Quarter-Back Bates

“Last year we had Patterson. He was a wonder, my idea of just what a quarter should be. If it was fourth down on the other fellow’s one-yard and Billy called for a punt we’d have thought it all right. Not one of us would have questioned. He didn’t make mistakes and we knew it. I say he didn’t make mistakes, but of course he did once in a while. He was only human, you know. He pulled an awful ‘boner’ in the Chancellor game. He had called the ‘big shift’ and then he sent K around the wrong end and we lost about six yards; and a touchdown, too, as it proved, for we couldn’t make the distance afterwards. Of course we were pretty sore and we’d have said some hard things just then to anyone but Billy. You might expect a quarter after doing a stunt like that to be all broke-up, but when I got on my feet again Billy was laughing for all he was worth. ‘That’s the worst one I ever pulled,’ said he. ‘I guess the old bean’s slipping, fellows!’ So, in about one second we were all laughing, too, and calling it a joke. But Billy’s old bean didn’t slip very often, I’m telling you.”

“Did you win that game, Warden?” asked Dick.

“Oh, sure! We got over the next try all right. I forget the score. Something like three scores to one, I think. But if Billy had got sore we’d have all been sore, and being sore doesn’t help much. Unless you’re sore against the other team. A quarter wants to be a regular double-dyed optimist, Bates, and he wants to let everyone know it, for the rest of the team will take their cue from him. Just let them think that he’s discouraged and they’ll feel the same way, and as soon as they do they’ll quit trying their hardest. They won’t mean to, mind you, but they will. There’s a lot of psychology in a football game, old man.”

“Yes, I think that’s so,” agreed Dick. “Where I’ve played, back home, though, it’s always been the captain that’s run things, Warden.”

“Bad business. A captain shouldn’t butt in on the running of the team unless it’s absolutely imperative. He has a position to play and he ought to give his whole mind to playing it. You watch Bob. You’ll almost never see him question a signal or even suggest a play. You can’t have two bosses, Bates, and a quarter-back is in position to see what’s going on and to dope out the answer. Sometimes Bob will guess what the other fellow is up to and let us know, and he’s usually right, too, but that’s about all he does except play his position. Off the field he’s the Big Boss, but on it he’s taking his orders from the quarter just like the rest of us. I’m doing a lot of talking, but I’ve got rather strong convictions as to the proper playing of the quarter-back position, Bates, and I thought I’d hand them on. Even if you don’t like ’em there’s no harm done.”

“I’m glad you have, Warden,” said Dick earnestly. “I’d never thought much about the – what you call the psychology of the thing. But I see that you’re right. And I’ll keep it in mind – if I ever get a chance!”

“Oh, your chance will come before the season’s over. Mr. Driscoll isn’t keeping you on the squad just to look at. Bates, I’ve seen a whole team pretty nearly turned upside down between the first game and the last, seen fellows who supposedly never had a chance come out of the big game covered with medals. You never can tell! Well, next stop’s ours, I think. I’m as hungry as a bear. I hope they give us a good feed at the hotel. Two years ago we nearly starved.”

Phillipsburg didn’t impress Dick very favourably at the first glance for the sunlight of a gorgeous October day was almost obscured by a pall of smoke from the many factories along the railway. But later, when they had left the station behind and were trudging up the hill toward the centre of the city, the smoke disappeared and Phillipsburg turned out to be rather attractive. The hotel was one of those old-fashioned hostelries set close to the street, with a broad verandah running along the front on which gentlemen of leisure sat tilted back in their chairs and watched life go by. To the loungers the arrival of thirty-odd guests in one bunch was a refreshingly momentous event, doubtless affording them more real excitement than they had experienced since the last collision or runaway. Quite a number of them abandoned their ease and comfort and followed the end of the procession into the lobby to satisfy their curiosity.

Dinner – or luncheon as it really was – was served in a small and very musty smelling room on the second floor, a room evidently dedicated to the yearly banquets of the Odd Fellows and the annual conclave of the local Order of White Elephants. There was a faded red carpet on the floor and three long walnut tables were arranged around as many sides of a square. The chairs matched the tables and dated back to about the period of the Hayes and Tilden campaign. But the food wasn’t bad and the two coloured waiters, in spite of the infirmities of age, managed to get it to the table fairly hot.

After the meal was finished Coach Driscoll explained the plans for the afternoon game. Phillipsburg Academy had a light-weight and supposedly speedy team that relied on passing and running more than on line-smashing. Her punters were exceptionally good and her ends fast. To meet the Phillipsburg style of offence Parkinson would play her ends back and her tackles out, with Stone and Warden dividing the field. Phillipsburg made use of both the “bunch” and the “one-man” pass and used a lateral pass as well. If Phillipsburg switched her attack to the centre of the line, the Parkinson tackles were to come in again, but there were always to be two men up the field. On attack the Brown-and-White was to try out several new running plays and to use the forward-pass whenever practical inside the neutral zone.

“We’ve got a good chance, fellows,” said Mr. Driscoll, “to try out our passing and end-running plays against a team who has a scientific defence against them. If we make our passes go we’ll have reason to be a bit satisfied with ourselves, for Phillipsburg has worked out a pretty good defence against the passing game. What she can do to stop end-runs remains to be seen. But you’ve got to start quick today and run hard and watch the holes, you backs. You’ve got to show about twice the speed you showed against Cumner last week. If you don’t, these chaps will make you look mighty poor.

“I’m going to see that every fellow has a look-in at some time during the game. We may lose the game, but we’re going to get experience. Mind, I’m not saying we shall lose it or that we ought to, because I don’t think for a moment that Phillipsburg is a bit better than we are, even if we use third-string players. If you’ll use your heads today, and play as fast as you know how, you’ll come out on top. I want to see that Number 12 play go smoothly today. It’s a winner if you pull it right, but you’ve got to get together on it. All right. Any questions, fellows?”

A few minutes later they crowded into two yellow trolley cars and went bouncing and swaying out toward the Academy, a mile from town. Dick had held a few hurried words with Stanley and Blash in the lobby. Rusty, it seemed, had disappeared while they had been having lunch in a white-enamelled place down the block and hadn’t turned up since. “He’s probably up to some idiotic tomfoolery,” grumbled Stanley, “and we’ll have to go to the police station later and bail him out, I suppose. Well, good luck, Dick! Hope you get into it. If you do, remember the Maine and all that sort of thing!”

The squad changed into football togs in a room assigned to their use in the Academy gymnasium and at a few minutes past two went across the elm-shaded school yard to the athletic field beyond. A tall youth with an embarrassed manner and a prominent Adam’s apple, the assistant manager of the Phillipsburg team, personally conducted them. The game was scheduled for half-past two and already the stands were well sprinkled with spectators. A cheering section of some hundred or so Parkinsonians was already in place and the Brown-and-White trotted onto the field to a quite noisy reception. Three squads took the gridiron for signal drill and the punters got busy. Dick accompanied the latter and punted and caught for a good fifteen minutes, getting rather warm during the proceedings. Phillipsburg arrived at two-twenty and hustled out for a warming-up. By that time the stands were about filled and the cheering was on in earnest. Then the teams retired to their benches, the captains met in midfield, shook hands and watched the flicking of a coin, and Bob Peters waved toward the south goal.

“Means we won the toss,” commented Jerry Wendell, right tackle. “Well, here goes!” Dick laid strong hands on Wendell’s sweater and the latter squirmed out like a moth from a chrysalis.

CHAPTER XII

THE PHILLIPSBURG GAME

There were not as many in attendance at the game as was usual at Parkinson, although Phillipsburg was a fair-sized city and Warne only an overgrown town. Perhaps the fact that Phillipsburg Academy was a very long mile from the city had something to do with the meagreness of the audience. At all events, aside from the rival cheering sections the stands showed long empty stretches, and Cardin, who shared an end of the bench with Dick, resented it.

“Guess they must think this is a practice game,” he grumbled.

“Well, Mr. Driscoll seems to think so, too,” said Dick. “He says we’re all to have a show before it’s over.”

“He’ll forget that, though,” replied the other pessimistically, “when we need a score to tie or something. Coaches are always making cracks like that and then forgetting ’em. Bet you I won’t get in, Bates, and bet you you won’t.”

Dick shook his head. “I might bet about you, but I wouldn’t wager an old straw hat on my chances. Still, he said we would. There we go!”

Long, who was at right half, had pulled down the home team’s kick-off and started across the field with the ball, but the advance was short-lived, for a speedy Phillipsburg end soon had him, and it was Parkinson’s ball on her twenty-two yards.

Kirkendall shot through the enemy left for three and then lost half the distance on a similar attempt. Stone punted to the Phillipsburg forty, a high kick that found both Peters and Furniss waiting when it came down. The catcher was downed in his tracks. Phillipsburg started in merrily with a twenty-yard pass diagonally across her line, but Peters smashed it aside and the ball went back. A second forward, this time to the opposite side, grounded, for Warden had run the receiver far out of position. Phillipsburg stabbed the Parkinson centre once in a half-hearted way and got a bare four feet and then punted. The ball, rising near the thirty yards, corkscrewed beautifully down to the opposite thirty-five where Warden got it but was stopped immediately. On the exchange Parkinson had gained ten yards. Kirkendall smashed the centre and got two, Warden added three and Stone again punted.

This time he managed a better ball, for it had both height and distance and was nicely placed in the left-hand corner of the field. With Peters and Furniss both on his heels, the Phillipsburg quarter made no attempt to catch, and it was Furniss who finally seized the bounding oval and downed it on the enemy’s twenty-seven. Phillipsburg split her line and shot the quarter through on a tricky dash that fooled the opponent nicely. When the quarter was stopped he had reeled off twelve yards and the ball was close to the boundary. The Phillipsburg rooters cheered lustily. An attempt to advance on the short side was foiled and the ball was paced in. On second down Phillipsburg was caught off-side and set back. A run half across the field netted but four yards and Phillipsburg punted from near her thirty-five, the ball going out at the visitor’s forty.

Kirkendall got clean away on the first run from kick formation and, with excellent interference, put eighteen yards behind him. Long was stopped and Warden made three. Kirkendall, again called on, tried left tackle and managed to make three more. Stone again punted.

On the side-line Coach Driscoll was frowning intently. Dick, noting, thought he understood. He had heard the final instructions in the gymnasium and recalled the coach’s words distinctly: “Keep out of their line, Stone, until you’re certain you can’t get your distance any other way.” Now Stone seemed to have forgotten those instructions, for not once had a forward-pass been tried, while at least a half-dozen plays had been aimed inside the Phillipsburg tackles. Dick didn’t see what Bob Peters had gained by giving the kick-off to the enemy and then promptly punting the ball back into her hands, nor what Stone’s idea was in kicking regularly on third down, irrespective of the distance lacking. However, it was possible that Stone had something up his sleeve, and when Phillipsburg had failed at a well-tried “bunch” forward and been stopped at the opponent’s left end and had punted to mid-field, Dick looked for another forward-pass. But it didn’t materialise. Instead, Stone tried a delayed pass and got away with the ball very neatly along the left side. But an obstreperous Phillipsburg lineman wormed through and nailed him short of any gain. Kirkendall again retired to kicking position and, with the ball snuggled, shot off at a tangent for the enemy’s right. But the play worked less well this time. The interference was split and a Phillipsburg half nailed Kirkendall three yards past the line. Then the delayed forward-pass came and Warden tossed across to Peters. Peters tipped the throw but lost it. Again Stone punted, this time making a miserable failure of it and landing the ball but twenty yards away. It descended in the midst of a pushing crowd of opponents, leaped toward the side-line and was finally landed a few feet away.

For another three or four minutes the play hovered about midfield, neither side showing any indication of a consistent attack, and then the whistle blew. Coach Corliss summoned Cardin to him. Dick watched them in conversation a bit enviously. Then Cardin sped on, followed by Bartlett, a right guard, and Gross, a left tackle.

When play began again Stone was somewhat dourly looking on from the bench and Cardin was in command. Phillipsburg had made no changes. Phillipsburg shot a breath-taking forward from her thirty-seven yards to Parkinson’s thirty-five, but, although it deserved to succeed, Bob Peters had his man guarded too closely and the pass grounded. A second attempt on a third down went better and Phillipsburg got seven yards, three more than needed. Then, on her forty-five, she started an advance that only slowed when she was under the Brown-and-White’s goal. Two forward-passes, each short but certain, took her well past midfield. After that two tricky split-plays let her clever quarter through for scandalous gains, and, almost before Parkinson realised what was happening, the ball was on the Brown-and-White’s twenty-one. There was much shouting from the stands, much anxiety on the benches as Phillipsburg stabbed the line once for practically no gain and then dropped a tackle back to kicking position.

“Any fool could make a goal from there,” growled “Tip” Harris, who, deposed from left tackle position, had seated himself beside Dick. “It’s dead in front of goal and not thirty yards!”

“But do they mean to try?” asked Dick. “Seems to me one of those short forwards of theirs – ”

“Yes, but I guess they want the three points, Bates. There’s a lot in getting first blood. Say, he doesn’t act as if he meant to kick, though! By jiminy – ” Tip raised his voice imploringly: “Watch a run, Parkinson! Watch that man, Bob!”

Mr. Driscoll, nearby, turned disapprovingly. “Cut that, Harris,” he ordered. Tip subsided, muttering. From the teams came many warnings: “Hold that line, Phillipsburg! Hold that line!” “Break it up! Block this kick, Parkinson!” “Watch that half!” “Signals! Signals!” “Come on! Here we go!”

Back shot the ball to the tall tackle’s waiting hands. The lines plunged and heaved. The tackle swung a long leg under him. But the ball hadn’t left his hands, and now, pushing it into the crook of his left elbow, he sprang off to the left, the other backs closing in about him. As quickly as he had started, he stopped, swung directly about and, with two Parkinson men trying to reach him past his interference, raised the pigskin on high and threw far and swiftly. Thirty yards away a Phillipsburg end was streaking toward the corner of the field. Now he was past the line, well into the end zone, and not an opponent was near him. Straight for his upstretched hands flew the ball, like a brown streak, and not until too late did Parkinson see her danger. Then half a dozen of her defenders sprang toward the lone enemy. But the deed was done. Into his hands settled the ball, he turned on his heel and plunged toward the goal and when he had been rescued from under three brown-and-white legged opponents the pigskin was half-way between side-line and nearer goal-post.

Phillipsburg waved and cheered, and stood on the seats and howled, while from across the gridiron came a fainter but defiant “Parkinson! Parkinson! PARKINSON!” Mr. Driscoll turned his countenance to the bench and shook his head, smiling ruefully. “Half our team asleep, fellows,” he said. “Scoville, go in for Furniss! Warm up, Gaines!”

Phillipsburg missed a fairly easy goal after the touchdown and play began again in midfield. There was no more scoring in the quarter although Gaines, restored to his place at half, twice almost got clear. Under Cardin’s direction, Parkinson thrice tried forward-passes and but once succeeded. Then Gaines, catching, reeled off a dozen yards before he was forced out of bounds. The half ended with the score still 6-0.

There was some hard, plain talk in the gymnasium for the Parkinson audience. Mr. Driscoll was far from pleased and he didn’t hesitate to make the fact known. “You fellows have been taught football for two years, some of you longer, and yet you went out there and just stood around all during the first period. That sort of thing won’t win games! Do something! Try something! If you can’t do anything else, worry your opponent. All you did was to hand him the ball back. Stone, a lot of that was up to you. You had your instructions to try out your overhead game, and your running game, and what did you do? You went at the line every time you got the ball! Now I’m going to start in with the beginning of this last half and use the bench. If you don’t want to get licked, use your heads and play football! You can score if you try hard enough. You ought to score at least twice. And if you let those fellows get close enough to your goal to pull another of those forwards over the line you deserve to lose! You were all asleep, every man Jack of you! Long, where were you when that happened? And you, Gross? And you, Stone? Someone’s got to watch the end of the line, fellows! You can’t all go off visiting like that! You’ve each got a duty to perform on every play and you each know it, but just because the other fellow pulls something you haven’t met up with since last year you forget everything and go straggling after him to see what he’ll do! You stay in position after this, no matter what the other fellow does. Another thing – and I’m aiming this at you, Wendell, more than anyone – watch your hands. The rules require that no part of your body shall be ahead of the line of scrimmage. If the umpire was strict he’d have called you off-side twenty times. Keep your arms down and your hands back until the ball’s in play. After that I don’t care how fast you bring them up. Now, then, we’re going to play fast ball this half. Pryne, you’re quarter. Keep the team on the jump every minute. Start your signal the minute the whistle blows and make your men hustle to positions so that the play can snap off quickly. You’ve been loafing for two periods. Now I want to see some work! I want a score inside the next twelve minutes. Here’s the line-up.”

That the coach meant to “use the bench” was very evident. Of the original starters only three remained, Kirkendall, Upton and Peters. Save for the former, the backfield was all new: Pryne at quarter, Skinner and Curtis at half: and in the line were five second- and third-string players. That Parkinson could win with that aggregation was far too much to expect, and there were plenty who said so on the way back to the field when half-time was over. Stone was still disgruntled and very pessimistic, and he and Cardin grumbled together all during the third period. Usually they had little to say to each other, but today their wrongs drew them together.

That third period, in spite of the “crape hangers,” showed the visiting team to far better advantage. Although, as it turned out, Parkinson neither scored or came dangerously near scoring, she played a hard, earnest game and stopped every attempt of the opponent to get to her last line. In the first three minutes of the quarter Phillipsburg attempted a hopeless place-kick from the thirty-eight yards, but it landed far short, and after that her desperate forward-passes were always spoiled. It is only fair to say that luck favoured the visitors more than once, however. With an even break of fortune there might have been a different story to relate.

Pryne ran the team according to directions as best he could. He lacked experience, though, and if the play went faster than before it was due more to the eagerness of the substitutes than to Pryne’s efforts. Those substitutes did themselves proud, even if they weren’t strong enough to score, and, although many fellows on the bench wished that Coach Driscoll had cared more about winning and less about developing substitute material, it was generally agreed that much credit was due the “rookies.” Before the quarter was ended Captain Peters was added to the retired list and Findley took his place.

The third period ended with Phillipsburg making several changes, something she had refrained from doing before, and the ball in Parkinson’s possession on her twenty-nine yards where Skinner had been downed after a punt. More changes were made. Trask went in for Kirkendall and Dean for Upton, at centre, and four other substitutes trotted nervously on. One of them was Dick.

CHAPTER XIII

THE LAST QUARTER

Phillipsburg began that final period with all the confidence born of having held her enemy scoreless through thirty-six minutes of play. She had replaced many of her first-string men, but her captain was still in and so was the quarter-back who had started. On the Parkinson stand the audience was on its feet, imploring a touchdown.

Dick had been through some trying moments during his brief football career at Leonardville, but he had never felt quite so conspicuous, never so uncertain of himself, as when he trotted out and joined the group of brown-jerseyed players by the thirty-yard line. His heart was beating like a sledge-hammer and his palms were moist and there was a funny prickling sensation in his legs. Diffidence had seldom troubled him before, and he felt doubly awkward now for that reason. But there wasn’t much time for thought of his feelings, for he had hardly joined his team-mates when the whistle blew the end of the minute intermission.

Dick looked over his companions in the back-field and wished that he knew more of them. Trask, in Kirkendall’s position, was much the same sort of fellow in appearance as K. But he was lighter, and a good two years younger, Dick thought. Curtis was a good man and so was Skinner, but of the two Curtis’s style of play was better known to Dick. Gleason had been made acting captain, and it was the substitute guard who bent behind centre to whisper into the quarter’s ear.

“We’ve got to get Skinner loose, Bates,” said Gleason. “He’s the boy if he can get away.”

“All right. Let’s start something, Parkinson! Signals!”

When the ball came back from between Dean’s wide-spread legs, Dick whirled and tossed it to Skinner, and Skinner, rather heavily built but quick at starting and hard to stop, went hurtling into the opposing left guard and, with half the Parkinson team behind him, smashed his way through for six yards. Then came every indication of a forward, with the left end edging out and showing nervous impatience and Dick dropping back eight yards behind centre and the half-backs watching the opposing ends. Back shot the ball to Dick, he made a pretence of throwing it to the left and turned his back to the line. Around swept Findley, the right end, and to him went the pigskin at a short, quick pass. The halfs fell into stride beside him and Dick sprang away to guard the rear. Four strides, six, and a sharp cry of “In! In!” The end dug a heel in the trampled sod and swung to the right. Straight toward the confusion of swaying bodies that had formed the two lines a moment before, he raced. Yet there was some method in the confusion, for Parkinson’s right end and one half had been drawn across the field on the false alarm and her tackle had been forced in. Back of the enemy line the secondary defence was rushing to the support of the forwards, but the interference cleaned the hole nicely and Findley shot through, dodged a tackle and was off at a tangent, finding holes where there seemed none, racing diagonally toward the right side-line. The interference was gone now and he was on his own, but only the Parkinson quarter remained between him and the distant goal. Free of the mêlée, he swung down the field at the forty-yard line, a scant dozen feet from the boundary.