In one corner, offensive and defensive linemen crashed into each other. In another, linebackers stutterstepped as they practiced intercepting passes. From the other end of the stadium could be heard a recurring and resounding thunk as a football was repeatedly propelled off the foot of the punter to soar into the upper reaches. Midfield the passing personnel of the offense were scrimmaging against the defensive backs.
Through it all, the voice of Coach Bradford, who was with the scrimmaging players, could be quite clearly heard. “I wanna see some urgency in those third and fives.”
They were practicing third-down formations, each scrimmage simulating a third down with five yards to go for a first down.
Bobby Cobb slapped the ball in his hand and retreated while the offensive players ran their pass patterns and the defensive players retreated to cover their zones. Cobb’s throw was long and deep, intended for a wide receiver who was going full speed. Then the receiver, “hearing the footsteps” of the defensive back who was closing in, at the last moment backed off, and the ball fell harmlessly to the turf.
“Ritter!” The returning receiver hung his head. “I don’t care how much you get paid,” Bradford blazed, “but you’re not gonna get it free. Desire, Ritter! Desire, drive, dedication, execution! They go together, Ritter!”
Harris and Ewing walked along the sidelines until they reached the Cougars’ bench where the trainer, Jack Brown, was standing.
“Mr. Brown,” Harris began.
“Brownie,” said the trainer; “everybody calls me Brownie.”
“Okay, Brownie, could we talk to you for a few minutes?”
“Sure. Do you mind if we go into the locker room? I’ve got some things to do down there.”
“Good idea.”
They retraced their steps to the locker room. Place kicker Niall Murray, left ankle encased in an ice pack, reclined on a training table. The detectives, of course, knew Murray, but not the man standing next to him. They were introduced to John Owen, the team’s public relations representative.
Owen, face seemingly set permanently in a concerned frown, addressed Brown. “So, what we got?”
“An ankle.”
“How bad?”
“Bad bruise and swelling. I’m hopin’ the ice’ll bring it down. It’s gonna be sore.”
“How’d he get it?”
“Special team drill. A pileup. Somebody kicked him. An accident.”
“How many times you been told to stay away from the point of contact!” For the first time in this exchange, Owen directly acknowledged the presence of the person whose injury they were discussing. “Just kick the ball and get off the field.”
“Aw,” said Murray, “it’s no fun that way at all.”
“So how can we list him?” Owen went back to Brown. “‘Questionable’?”
“Not yet. The injury is too bad for questionable. Better put him down as doubtful.”
“Godalmighty! In one week we lost the tight end who’s practically the franchise, and now the kicker. How the hell do they expect me to promote this team?”
“The kicker’s down, not out,” said Brown. “Just don’t list him as questionable yet.”
Owen, grumbling, departed.
Brown carefully removed the ice pack from Murray’s ankle. The swelling made the ankle appear grotesque. In addition, there was a dark pinkish hue that reflected some internal bleeding.
“Looks worse than it is,” Brown commented. He touched the ankle gingerly. Wherever his fingers went, small white prints appeared, only to resolve again into the angry pink. “But it’s way too early to tell how it’s gonna respond.”
Brown began wrapping adhesive tape in a figure-eight on Murray’s foot-around the ankle, across the arch, under the instep, back again over the arch, and around the ankle. “Too tight?”
“It’s okay,” Murray replied.
“What happens next?” Ewing was genuinely interested.
“Well,” said Brown, “lucky it isn’t his kicking foot or we’d really be in trouble. Still, the left ankle gets a lot of pressure. He plants all his weight on it when he kicks. I may just have to build a protective device for it.”
“You build one?”
“Lots of times. Out of fiber glass. Then cover it with foam rubber. Then adhesive tape. Can provide some protection for almost any body part, especially the arms and legs. Usually, one of the officials will check it before the game. . make sure we don’t build a weapon.”
Ewing looked around the trainer’s quarters. He was surprised at the number of cardboard boxes containing adhesive tape of various dimensions. “How much do you use, Brownie?”
“Don’t rightly know. Lots. We’re budgeted for $20,000 worth of tape for the season.” Brown continued to tape the ankle, then reapplied the ice pack. “But you fellas didn’t come out here to talk about the Mick’s ankle.”
“We wanted to talk to you about Hunsinger,” said Harris, in a far more friendly tone than he had used during Brown’s initial interrogation.
“We already talked about him.” Brown clearly was reluctant to undergo another questioning.
“This is not like the last time, Brownie,” said Harris. “We thought it might be helpful if we got a little more background on Hunsinger. Sort of find out more about what kind of guy he was. For one thing, the bottom-line image we’ve gathered from comments made about him is not very favorable. We thought we’d like a peek at the other side of the coin, as it were.”
“That’s right”-Brown sounded more relaxed now that he was reassured that this would not be a repetition of the interrogation- “nobody’s had much good to say about the Hun. Well, he wasn’t a Boy Scout.”
“So,” Harris hoisted himself onto an adjacent training table and sat there adding to the informal atmosphere, “maybe there isn’t a flip side of the coin.”
“Well, I’ll say this for the Hun: he sucked up more pain and played through it more than a lotta guys I know.”
“Was he hurt much?”
“Football’s that way. Read the team reports from the league office any given weekend. There’s usually more than three hundred players listed with more than four hundred injuries.”
“How could that be-a hundred more injuries than players?”
“Multiples. The Mick’s got an ankle. But he coulda been worse. He coulda got a left ankle, left neck, right hand. The worst I ever saw was Dorsett listed with general all-body soreness.
“But don’t get me wrong; the Hun wasn’t lookin’ for trouble. Some guys do. They don’t take enough care with their equipment. Take the shoe, for instance. For football, especially on artificial turf, a shoe is, or should be, protective equipment. But if it’s not designed right for support, or if it’s worn out, you can pick up a nasty ankle injury or what they now call ‘turf toe.’
“But the Hun always got the best shoes, the best equipment. He may not have been a knight in shining armor when it came to his own personal conditioning. But that was his own personal choice. He decided he’d rather have fun than stay in tiptop conditioning. He also decided it was foolish to take needless risks with less than perfect equipment.
“And, as you know, he played just about every game. Just about every offensive play. And I can testify he had to suck up more pain than the average guy to do it.”
“But what’s so odd about that, Brownie?” Harris pursued. “Don’t the players have a saying, goes something like-“
“You can’t make the club from the tub,” Murray supplied.
“Yeah,” Harris agreed. “Doesn’t everybody play even when they’re in pain?”
“You don’t understand-or you forgot: the Hun had a guaranteed contract. Owners and management always have that fear when it comes to players with a guaranteed contract: that they’ll sit it out when they could be playing. And some do. I’ve known my share of players who float once they’ve got a contract with guarantees built in.
“But that’s the way it is. There’s always gonna be a certain kind of player who’ll put out what he thinks he should do just to remain comfortable. Then there’s those who always give 110 percent no matter how much they’re paid.