“He’s smarter than he looks,” I said.
Dupliss and Stelzac came in with large chips on their shoulders. Dupliss summed it up by saying, “We know you four characters are very happy together, and we don’t want your jobs. So help us look good in there when he sticks us on offense, will you?”
The same deal went on for days. Never did the four of us get in the same back-field. We were getting thoroughly browned off.
At the end of the week Bunny Hale decided we were ready for a few full-scale scrimmages.
He said, “Just to see how sharp you boys are, I’ll play defensive fullback. Offensive backfield, McKeaver, Western, Sanchenelli and Mulligan.”
We really snapped into it. We gave each other delighted grins. Charlie said, “Let’s run him right into the ground, hey?”
Bunny had had some private words with Joe Goldman, defensive quarter. On their first shift, Bunny moved up as a line backer. We were starting at our own twenty and running it as a regular game.
I called a single wing and the snap went to Charlie, with all the power smashing off to the right. Charlie managed to bull three yards. Then, on second down, I called one of the 31 series. Bus was to take the flip, fade back and pass to Sancho who had cut into the flat after the fake.
But as I took my three steps something hit me. I managed an awkward flip to Bus and saw him get it just as a house fell on him. Bus got up a little slowly.
We huddled and Bus said, “The line let that big lug through.”
“Let, hell!” the guard said. “He ran over me like a tank.”
“Come on,” I said. “Third and thirteen. Thirty-one-four. Western down the alley.”
Charlie came down the alley and I fed it right into his stomach. Charlie can drive. He hit Bunny who appeared somehow in the middle of the line. Charlie took three running steps without moving from the same spot and then flopped over onto his back for a two-yard loss.
In the huddle he said, “Oh, fine! Who was supposed to take him out?”
The guard said, “I hit him hard. I thought I was getting him just right, but I got an elbow in my mouth and a knee in my gut. Next time you hit him.”
“Punt formation,” I said.
Bus went back and got it away nicely. Joe Goldman had moved back to safety. He brought it up to their forty before right end nailed him.
Bunny said, “We’ll roll it the way it is. You boys stay in on defense, unless you think it might be too rugged.”
What could the answer be?
We knew the defensive shifts. I smelled a single wing, moved the backs to their strong side. The line almost held. Almost. Bunny Hale came through the foot-wide gap, footwork as delicate as a toe-dancer. Beyond the gap he turned into a jet-propelled tank, concrete knees thumping high. Bus Mulligan hit him and bounced off. I hit him and then I was sitting there watching him go. Sancho and Charlie hit him at the same time. He plunged free Of Sancho, but Charlie clung. He dragged Charlie six yards before he finally went down. Eighteen yards total, right through the middle.
Charlie said, “I got him!”
“You did real good,” Bus said bitterly.
Bunny, from his backfield, called, “Okay, dreamboys. This time I’m coming right over the middle.”
I didn’t quite believe it. But I bunched us a little just in case. He hit the bunch of us like throwing a sash weight through a Venetian blind.
Eleven yards right through what were supposed to be four of the hardest, smartest college backfield characters in the country.
Our pride was smarting. Charlie said angrily to Sancho, “I saw you flinch off of that one, Sanch.”
“You were too busy running for cover to see what I did,” Sancho said dryly.
“Shut up, you guys, and stop him,” I said.
“Same play,” Bunny yelled.
This time I believed him. I bunched us, two and two, right behind the same slot. The line did good. They rose up to smack him and put him off balance as he came through. He came through spinning, and when he spun he was all elbows and knees. I thought I had him solid but it turned out I only had one stone-hard thigh in my arms. My feet spun off the ground and my hands slid off his pants and I landed face down ten feet away a thump that made my breathing sound like a rusty bellows.
He straightened out in time to stab Charlie in the collarbone with a stiffarm that nearly drove Charlie underground. He feinted the end who had cut back, circled so the end did an automatic block on poor Bus, and then he picked up full speed in two steps and ran over Sancho as though Sancho were the invisible man. He didn’t even break stride for Sancho.
Charlie was beating the ground with his fist and his face was all screwed up like an advertisement about what not to feed your baby.
Sancho picked himself up in sections, went over to Bus and said, “You big tangle-footed, ham-handed...” He launched the punch from way back yonder.
Charlie grabbed Sancho and I grabbed Bus’s arm. When Bus tried to punch back it lifted me right off the ground, but the arm didn’t go anyplace.
I said to Charlie, “High-school kids could have ducked under that stiffarm he gave you.”
Charlie said, “You had him once. Scared to hang on, Hal?”
Then Bus grabbed me and Sancho grabbed Charlie or, in the madness of the moment, I would have given away seventy pounds and tried to punch the head off the big fullback.
Bunny Hale, once in the clear, bad circled back. He stood, breathing easily, the ball under his arm, an amused look on his face. His voice, when he used it, was like a bucket of icewater. “Come, come, children!”
I flushed and looked down at my shoes. My three pals were all doing the same.
Bunny said, “We’ll break it off right here. Four times around the field and hit the showers. McKeaver, Mulligan, Sanchenelli and Western, show up at my place at five-thirty sharp.”
He was waiting for us as we filed into his living room. In his sports jacket he looked almost as big as on the field.
“Sit down, guys,” he said.
We sat, feeling enormously uncomfortable. He paced back and forth for a time, looking both sleepy and amused. I noticed a bruise on his cheek that he’d picked up in the scrimmage.
Finally he said, “Every coach runs into this. I got the pitch from Linklater. But usually the boys involved aren’t as able as you four. For college players, you’re okay. You couldn’t compete on a first-class pro team. You’re green, and you aren’t thinking of the game as a business. I purposely made you look a little silly out there and you started blaming each other. It isn’t any different from the way you were making the others boys look silly when I tried to force them into your closed shop.
“This year of play finishes you four up at Mideastern. But I’m on a three-year contract. If I let you guys push me around, I’ll have nothing to go on for the nineteen fifty season. We’ll have a big squad in the fall. So around each one of you four I’m going to build an offensive backfield. Each one of you guys will be an unofficial coach for his own backfield. The slickest combo resulting becomes first string, but I’ll use all four interchangeably.”
He gave us a chance to think it over. I gave Charlie a sidelong glance. He had a grimly determined look. Bus looked bemused. Sancho was scowling.
Bunny said, “Naturally each one of you guys can develop the timing of your backfield to bring out your own best talents — within the pattern of the standard plays.”
That did it. Sancho said, “These guys have been blanketing me. Just give me a chance to build my own foursome, and—”
“Blanketing, hell!” Charlie said. “We’ve been covering for you. I could drill a little group that’d gain more yards than you’ve ever seen.”
“Besides,” Bunny said softly, “if this coaching wasn’t a good deal, I’d still be plunging my brains out for the Burros. You guys might get a start this way that could lead to a fine career for you.”