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Show r - , ,.. ,. . g I j , f ! Whyj)oElevens Delay Use of Forward Pass in Modern Game? BY RILLY EVANS. te.?h' 1?.0S Prtfeally oTery football team watt until defeat stares It In the face before opening up? W Ith a majority of elevens the for- ward pass Is merely a weapon to use aa a last resort if defeat seems certain, try to stave it otf with the forward pats. Notre Dame is ono of tho fCW teams that uses the pass more than merely a weapon. With Coach Rockne's teams the forward pass is one of his very beat bets on the offense Sitting next to me in tho press box at the Harvard-Princeton game was Earl Sprackling. ono of tho greatest tuarterbacks tho country' has ever known. During hla days at Brown. It was the exception for any one to pick an All-Amerlcan team that failed fail-ed to includes Sprackling During the progress of the Harvard-Princeton game, certain situations situa-tions arose that called upon the quarterback quar-terback for snap Judgment. Often two or three posslbllltleo presented themselves as a solution Before tho play would be pulled I would invariably invari-ably say to Sprackling "Well, Earl, what play would you call If you were out there directing the team?" Seldom Sprackling made a mistake of football Judgment when he was a star. After BuHi left tho game, tho Harvard quarters who succeeded hhn didn't always do what Sprackling figured fig-ured was the best play I might add that the Harvard quarters were wrong, not Sprackling. Several times tho Princeton quarter quar-ter didn't do Just as Earl figured he would. On one occasion after Snlve-ly Snlve-ly had thrown a long forward pass that was grounded, Sprackling remarked re-marked : 'That is a dangerous play. I am a bit surprised Princeton is using It. Seems to me the half must be nearly over. It would bo much wiser to ),'"t off a few line plays or end runs in slow fashion and use up as much time as possible, since they are out in the lend "Thero is always a chance that one of those long forward passes will bo intercepted and someone run for a touchdown." Sprackling had scarcely finished when Snlvely cut loose another long forward pass that was Intercepted by a Harvard man, who for a time seem- I ed on his way to a touchdown. A fow seconds later the whistle blew, ending the half. "Why doesn't Harvard open up?" Late in the second period Sprackling kept salng that to me. It seemod 1 f that Harvard must do so If It was to win. Yet Harvard refrained from opening up until the game was practical prac-tical ly over and ahnost certain defeat de-feat was staring the Crimson In tho face. That Is the big trouble with the open game," said Sprackling. "Coaches Bpend hours drilling the men in various va-rious formations and seldom uso them. Instead of making the pass the big threat of their system, most coaches use It merely as the pinch Play. "I belle...- ii some coach would do- clop the pass from various formations forma-tions to a high degree and then constantly con-stantly use such plays throughout tb': game that his team would run roughshod rough-shod over its opponents "Open play, featuring tho forward pass and other bits of strategy, have mado football popular, yet tho coaches are not getting the possibilities possibili-ties out of the play or giving the spectators tin kind of a game they like I certainly agreed with everything Sprackling said Often I have wondered won-dered why different teams with a well developed open game insisted on playing play-ing straight football. The risky features fea-tures of the play seem to holel most coaches In check. They don't want to gamble with the possibilities pro and con. |