals in Massachusetts.

*********** Hugh: I just read your latest column(good color pictures) and something struck me about how we worked at Delaware in the fall of 1953 as a freshman team to prepare the varsity for their opening game against Glenn Killinger's West Chester team which had beaten Delaware in 1952 primarily by putting defensive lineman on the inside shoulder of the Delaware offensive guards and at the snap of the ball literally dived and pinched in between the guards and the center, sometimes turning sideways to penetrate. If those defensive lineman were quick and made a powerful thrust they could penetrate enough to screw up the pulling game. I was one of the guys who successfully could beat the center's check block on some occasions. It drove those varsity guys(guards and center) crazy and it really screwed up the offense until we did it so much that they tightened up and became quicker and more aggressive in their blocking.Mike Lude was behind this, and he drove myself and several other quick defensive linemen to give the varsity offensive linemen a lot of trouble. They hated us. That year we beat West Chester 45 to 7 (or something like that.) That type of defense against a DW team that isn't ready for those type tactics can be beaten.You probably already know about these tactics but we practiced it so much before that West Chester game that those varsity linemen were really ready to defeat the pinch and penetrate defense.  Black Lions.  Jim Shelton, Englewood, Florida (Jim- General James - Shelton, USA retired - and Honorary Colonel of the Black Lions, was a two-way guard at Delaware under legendary coach Dave Nelson and legendary line coach Mike Lude. HW)

*********** Coach - That was a fascinating  breakdown, by Mr. Babb, but when he states  1.1 Million kids play in High School, is that Just  Kids in there Senior season or kids in all 4 classes Fr,SO,JR,SR  ?
 
 Coach - one thing that has always cracked me up,  and I have I heard this for years, in almost every community and every type of community, is something along these lines  -  " Johnny Jones the Head Coach of  XYZ  High School that my  son played for didn't help my Kid  ( or didn't do Enough ) get in to College and play ball ( or Not play )  " but there main beef is  that the coach didn't do enough to  help there  Kid
 
   A )  Isn't that what the Guidance Councilors  get paid for ?  &  B )  If you're Kids is a Good enough athlete and student  the correct college  be it D1 D1-AA, D II or DIII will find the kid ? for athletics, academics or both ?
 
 Coach do you remember  Sports Illustrated  did a breakdown similar to Mr. Babb, Like 10-15 years ago, it was an estimated breakdown  I thought it went something like this, 300,000  Sr.  boys dress up for the Fall to play High School Football,  only 30,000 will move on to play college Football at all levels - D1-A,D1-AA, D II, D III, NAIA, JUCO,   3000 will play at the 1- A level,   300 will get drafted by the NFL,  90 will make  an NFL roster  and  play  at least  1 year in the  NFL,  30 will play at least   3 years ,   10 will play  5 years or more  ?  My numbers could be way off but it was a fascinating  breakdown by S.I.  that I thought every parent  with kids in High School Football should see it, with the basic message  You're kid will only come down this road once playing High School Football  ENJOY the experience  , IF you're Kid is one of the fortunate  30,000 to play at the next level  Enjoy that , but don't get caught up in it ,  I Think that SI article should be posted by every High School Football program in America  to give the parents a dose of reality  -  see ya Friday Coach  -  John  Muckian   Lynn, Massachusetts

That's 1 million kids is all kids in all grades.  So in any one year there are some 200,000 coming out (allowing for some dropouts along the way).

If there are 30,000 playing college football, that means that some 7,500 openings will be created by graduation and dropping out.

You are so right - parents put too much responsibility on the coach.  But by the same token, I see all sorts of garbage about this coach or that one "sending" players to major colleges, or "sending" them to the pros, as if the coach did it, when you and I know good and well that God and good fortune (and far too often, good recruiting) sent those kids to those high school coaches in the first place, and that's the primary reason they're at a major college or in the pros.

As for guidance counselors... they should be doing what you suggest, but in most high schools they're  tied up with making sure that the ever-growing number of  knuckleheads get the credits they need to graduate (so that the school doesn't get a failing grade from the Feds).

I sure wish that we weren't so hung up on the Big Time.  I realize that it is impossible for any kid to resist the lure of  today's big NFL money, but going back to a different time, when I was in college, I believe that football-wise I would have gotten more out of playing in a good D-III program than I did from the Big-Time Ivy program that I chose.  

And for those who dispute the "Big Time" label, and don't realize how much the power structure of the game has changed since I was in school,  I offer this:

In 1957, my freshman year, the Yale Bowl seated 71,000. Only seven other colleges had larger stadiums. (Those of such odern-day giants Alabama, Florida, Penn State and Tennessee were smaller.) That year, Yale averaged 217,000 in six games. That's an average of more than 36,000 a game.

That was more than the average attendance at such modern-day giants as (get ready for this)

Washington (35,000), Tennessee (34,000), Auburn (34,000), Texas A & M (33,000), Florida (32,000), Nebraska (31,000), Penn State (28,000), Kentucky (28,000), Georgia (25,000), South Carolina (21,600), Clemson (19,000)

Here's some good ones for you --- Florida State, which wasn't all that many years removed from being a women's school, (16,000); BYU, still a small church school somewhere out West (9,000); Virginia Tech, at that time an aggie school hidden away in the mountains of Appalachia (9,000)

And - get this -  Holy Cross (16,000) outdrew BC (14,000)

How things have changed!!!!

*********** Speaking of the Ivy League...

Coach Wyatt....Just fyi. I am a big Ivy League FB fan and thought you might enjoy this. Hope all is well and I look forward to seeing you in RI. For what it's worth Brian Dennehy lives about a 1/4 mile from me in Woodstock CT. Interestingly enough there are several "celebs" that live here and in neighboring Pomfret CT. One of the two nicest towns in New England in my opininon.

Take care, Scott Wendel

The following notice is from the National Football Foundation...

Former Ivy League Standouts Featured in New Documentary

For Love & Honor Productions has completed the documentary, "Eight: Ivy League Football and America," an original feature-length documentary film (TRT 96 minutes). A world premiere, hosted by the Ivy Football Association, will be held on Thursday, Apr. 24, 2008, at the Yale Club in New York City.

"Eight," which tells the history of Ivy League football from its earliest days to the present, is narrated by two- time Tony Award-winning actor Brian Dennehy (Columbia '60). It also features interviews with Academy Award-winning actor Tommy Lee Jones (Harvard '69), College Football Hall of Fame coach from Penn State Joe Paterno (Brown '50), ESPN anchor Chris Berman (Brown '77), General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt (Dartmouth '78), former Secretary of State George Shultz (Princeton '42), College and Pro Football Hall of Famer Chuck Bednarik (Penn '49), four-time Pro Bowl running back Calvin Hill (Yale '69), Chicago Bears' star Dan Jiggetts (Harvard '76), College Football Hall of Famer and Heisman Trophy winner Dick Kazmaier (Princeton '52), College Football Hall of Famer Ed Marinaro (Cornell '72), Intuit chair and NFF Board member Bill Campbell (Columbia

*********** I have to say that I am glad to have you helping me out.  Coaching is a funny thing - we learn it in so many places.   There is a University or College where you can sign up for double wing 101 or west coast passing game 101 etc.  And it can be difficult at times to find a mentor - as it is unlike many other professions.  I have tried to find crumbs of knowledge, philosophy etc. here and there.  It is funny how you take this from one guy and that from another, how you can work with a guy who you don't agree with on philosophy, but you learn x's and o's from him, and then how you can go work for a guy who you don't agree with x's and o's but you like his philosophy etc.  It is a great service that you offer those who are willing to buy in, because we get the whole deal, philosophy and x's and o's.  Maybe you should get some accreditation (spelling?)  For Wyatt University of Football Coaching (ha ha).  I'd like to think Im finishing up my Masters Degree with you and getting ready to begin my PHD in the double wing and coaching young men, but just when it seems to think you've got the answers - there is much more to learn.  John Dowd, Oakfield-Alabama, New York

Interesting that you mention it, because the idea of a "Wyatt University" (I would certainly use a less self-promoting name) is something that has occured to me many times, simply because (1) so many guys have no place to turn to for help, and (2) although there are ways such as ASEP to give guys certification in the "human relations" aspects of coaching, there is no way of certifying that a guy might know what to coach or how to teach it.

In any case, I would say that you have earned your Master's in the Double Wing and are on your way to earning your doctorate.

*********** Gabe McCown, an Oklahoman whom I've grown to know through coaching, knows of my beer business background, and was kind enough to send me a bottle of something called Choc Beer.

The name comes from its having been brewed in what is now Krebs, Oklahoma, in the "Choctaw Nation" of Indian territory, since the early days of the 20th century. It was the product of an Italian immigrant named Pete Prichard, who first came to Oklahoma to work in the coal mines, but after being injured on the job, turned to making and selling beer ("home brew," to be truthful), and eventually opening a restaurant called Pete's Place.

As the story goes, Pete continued selling his beer even after Prohibition (perhaps the news hadn't yet reached Krebs, Oklahoma), until 1932 when - according to the label on the bottle - "Pete was arrested for the illegal brew and had to spend a little time in a federal jail at Muskogee."

Afterward, when the rest of the country repealed Prohibition but Oklahoma chose to remain dry, Pete continued to produce his beer anyhow. Eventually, this got him in trouble again, but fortunately for beer drinkers, things are more up to date in Oklahoma these days, and now, under the supervision of Pete's son, Bill, Pete's Place is as popular as ever, and the beer is back in production.

My son's birthday was yesterday and he happens to be visiting us here in the states, so we decided to start the celebration off by popping open the Choc Beer.  Great stuff!

http://www.petes.org/

*********** From the Internet...

The Ant & the Grasshopper - 2008

OLD VERSION (Aesop's Fable): The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays
the summer away.

Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be responsible for yourself!

MODERN VERSION:

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food. America is stunned by the sharp contrast.

How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so ?

Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper, and everybody cries when they sing, 'It's Not Easy Being Green.'

Nancy Pelosi & John Kerry exclaim in an interview with Larry King that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and both call for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his fair share.

The EEOC drafts the Economic Equity & Anti-Grasshopper Act retroactive to the beginning of the summer.

The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.

Hillary Clinton gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges appointed by Bill Clinton.

The ant loses the case.

The story ends with the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while the government house he is living in, which just happens to be the ant's old house, crumbles around him because he hasn't maintained it.

The ant has disappeared in the snow.

The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident. The house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.

*********** Uh-oh. One of the things that really suck about growing old is that the deaths of players you remember from your boyhood, and even some contemporaries, begin to happen with increasing frequency...

Former stars Buddy Dial of Rice and Jerry Groom of Notre Dame died on February 29.

Buddy Dial was born in Ponca City, Oklahoma, and went to Magnolia (Texas) High School. From 1956-he was an All-America and All-Southwest Conference end at Rice, leading coach Jess Neely's Owls to the 1957 SWC title and an appearance in the Cotton Bowl, and being named to the bowl's all-star team. In 1958, he was named team co-captain and MVP. In the NFL, he was twice selected to play in the Pro Bowl.

Originally from Des Moines, Iowa, Jerry Groom was a standout football and baseball player at Dowling High School. At Notre Dame he was a three-year starter at center and linebacker for Frank Leahy from 1948-50. He led the Irish to a national title in 1949 and was named team captain en route to becoming aconsensus All-American in 1950. Mr. Groom was named to the Pro Bowl in 1954 while playing for the Chicago Cardinals.

*********** NFL Players' Association executive director Gene Upshaw has been criticized in some quarters as being "cozy with management," and he is under attack by old-timers as being stingy with financial support for them, but it would be hard for any current player to build much of a case against him.

Since 2006, the percentage of league revenue paid to NFL players has jumped from 54 percent to 59 percent.

That's higher than for any other sport. Baseball's percentage now varies between 51 and 55 per cent; NBA players are guaranteed 57 per cent of league revenue, and NHL players 55.6 per cent.

*********** Hey coach, hope all is well with you. I have a question for you when and if you have time. Is there any place you can go to get a history of Double wing success as far as high school play off appearances, scoring and yardage records etc. I would love to have something printable I can just hand to the constant parade of idiots and naysayers I have to talk to about the offense. We went to the Junior division championship last year with a team that has never had any success until we switched to the double wing and came within a whisker of winning it. You would think that would shut some of these people up but it does not seem to help. You are something of a historian , help us out coach ! I bet theres a bunch of guys like me that would love an updated hand out with some info like that ! Thanks, Kirk Melton , Burlington Tigers, Burlington, Washington

Coach, Take a look here...

http://www.coachwyatt.com/successes.html

This page is dated, but it will show you that FIVE YEARS AGO my system was kicking butt and it hasn't let up since. If people are not yet aware of that fact, I'd have to say that it's more a reflection on them than on the Double Wing!

Hugh Wyatt