Football Daily

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When you think you have heard it all, a football story like this is revealed! It's so strange you won't believe it, but this oddity occurred in the game a century ago when things were just a bit different.

I have heard of many strange situations that occurred during football games throughout the ages. Ill weather, lost balls, and even nonplayers and vehicles out on the field of play; however, when I read the Football Archaeology.com Tidbit titled Punting From Behind A Barbed Wire Fence.

It may just take the cake for being the strangest.

I appreciate Timothy Brown for sharing his time, knowledge, and incredible story from yesteryear.

We present this video to preserve the legacy of American football history.

-Full Transcription of Conversation with Timothy Brown on Punting Behind Barbed Wire



TBrown_PuntBehindBarbedWire_1

⏰Wed, 05/01 04:44AM · 12mins

Transcript

Darin Hayes:
We have a great day planned for you today on this episode. Timothy P. Brown of footballarchaeology.com is joining us just like he does each and every Tuesday. Tim, welcome back to The Pig Pen.

Timothy Brown:
Darin, thank you. How are you doing this evening?

Darin Hayes:
I am doing great. And how about you?

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, can't complain, can't complain. Gonna get out of town in a few days and get away for a week. So that's nothing for me.

Darin Hayes:
Well, that's great because this winter time, it's almost like, uh, you know, especially us up in the colder climates, uh, a bit of a prisoner, almost like we're behind a barbed wire fence. And, uh, I had to stretch for that one to segue into our topic tonight. That's why Tim is laughing because he recently wrote a post he titled Punning from behind a barbed wire fence; Tim, that sounds like a pretty risky business there. And, uh, maybe you could explain this title.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, so this is one where there's like multiple rules involved that were current in 1907 when this event occurred but are long, you know, long gone from the game. So it's one, you know, I came across, I've done a couple of different articles from a series that ran in the 1920s called the most spectacular play I've ever seen. And they went out, and they interviewed a bunch of people about, you know, the most spectacular play they ever saw. And so this guy named Bill or CW Street mentioned a play that he in a game he had participated in. So, you know, just to kind of set up the stage a little bit. This guy CW played at Auburn for two years and then at Washburn and Lee. It was during his senior year, Washington Lee, in 1907, that this game occurred. But you know, he then went on. He was a track and wrestling official. And I mean that both in terms of, you know, help, like officiating, but also kind of managing as part of the, you know, the US Olympic teams for both as an administrator and official type, but he also was the field judge for the 1929 Rose Bowl, which is the game when Roy, you know, the "Wrong Way Riegels" play. So he was on the field for that play. So anyway, he saw some spectacular plays. And that was, you know, the wrong way. Riegels wasn't one of them, although I guess it actually wouldn't have occurred by the time the articles came up. So

Darin Hayes:
He might have changed his mind after that play, right? Yeah.

Timothy Brown:
So, so what happened with this guy was he was the captain of the W and L team, and they were playing Bucknell close game, and at one point, Bucknell drove the ball down to the three-yard line, and then they, the W and L's, defense held so the ball was turned over on downs. So back in that time, you know, if you had the ball inside your 10, it was very common that you pumped it on first out. And so he's saying, yeah, that's what we're going to do. But in this particular instance, the, you know, back then they didn't have hash marks. So if the play ended over towards the sideline or the previous play ended over towards the sideline, that's where the next play started. And then this is 1907, so they didn't have end zones yet. They had a goal line but no end line, no end zones. And so, in a lot of locations, since the ball couldn't, the only way you could score a touchdown was to run the ball across the goal line. You could catch a pass, a forward pass in 1907. But if the ball in the air or bounding went across the goal line, it was a turnover. It was basically a touchback. So, basically, you didn't need the depth in the end zone. It was like all you needed was across the end zone. And so, as a result, they could fit playing fields into pretty tight spaces. And there might be a wall just beyond the end zone in a stadium like the Polo Grounds. So, in this case, on one side of the end zone, there was a barbed wire fence a little bit behind the end zone. And so the street asks the referee, can we move the ball over to the other side of the field so that we can punt? And the referee says, I understand why you want to do that, but no, you can't. That's not within the rules. We can't just move the ball through the other side of the field. So the streets are like, okay, we're playing by the rules. So I'm going to play by the rules, too. So what he does is he, he has his punt, he tells his punter to go on the other side, go through the gate, lock the gate, and then go on the other side of the barbed wire fence and stand there to be ready to take the snap. So that's what the punter does. So he's back there. He gets a snap, and the Bucknell defenders start racing toward him, but they stop before they get to the barbed wire fence, and they can't figure out how to get to the guy. In the meantime, his people are running him down the field. And he's just kind of waiting there, ready to, he's waiting to punt the ball until his teammates get downfield. And now, the other thing about the rules of the time was in 1906; they made the, you know, what they call for a while the quarterback kick or the onside punt. In 1906, they made it so that if you punted the ball, any one of your teammates could recover the ball and advance it. You know, they had as much right as the return man. So by the time he punted it, they had, you know, 10 of his teammates downfield than just one return man. So they ended up recovering the ball, you know, W and R, you know, recover the ball. Unfortunately, they ended up with the same guy who was the punter on another occasion; he was back to punt, stepped behind the end zone, or I should say behind the goal line and was tackled for a safety. So they end up losing the game two to nothing. But it is the only known game in which a punt was made from behind a barbed wire fence. If anybody else knows of any others, let me know.

Darin Hayes:
It introduces your chance of getting your kick blocked.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, yeah, that's great cup protection. You know, I've got a nice barbed wire fence in front of you.

Darin Hayes:
Think about the pressure on the long snapper, though. He's got to make sure he clears that fence or, you know, there could be some trouble there.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, they only used one ball at the time, so if that ball had popped. Thank you.

Darin Hayes:
Well, but even now, okay. Let's say he snaps that ball at the rules at that time, and it hits the wire, the fence, and drops it straight down. That's a loose ball, right? So you're going to have these guys going in for a fumble next to a barbed wire fence and trying to recover. Ooh, boy. Holy porcupines, Batman. That sounds like a bad one.

Timothy Brown:
Kind of a prickly situation.

Darin Hayes:
Yeah, that's for sure. Well, I'll tell you what, Tim, you, uh, you, you definitely, uh, go through it, and you will find some interesting ones. That's, that's a good one. I would have never even ever thought of, uh, that being, uh, you know, but if, yeah, but there's no, uh, no end zones, there's no out of bounds. So it probably goes on forever, too.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, it's an infinite end zone or infinite goal area.

Darin Hayes:
Very, very interesting. Really makes you think on that one. Uh, yeah.

Timothy Brown:
And again, I mean, there's the, you know, just the difference in the, you had the, the on-site punt, you know, you had the, the ball over, you know, without hash marks, the balls over near the sideline. There's no, no end zone. You know, it's just a lot of different rules, you know, in place.

Darin Hayes:
It's amazing how much the game has evolved, and I think we're probably all grateful for it, except for maybe the punters. Maybe they would still want the rule to be like you just described so they could have some extra protection.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, well, I'll do a little reading on the rule book tonight see if they have any any specific mentions barbed wire fences.

Darin Hayes:
Well, I wonder, I mean, I wonder if it would have, what would have happened? It's like some of the stadiums you described where the goal line was very close to the wall of possibly the stands. Yeah. Would the punter be able to stand in the stands if the snapper could get it up to where he was and kick from an elevated position or really? Yeah, presumably. Yeah.

Timothy Brown:
Um, you know, I mean, it's just like, you know, the one, you know, fumbles out of bounds, you know, they, the ball was not dead when it went out of bounds back then. So, you know, tumbling over water buckets, over cinder tracks, all that kind of stuff. And so, you know, and it was, you know, a little bit of the reason why they kept everybody seated along the sidelines was, I mean, it was by rule, they, you know, teams were limited to like two or three or five rules varied over the years, but you can only have a certain number of people standing along the sidelines. Everybody else had to be kneeling or seated. So, you know, that's why you see in the old photographs, everybody's sitting on the bench.

Darin Hayes:
Well, as a former sideline official, I'm so jealous of those times when everybody sat on a bench. It would have been lovely. Yeah. Wow. Well, great job, Tim, uh, you know, you have such interesting little pieces like that, uh, your tidbits on football archaeology .com. Why don't you tell the listeners a little bit about how they too can partake in, uh, enjoying, uh, football archaeology's, uh, information and content?

Timothy Brown:
Yep, so you just go to footballarcheology.com. I mean, obviously, you can just go there whenever you want, but if you want to subscribe, you can subscribe for free. That gives you access to about a third of the emails I send out; you'll get and get full access to the other article or to the article; the others, you can preview the article, and then it kind of cuts off on you. Then, the paid subscription is five bucks a month, and they're 50 bucks a year. You can do a seven-day trial for free, that kind of stuff. I also post on threads and Twitter. I'm not really active on threads; I just post there and then on Twitter, you know, a couple of times a week, I'm posting something in reaction to what somebody else has said and blah, blah, blah. So, you know, fun conversations occur out there on Twitter.

Darin Hayes:
His name is Timothy Brown:. Football archeology.com is his website. Tim, we really appreciate you joining us and telling us about this very interesting piece of football history, and love to do it again next week.

Timothy Brown:
Very good. Thank you.

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Timothy P. Brown of Football Archaeology visited us recently to tell the story of one of his recent Tidbits about paying players at the collegiate level a century before the NIL.

In the video, Tim discusses how college football players have been getting paid under the table for many years. He mentions that in 1929, the Carnegie Foundation issued a report criticizing the underground payment system, but it was largely ignored due to the Great Depression.

This video is a fascinating look at the history of paying college football players. It is clear that this is a complex issue with a long history and that there are many different opinions on the matter.

Transcribed conversation with Timothy Brown on Paid College Players over a century ago

Hello, my football friends! Welcome again to The Pig Pen, your portal to positive football history. It is Tuesday, and we are happy to say that Timothy P. Brown of FootballArcheology.com has joined us again to talk about another of his great tidbits. Tim, welcome back to The Pig Pen.

Darin, thank you. It was good to see you again, hear your voice, and have the opportunity to chat a little bit. Yeah, this is, you know, the football seasons are winding down in all leagues here.

This is this coming weekend. We have the Super Bowl coming up. You know, we're actually recording a couple of weeks ahead of time, but we know who the participants are. And, you know, it's not so good for your neck of the woods. You know, the Lions had a great season and just didn't work out their way at the end of the game of the NFC Championship.

Unfortunately, I grew up a Packers fan, and they bit us the week before, and then the Lions. So I don't know that I really care anymore about either team that's in there. Sometimes, that's what makes it fun.

If you have no vested interest in it, you just sit back and hope for good football and enjoy the athletes, some of the great things they do, and what happens. And, you know, you're not worried one way or the other if something bad happens. Yeah.

Yeah. My daughter, who grew up in Detroit
 but lives in San Francisco, kind of couldn't lose in that game. So, hopefully, she's got a continued rooting interest, but not for me.

Yeah. What are you going to do? Well, paying players—you know, these players in the NFL are getting paid quite a bit, and it sort of segues into what we're going to be talking about now. We know that college players are getting paid with the NIL contracts and everything, but you have a story in one of your tidbits from a little while back where you talk about some players getting paid in college almost a hundred years ago.

And maybe you'd like to discuss that with us today. Yeah. Well, you know, I think it, the idea of paying somebody to participate in sports, particularly at the college level, I mean, that's as old as people, you know, from the day that people said, hey, it's important for my college to be your college.

From that moment, they started finding ways to ensure that good athletes attended this school or that school. You know, and for a long time, it was an informal process. You know, there used to be a banker in town who would send, you know, pay for a kid to college.

And geez, if he happened to be a good athlete and went to Old State U, that was great. But, you know, they, you know, they're also like way back in the day, you know, top student-athletes often were like, they'd be like agents for cigar manufacturers or chewing gum manufacturer, you know, any, anything that was sold on campus. And then if they could influence people's buying behavior, you know, they got paid money, you know, for that kind of thing.

And there's a lot of that kind of stuff going on. And then, obviously, there were the easier no-show jobs that guys had. But so, I mean, there's always been kind of the under-the-table thing.

And then, in 1929, there was a big report. The Carnegie Foundation, you know, reported on college football, basically criticizing all of this underground payment, you know, system and, you know, having guys there who maybe weren't the greatest students, et cetera. And so the one, the funny thing about that, I mean, it was one of those things that kind of just ignored.

I mean, the Great Depression started shortly after they issued the report. So people kind of had, you know, bigger problems too, you know, to worry about. But there were, you know, a handful of people, professors, you know, folks directly involved in athletics who were kind of saying, we should pay these guys, you know, they should get a percentage of the gate or, you know, they should get, there was a guy at Missouri who said, you know, the players should get $2 per hour for practice.

Now, that doesn't sound like much, but it'd be the same as $36 an hour today, you know, beer money, you know, for a college athlete. And then there were a couple of student newspapers, Minnesota and UCLA, that came out saying, hey, you know, the football players in particular, they subsidize all other sports, which was true at most bigger schools at the time. And I've, you know, I've got documentation on that that I'll probably put out in another tidbit.

But so anyways, you know, and then others were just arguing like, you know, football in particular, and then later on basketball and baseball, they had, they were commercialized, you know, they were professionalized in every way other than paying the players. The coaches got big-time money, and people had to pay money to attend the games. And, you know, then they started selling video rights, and then they started selling TV rights.

So, you know, there were these pots and pots of money. So, if you look at a big-time college athletic program, that is a pro program. You know, it's run by professionals.

In some ways, it's run for professionals, right? And the only thing that wasn't professional about it was that the athletes didn't get paid. They got a scholarship, you know, at bigger schools, and then eventually they'd get some spending money and, you know, dah, dah, dah. But nothing like what their actual market, you know, power was.

And so now that this NIL is out there, you know, all of a sudden, guys are, you know, starting to make some pretty good money. Some guys are better off staying in college an extra year than signing some, you know, low-level rookie contracts. Now, then their pro contract, that clock starts, you know, doesn't start clicking or, you know, ticking for another year.

But, you know, somebody tells me I can make whatever, a million bucks through NIL, you know, versus, you know, whatever, you know, 800,000 or whatever the current rookie contract is worth, you know, you got to think about. So, it's just really, um, it's been a long time coming, right? And like myself, I don't necessarily like some of the things that are going to, the impact it will have on the game. But that's just selfishness, you know, whereas the kids deserve the money, you know, just like artists or, you know, musicians, or a kid who invents, you know, writes a piece of software or whatever, you know, TikTok sort of influencer, whatever, you know.

Anyway, it's one of those funny things. It's that conflict that has always existed, but now it's more or less out in the open.

So I think that's good. Yeah. Cause, uh, I mean, if it wasn't for the student-athletes, people wouldn't be paying to go watch an empty football field or basketball court or whatever event they're going to.

So yeah, those kids deserve it, and they work hard. And, uh, you know, I was kind of surprised though. You know, I knew when the NIL was coming out that, uh, you know, players were going to be getting paid, but I had no idea there was going to be as lucrative for, for some of these folks as it is in the, uh, I was astounded the LSU gymnast.

Uh, and I forget what her name is. She's on a couple of commercials now and is a social influencer. She's making millions, uh, just by her likeness and image.

So it's amazing. Yeah. And, you know, some people will get that money based on, frankly, what they look like, right?

Uh, others, you know, their personality, just their, you know, obviously she had to be smart enough to, I mean, she's a very attractive young lady. Still, you know, she figured out the game and, uh, was doing some, you know, you know, she, she's, you know, I mean, I've never watched herself, but I assume she's got to have a presence and delivery, whatever it is. Right. Um, she was so smart enough to take advantage of that and the situation she was in.

So yeah, more power to her. Yeah. He has a couple of extra bucks left over after buying the school books each semester.

That's for sure. Yeah. She didn't even have to sell her school books in the old days.

Great. Well, that's, I mean, that's interesting that it's been around that long that, uh, you know, the debate's been long for a hundred years now. So that's, uh, it's incredible.

That's why it's such a great read. And maybe you could share with the listeners how they, too, could partake in your tidbits. Yeah.

You can subscribe on Substack or visit footballarchaeology.com whenever you want. You can also follow me on Twitter, so whatever fits your fancy.

Well, Tim, we really appreciate you coming here and sharing another one of these great stories of football and aspects of football of, of old that, uh, you know, really have big meaning in today's college football world. And, uh, we appreciate you, and, uh, folks, make sure you check out FootballArchaeology.com. We have the links in the show notes to this tidbit, and it takes you into Tim's realm of FootballArchaeology.com, which you talked about. And Tim, we would love to talk to you again next week about another aspect of football.

Very good. Look forward to chatting again.

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The modern touchback rule in American football, where a ball fumbled out of the end zone results in possession for the receiving team at the 20-yard line, wasn't always the way it was. Its history reveals an interesting journey shaped by strategic considerations, safety concerns, and the ever-evolving nature of the game.

Timothy Brown of FootballArchaeology.com joins us to discuss this interesting but rare football event and its evolution in history.

Early Days and the Muffed Punt: In the early years of American football (late 19th century), recovering a fumble in the end zone, even if accidentally, awarded the recovering team a touchdown. This strategy, known as the "muffed punt," involved intentionally fumbling the ball just before crossing the goal line to score. It was a risky maneuver but potentially offered an advantage in scoring position.

Safety First: Introducing the Safety: Recognizing the dangers of this practice, a new rule was introduced in 1882, awarding the opposing team two points (later changed to one) for recovering a fumble in the end zone, effectively discouraging the "muffed punt" and prioritizing player safety.

Strategic Shifts and the Touchdown: However, the new rule also created a strategic conundrum. Teams facing fourth-and-long situations near their own end zone could intentionally fumble the ball out of bounds for a safety, essentially sacrificing two points to avoid a potential turnover and touchdown by the opponent. This led to the introduction of the "touchback" rule.

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For decades, player numbers on football helmets were as iconic as the sport itself. However, their use has steadily declined in recent years. Let's delve into the history of this practice and the few remaining teams that cling to it.

Football Archaeology's Timothy Brown joins us in telling the history of the headgear emblem and its importance in football history. Tim's original Tidbit article with great images can be found at The Rise and Fall of Helmet Numbers.

You Can also find the podcast version of the discussion

In the early days of football, jerseys did not have numbers on them. Numbers were introduced to help fans and media identify players on the field. In the 1950s, with the invention of television, conferences required teams to put numbers on jerseys or helmets to better identify viewers. Since then, helmet numbers have become less important because TV screens have increased, and logos have become more popular.

From Humble Beginnings to Widespread Adoptio

While seemingly a simple design element, helmet numbers in American football play a surprisingly multifaceted role. From aiding player identification to fostering team unity and even impacting strategy, these numerals hold significance beyond mere decoration.

Helmet numbers' most basic function is clearly identifying players on the field. With multiple players wearing similar uniforms, these numbers allow coaches, referees, and spectators to distinguish between teammates and opponents. This is crucial for officiating calls, play recognition, and overall game flow.

The early days of football helmets offered little protection, let alone space for numbers. As helmets evolved in the 1930s and 40s, teams experimented with various methods of putting numbers on the outside. By the 1950s, displaying player numbers on helmets' backs became common. It provided better visibility for referees and fans, aiding in player identification.

The Rise and Fall of a Tradition

Throughout the latter half of the 20th century, player numbers on helmets remained a staple. However, several factors contributed to their decline.

In conclusion, helmet numbers in American football transcend mere decoration. They serve vital functions in player identification, fostering team spirit, and even influencing strategic decisions. As the game continues to evolve, the role of helmet numbers might expand further, offering new avenues for player expression and strategic innovation.

Here is the transcription of our conversation on helmet numbers:

Darin Hayes
Welcome once again to the Pigpen, your portal to positive football history, and welcome to Tuesday. It's footballarchaeology.com's Timothy P. Brown day, and Tim has another one of his great tidbits. He was going to reveal some interesting history that maybe we don't remember or just have been forgotten. Tim, Welcome back to The Pigpen.

Timothy Brown
Yeah, thanks, Darin. This is a story about when somebody's number was up, right?

Darin Hayes
And somebody's number is up indeed. And up at the highest point, it can be worn, I would guess, because you titled this article a few not too long ago, The Rise and Fall of the Helmet Numbers, which is an interesting piece of history. So yeah, would you tell us a little bit about that story?

Timothy Brown
Yeah. So we've talked about this, you know, in the past about the elements of football that were there for the fan, as opposed to the players on the field or the coaches. And so the numbers that are on the backs and then later on fronts of jerseys were there for the fans, not because the players or the coaches wanted them, they were opposed to them in many cases. Still, they were for fans in the stands to figure out who is who and be able to attract, you know, who was Red Grange or whomever, right? So, similar changes were made when they were for the fans in the stands. Later, when the TV came along, they, you know, made one of the changes to use white jerseys for the road team in football, and then the home team would wear dark jerseys. Now, that wasn't so much for the players in the stand or the fans and the stands because they could tell a red jersey from a blue jersey. But they couldn't tell the difference on black and white television and small screens of the day. So that was the rationale for going to the road white and home dark jerseys. The other thing that happened at about that same time was that the NFL passed the Road Jersey rule in 1954; the NCAA didn't adopt it until 1983, after everybody did it. Really, yeah, that's just one of those, you know, just like they didn't, they didn't require face masks till 1993 or something like that. It was just one of those things everybody did, so they didn't need a rule until they finally put it in. But back in the mid-50s, from 53 to 54, the National Photographers Association represented photographers, and presumably, they were involved with TV cameramen and you folks like that. They requested schools and then conferences. They wanted them to put more numbers on uniforms to make it easier to identify who was who. So, you know, anybody who's actually watching this on YouTube, my background has a team from a 1910 era playing, and nobody's wearing jerseys or no one's wearing numbers, so it's hard to tell who's who. But even in the early 50s, you know, depending on how somebody is standing or getting tackled, you might not see the front or back of their jerseys well enough to see their numbers. And so they said, can you put more numbers on the jerseys and so or at least on uniforms? So in 1950, in 1955, Georgia Tech was the first team I identified with TV numbers on their uniform. What they did was they put numbers on the shoulder pads. On both shoulder pads, they've got numbers. A week later, West Virginia opened its season, and the team had numbers on its helmets. And so other teams put numbers on sleeves. But, you know, basically, what happened is, almost every conference required teams to put numbers, ideally on their helmets, but they would grandfather you, if you have had numbers on your shoulder pads or your sleeves, then you wouldn't have to put them on, on your helmet. And so from, you know, say 56 is when the conferences started implementing those rules from 56 till like the mid-sixties, if you look at photographs from those years, almost everybody has numbers, the side of their helmets, college teams and some of the proteins too, you, know that the old, uh, San Diego Chargers, AFL at the time, but they've got numbers and the lightning bolt on their helmets. So that, you know, that kind of thing was, was not an, you know, was fairly common.

Darin Hayes
It was shocking with that lightning bolt.

Timothy Brown
Ah, yes. Yes. That was pretty good. Only two dads could appreciate that joke. Yes, so I got a charge out of it. But so anyways, everybody starts putting these numbers on and but at this, you know, in the late 40s, you know, he had the Los Angeles Rams, you know, they painted the horns on their helmets, and so there was a slow shift to logos as you know rather than numbers and the helmets and so if you look at you, look college yearbooks or you know whatever during the 1960s, you start seeing more and more teams putting logos on their helmets. Another thing that happened in that area was that Wisconsin did it; I don't know what Vanderbilt did, but there are a couple of others. But in the 1960 time frame, several teams had logos, or they had numbers on the sides of their helmets, and then they would have the letter of the school, like Wisconsin W, Vanderbilt, had a V, seat on the front of the helmet, which was dumb looking, you know, it's a terrible look. You know? I mean, some people think it is cool, but I just think, yeah, kind of pig ugly. So, for a long time, it was like, why did they put these things on the front of their helmet? Well, because they had numbers on the sides. Right? Anyway, by the '60s, more and more teams were switching over to logos. And so a few, Alabama, put the numbers on the year before Bear got there. But then they've kept them all along. So for them, that's kind of a, you see that color, and you see the numbers on the side of the helmet, it's like, well, that's Bama,

Darin Hayes
right?

Timothy Brown
So it shouldn't be identifiable because they're more or less, you know, at least one of the few that does it, then it's tied to them. So anyway, it was kind of an interesting deal. Yeah.

Darin Hayes
Go ahead. If you had another point. Yeah,

Timothy Brown
I was just going to say, you know, that it wasn't logos, but I also think TV screens got bigger, so fans at home could see numbers better on slightly bigger screens. And so they just kind of like, we just don't need that anymore.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, now we can count nose hairs to identify the players.

Timothy Brown
Yeah. Yeah, that's amazing.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, have you ever thought about this? And I don't know why I think about this, but you know, especially in what seems like the 1970s, A lot of the college and pros teams had probably an inch and a half or one-inch high number on the back of their helmets. If they had a stripe down the middle, it'd be a number you; the number one digit would be on each side of the stripe. The only thing I can think of is maybe to identify the player if their helmets are on a sideline. Hey, I'm 22. I'll grab my helmet because it doesn't help anything for TV or during the game or anything like that. But that's the only thing I can think of. Do you have any other thoughts on that?

Timothy Brown
Well, sometimes there are shots from, and if there's a pile or even like in a huddle situation, you would see the numbers at the back of their helmet. So, yeah, it's not uncommon. You know the Giants, you wouldn't have the number on the front of their helmets. But it is the same situation as you described on either side of the middle or the center stripe. But, and I meant to say this early on, but originally, there were numbers, like in the 30s, see this fairly often, see numbers on people's helmets, on the back, but they don't correspond to their jersey number. So, they appear to just have been like an inventory number that the equipment manager would paint down there so that he'd make sure that you got 27 back from, you know, whoever wore that helmet. But then it also, I'm sure, part of the rationale is that it helps people identify their helmets, but I mean, I always knew which helmet was mine. And I think everybody else did. There's just something about whatever the scars were or your face mask. You know you just,

Darin Hayes
You kind of recognize your nasty mouthpiece stuck in it. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I don't want to pick up his helmet. I want that. Yeah. Very, very interesting. Again, you know another little aspect of football that we sometimes overlook, and we see Alabama play multiple times yearly. It's, you know, they're a popular draw to have on our televisions, but you never really think about, you know, why those numbers are on,. They did it, and they're cool because it is cool watching TV, and most of the time we had that sideline view And to know who number 17 is, you know, he's like quarterback especially the Alabama I think what they were like swapping quarterbacks a couple of years ago like one series would be one quarterback I think when Jalen hurts was there they did that, ya know and Uh, uh, Tua got hurt. They were bringing them in and out, you know, from each other. So, at least you knew who was taking the snap. Yeah.

Timothy Brown
And Bryant, when he was coaching, he was one of the guys; there weren't many teams that would do this, but if they played, say, Mississippi State, because their helmets at the time were they also had a maroon helmet. But when they played Mississippi State, Alabama would wear white helmets with the numbers on the side because he wanted the differentiation, especially for, you know, pass receivers. So I mean the original reason for painting helmets was to be able to identify I pass the receivers downfield. I mean, that happened in 1906, but. So, you know, back in the day, you'd see helmets were painted like the back of the helmet would be one color, the front of the helmet would be another. And it would only be the eligible receivers who had that. So anyway, there's some history behind Alabama's helmets, even if they look kind of plain. I mean, they've done, you know, they have done a little bit of their own thing.

Darin Hayes
They look quite lively compared to Penn State's helmets. But they're iconic—both helmets are iconic—and you can't picture that team wearing something else, you with any colors or logos on it. So yeah, very interesting.

Timothy Brown
I'm going to challenge Penn State. I'm going to tell them I'll donate half a billion dollars to them if they put logos on their helmets, and we'll see what they say.

Darin Hayes
Oh, I'm sure you'd put your football archaeology .com emblem on there if you want to. You donated that much to him, I am sure.

Timothy Brown
But I don't think you have to worry.

Darin Hayes
about that.

Timothy Brown
It just is it's a pittance.

Darin Hayes
Very interesting, Tim. I appreciate you sharing these little pieces of football history, these little nuggets, or tidbits, as you call them. And you have these on your website. You have almost a thousand of them, I believe you said. Maybe you could tell the listeners how they can share and take in some of this football history.

Timothy Brown
Yeah, just go to the website, football archaeology.com, and or Google it, and you'll find you find it. You can subscribe. You just submit your email. You subscribe for free. That gives you access to about a third of the content. Paid the subscription is five bucks a month or 50 bucks a year, and then that gives you access to everything that I publish, and I'll send you a copy of, you know, One of my books, and you get access to all the car archives and all that kind of stuff So, you're not just kind to the that's the deal. Whenever I publish a new story, I publish it or post it on threads and Twitter. So, if that works for you, then follow me on those.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, folks, it's a great deal. Like Tim said, if you subscribe, you even get a copy of one of his books, which is an excellent read to get some more information. So I highly recommend it, and I recommend you check with us each Tuesday because we get the benefit of having this gentleman join us to talk about some interesting football history. So Tim, we thank you for that, and we will talk to you again next Tuesday.

Timothy Brown
I thank you, sir. I look forward to it, and

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Imagine getting all of your equipment at the beginning of the long football season. Shoulder pads, pants and pads, and of course a helmet. You look and the head piece looks a bit funny... it has no chinstrap. This is how it was in one era of football, and FootballArchaeology.com's Timothy Brown explains.

From Tim's original TidBit article: Football Helmets Without Chin Straps .

Timothy Brown, who runs the website footballarchaeology.org. The two discuss how early football helmets did not have chin straps. Instead, they had laces in the back to tighten around the noggin. These devices were not very effective in keeping the helmet on the player's head.

A company called Goldsmith, which was a major sporting goods manufacturer at the time, tried to fix this problem by creating a helmet with an adjustable back. However, this design did not work well and was soon abandoned.

In the 1970s, helmets with inflatable bladders were introduced. These helmets were more effective in conforming to the player's head, but they were still not as safe as today's helmets with chin straps.

The video concludes by mentioning that Timothy Brown's website, footballarchaeology.com, has more information about the history of football equipment.

-Full Transcript of the Episode on Helmets Without Chinstraps

Darin Hayes:
Welcome to Tuesday. Timothy P. Brown of FootballArchaeology.com is here to tell us a little bit about one of his recent tidbits. Uh, Tim, welcome back to the pig pen.

Timothy Brown:
Darin, thank you. Oh, it was a pleasure to be here and join you as we talk about old stuff, old football stuff.

Darin Hayes:
Yeah, most definitely, you had a recent tidbit that really caught my eye when it came out. I actually reread it a few days ago because it's just so fascinating. It's called the football helmet without chin straps, And it's, you know, something kind of peculiar that when we think of the football helmet, the chin straps are almost like an automatic part Of it in our day and age, and so it's very interesting what you wrote about, and I'd love to hear about it here in the podcast.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah. Well, so, you know, it's one of those funny things. Yeah, sometimes I've wondered, you know, how the name came about, like chin strap? I mean, now, chin straps are covering the chin, right? And then they connect up to the helmet with the two points on either side, but back, you know, that's really a post-1940 kind of look. Before that, that headgear, the wrestling-type headgear, and then, after that, you know, what we think of as leather helmets. For a long time, the strap kind of went from the ears and then looped under the jaw, not over the chin. Right? So, but I think they, I think, I think chin straps originated, I believe, on military helmets, and you know, so a lot of times they had them in military hats. So a lot of times they had those little straps, like kind of on the chin, a little bit below the mouth, that kind of thing. That's probably where that where the term came from. But anyway, so, you know, they had those original straps that were kind of elastic or cloth, they weren't, and they could tighten them. But, you know, they certainly weren't as good about, you know, keeping the helmet on the head as today's, you know, two or four-point, you know, chin straps do. Plus, the helmets are just tighter. So, you know, if you've got a leather helmet, you know, it can only conform to the head so much, right? I mean, if it's a little bit bigger, you've got it, you know, just nobody's had it shaped the same way, or no two people's are shaped the same way. So, you know, there's probably some little extra space here, little extra space there, in any given leather helmet. And so, you know, they used to come off. And so, so Goldsmith was, which was, you know, one of the original manufacturers of baseballs. They started back in 1875, and they were a big sporting goods manufacturer, at least till 1940. That's the last catalog I have of theirs. So, I'm not sure exactly how much longer they lasted. But so Goldsmith was trying to fix this problem. How do we keep helmets on? Because these little chin straps don't always work. So what they did was they got rid of the chin strap, which seems kind of dumb. They could have kept him, but they tried to make the size of the helmet adjustable. So they did that by putting it together like a drawstring system at the back of the helmet. And if you think about it, like, you know, we've all seen movies of like a Victorian woman who's getting her corset, you know, adjusted where they're pulling those straps and they're, you know, making her stomach, you know, look or make it look like she's got an 18-inch waist, you know, that kind of thing. So I mean, they basically had a system like that, or at least functionally, that was what it was supposed to do supposed to tighten the base of the helmet around the head. And so, but, you know, the fact of the matter is, it didn't work very well.

Darin Hayes:
You probably needed help getting your helmet on and off every time, I would assume.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, you know, I hadn't even thought about that. Yeah, it could be that. Yeah, you had to, you know, so it's what's funny that you mentioned that it's like, you know, back at that time, players, the front of their football pants, also had those like leather patches, the thighs and well, probably typically twice on the thighs on each thigh. They basically had drawstrings to tighten the thigh or tighten the pants so that they didn't move all around, and then they'd get protected by the thigh pads or the pants. So, you know, they didn't have really good elastic back then. So it's a matter of, you know, pulling laces of one form or another to try to get things to fit. So, you know, somehow, you know, they tried to do that with the helmet. But, you know, it was they were gone from the catalogs in about a year or two. So it tells me the thing just didn't work. The concept made sense. And in fact, you know, in the 70s, when people started, like, I think it was, I believe it was right now that did it first, but you know, they had the bladder helmets, where you pump air into it, and it conforms to your head, whatever the shape of it may be, you know, so they were trying to do that same thing. They just didn't have the means to do it at the time. And so, you know, good idea, bad execution. And so then that just disappeared. But I, you know, I still haven't figured out why you would get rid of the chin strap. So, even if you have this other cool thing going on, why get rid of the chin strap? Because I've never read anything about people being bothered by it, you know, like the nose guards. Yeah, that was big, you know, everybody, nobody liked wearing the nose guard because they had difficulty breathing and that kind of stuff. But chin strap, you know,

Darin Hayes:
Yeah, I mean, it's a natural place to secure because you sort of got that hook shape under your chin. You know, it's a good anchor point to tie it down to your head and get a little tension on there. That's that's weird. Thank you.

Timothy Brown:
So sometimes, you know, some of the stories, I mean, again, I like the stories where, you know, as football evolved, there were all these dead-end paths, right? Just like in, you know, animal species, right? And, you know, so for some of them, the thinking behind the path made sense; they just didn't have the tools, technology, or the right materials to make it happen at the time.

Darin Hayes:
Yeah, you, uh, very, very interesting story, but just you describing the back of that helmet and the core whole corset idea, it took me back to some time playing like a junior high ball, you know, we got sort of leftover pants and one year I had drawstring pants for football where you had to tie them up. Like you tie your shoe. What a pain in the ass that was every, every day for practice for game day. It just, especially when you're like, you know, 11, 12 years old, you know, you don't want to take your time to snap pants even, let alone, you know, sit on time and take them up and, and if you didn't tighten them up, then you had, you know, your, your jock and everything else was, you know, flopping, falling all over the place. And it was just a bad, bad design. Whoever designed those pants. I didn't enjoy those.

Timothy Brown:
Yeah, well, and again, it's one of those things that, depending on your age, you may not have as much experience with. But, you know, back in the day, there were a lot of people on the football field with, you know, white athletic tape wrapped around their thighs or around their knees to keep things in place. Right. And so I, you know, I've spotted that kind of thing going on back to the 20s and 30s. So people, you know, even back then, they were tapping the same problem.

Darin Hayes:
Oh, I didn't. I never thought about that. Yeah, I guess I guess you wouldn't be able to do it, too. Then I'm always sitting, sort of thinking like athletic tape and duct tape. You know, the fabric tape is more of a modern invention, but I guess they would have had that back then.

Timothy Brown:
And they had, if you look at the old catalogs, I can't tell you it was the exact same kind of tape, but they had athletic tape and illustrations like Walter Camp, the football guides, they had illustrations of how to tape an ankle, that kind of stuff going back pretty far.

Darin Hayes:
So, yeah, very interesting. Thank God that they have the chin straps, but even with chin straps, and I don't know about you, but when I played early on, I don't even think I saw a four-point chin strap until maybe I was in high school or something, I think it was sort of a, you know, the late seventies type innovation, I think, or at least became popular at the levels I played at then. But you see so many people with the four-point head strap chin straps, and they still come, their helmets still come flying off, especially the NFL level and big-time big-time college; it's unbelievable that those can come off. Cause once you have those helmets on, if they're done rubbery, I mean, it's hard to unsnap them when you do want to take it off, let alone have it come flying off in the middle of the game.

Timothy Brown:
I hate to tell you this, but some of those guys are stronger than you and your buddies were.

Darin Hayes:
I realize I'm still a

Timothy Brown:
has a little bit more force. Yes.

Darin Hayes:
Still, that's a lot of stuff to pop a helmet on us. It's amazing, Tim. That is a great story and a great piece of football history that we, you know, seldom get to appreciate something like that and what the sort of forefathers of football had to go through to do that, and you talk a lot about this kind of items on your website football archaeology calm and want you to tell people a little bit about it and how they can enjoy footballarchaeology.com

Timothy Brown:
So it's footballarchaeology.com. It's a sub-stack website. So, if you're familiar with sub-stack, you can find me there. I also post on Twitter and on threads, but the site itself is a subscription site. If you subscribe for free, you get access now to about a third of the stuff, and with paid subscriptions, which are basically five bucks a month or $50 a year, you have full access to everything, including the archives. So, if that's what you're into, then subscribe away.

Darin Hayes:
Well, excellent job as always, Tim, and if folks, make sure you take advantage of what Tim's saying because there is really a plethora of information on football history. We get to talk a little bit about it, you know, each week, but Tim has so much more in there. I think, what did you say? Do you have over a thousand articles in there right now?

Timothy Brown:
Not quite a thousand, but it's getting close.

Darin Hayes:
Yeah, wow. That's uh, you know, four digits there, guys. That's, uh, that's some good stuff to look at football history from different angles. So Tim, we really appreciate you coming on, and we would love to talk to you about more great football history next week. Thank you

Timothy Brown:
Pretty good; look forward to it. Thanks, Darin.

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Intentional Grounding is not something you see every game, especially in the NFL, where once a QB leaves the pocket, the foul becomes non-existent. The history of the foul is almost as old as the forward pas itself, and our Guest Timothy Brown has written about this football no-no in a recent Tibit titled: How Intentional Grounding Came to Pass How Intentional Grounding Came to Pass

What is Intentional Grounding?

Intentional grounding is a penalty called against the offense when a passer throws a forward pass that meets these two criteria:

-Facing Imminent Loss of Yardage: The passer is facing pressure from the defense and is likely to lose significant yardage if he sacks the ball (takes a knee) or throws it away.

-No Realistic Chance of Completion: The pass is thrown towards an area of the field where there are no eligible receivers in the vicinity, or the receiver has little chance of catching the ball.

-Why is the Rule in Place?

The intentional grounding rule protects quarterbacks from unnecessary hits. Without this rule, quarterbacks under pressure might be more likely to force throws into tight coverage, risking interceptions and injuries.

-Exceptions:

There are a few exceptions to the intentional grounding rule:

-Spike: A quarterback can legally throw the ball directly into the ground to stop the clock (spike the ball) if he begins the throwing motion immediately after receiving the snap. Note this must be a hand to hand snap, as shotgun would make this be intentional grounding.

-Batted Ball: If a defender tips the ball at the line of scrimmage, it's not considered intentional grounding even if there's no receiver in the vicinity.

-NFL rules allow a QB to escape the pocket and void intentional grounding rules.

-Penalty:

The penalty for intentional grounding is a loss of yardage, typically 15 yards from where the passer released the pass. If the pass is intentionally grounding in the end zone, it results in a safety scoring two points for the defense.

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The tipped pass is an exciting play that we see often in the pass-happy offenses of modern times and the athletes on both sides of the ball downfield. The rules we know today concerning the play were very much different than they are today. The video covers the early history of tipped pass rules in American football.

Darin Hayes, is interviewing Timothy Brown from Football Archaeology. Besides the video we have the audio on our podcast too. Brown discusses a time in football history, from 1907 to 1911, when a tipped pass was considered a fumble. This means that if a pass was tipped by a player from either team, the ball was live and could be recovered by either team. This rule was implemented to increase player safety, as the forward pass was a new and dangerous play at the time. However, the rule was eventually changed because it led to too many scrambles for the ball, which could be dangerous for the players.

The video also discusses other interesting facts about the early days of the forward pass, such as how teams would sometimes try to create a circle of players around the receiver to protect him from being tackled.

Modern rules concerning a tipped pass go along these lines. A pass tipped by a defender can be caught by anyone on the field, including a previously ineligible offensive player. Only an eligible offensive player or any defender can legally bring a tipped pass by the offense.

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College football jerseys are more than just fabric; they symbolize school pride, individual achievement, and moments etched in memory. But did you know some jerseys transcend even that, becoming so iconic they're permanently retired, hanging, and preserved for all to honor, forever out of reach?

Join us in this visit with FootballArchaeology.com's Timothy Brown as we delve into the fascinating stories behind the first three college football jerseys ever retired, uncovering the legends who wore them, the moments they immortalized, and the legacy they left behind.

Prepare to be transported back to a time when gridiron giants walked the Earth, their jerseys becoming more than just numbers but testaments to their enduring impact on the game we love. Buckle up, college football fans, and let's embark on a journey through history, one retired jersey at a time!

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The huddle, a ubiquitous feature of modern football, serves a crucial purpose: concealing play calls from the opposing team. But its origin story is far from today's high-tech headsets and complex plays. It's a tale of innovation born from necessity, showcasing the ingenuity of American football players in the early days.

Historian Timothy Brown of Football Archaeology and his recent post Gather 'Round, Boys: A History of Huddling.

Who invented the concept? When was the first huddle and what was the purpose? These answers and more are converted in the lively discussion with Tim.

Here is the Transcript of our conversation on the origin and history of the huddle

Darin Hayes
Welcome once again to The Pig Pen, your portal to positive football history, and welcome to another date with footballarcheology.com's Timothy P. Brown. Tim, welcome back to The Pig Pen.

Timothy Brown
Hey, Darin, I look forward to chatting about huddling today.

Darin Hayes
Tim, you had a title out a little over a year ago called Gather Round Boys. One of your tidbits mentions a history of huddling. But we'd really like to hear the history of this application in football.

Timothy Brown
Yeah, you know, sometimes you look back, and I hadn't looked at this tidbit for a while. And I realized I liked this; it was one of my favorite tidbits. Part of it is that I like the stories where you figure out how something developed. And its function today is not what it served when it first came about. And so huddling is a classic example of that. The other is just that it was one of those tidbits where, while we can't get anybody to see the images that were in the tidbit or that are in the tidbit, I would encourage people to go out and take a look at it. Because, you know, it's just one where I found some great images of the different types of puddles. So, so huddling, you know, there's the first huddling that people have been able to identify was, you know, Gallaudet College in Washington, DC. It's a, you know, college for the people, you know, hearing, hearing impairments. And so, you know, they actually, they used to go up, you know, this is back in the time, the four teams huddled, they would come up to the line of scrimmage, and the quarterback or a captain, somebody on the team, would yell out signals. So, you know, you read all the time in the old newspapers about signals. And it was just, kind of like Audibles, but essentially, you know, what teams did is have a sequential list of numbers for all their plays. And, you know, whereas like, I know, you know, used to be like, if it ended in an even number, it was a play to the right, or if it was odd, it was a play to the left. And, you know, sometimes the first number told you, you know, a 42 meant that it was going to go to the left half back or the right half back or whatever, you know, different kinds of systems made sense. But early on, it was either just a random string of words or a sequence of numbers. So, if you were a player, you had to know what you did on an 83 because that's all you heard. Now, they would hide those numbers in the signaling'd like to do a string of four numbers. And one of them was a code saying the next number is the one that is the play. So anyway, that's kind of the way it worked. A couple of teams here and there huddled, but pretty much nobody huddled until Illinois, and Bob Zuppke changed that in 1921. And they began huddling. But back then, they didn't initially huddle. I mean, part of the purpose was, you know, Zuppke would claim part of it was to get everybody to settle down and be able to listen to the play. It was typically a quarterback then who would call the play. But it was mostly the advantage of huddling was, that was a period when, you know, you had the Minnesota shift, you had the Heisman shift, he had the Notre Dame shift. So teams would line up at the line, you know, one played in, they line up on the line of scrimmage. But often, they would line up in a, say, pre-lineup, like a traditional team. And then shift, there'd be a moment where they'd shift to unbalanced right or unbalanced left, whatever it was. And then they, you know, there wasn't. While the rule said everybody had to pause before starting the play, there was no length of time that they had to pause. So basically, teams would shift in, and boom, the ball would be snapped, and you'd catch the defense, you know, off guard. So Huddle, the Huddle did the same thing, they would call the play in the Huddle, you know, so let me go back, a team that was shifting would line up, call their play, and then at some point, they'd shift, and then execute the play. What huddling did was that they would call it play in the Huddle. And then everybody would quickly run the line of scrimmage, get lined up, and boom, the ball was snapped. So it had kind of the same advantage as that pre-snap shift. But it happened even faster, right? And you know, the defense couldn't react, you know, They couldn't shift anywhere near as quickly as the offense could line up. So that's when Huddling came about in 1921, and teams started applying it. A lot of people said we shouldn't have it; it delays the game, this, that, but ultimately, it proved effective. And so they started using it. And in about 26 or so, the implementer rule said you had to pause for at least one full second after the shift or after coming out of the Huddle. So then that kind of calmed things down a bit. But then, to me, one of the fun things and where these images come into play is that business that I could figure out. There were three or four different styles of huddling. So there were the first Huddles, almost all of what people called the closed, circular, ring, or oval Huddle. So that was where everybody formed the ring. Sometimes, the quarterback is kneeling down, kind of inside the ring. And the lineman tended to be in the front, closest to the, facing away from, but closest to the line of scrimmage; the ends were at either end of this little ring. And then the backs were on the other side facing towards the line. And so that was normal for a long time. That was the classic Huddle. Then people said, well, if we're going to do all this Huddling, we should devise a better way to Huddle. And so, as far as I can tell, Bucknell got it started in 33, but people like USC used it in World War II and da -da -da. And it was called either a V or a triangle Huddle. And so the way that worked was if you think of a V or a triangle, there's kind of like the fat end or the open end of a fat end of a triangle or open end of a V., And so what they do is it had the quarterback at the open end along with one other back. And then the rest of the folks would be in kind of in a V shape, typically facing toward the line of scrimmage with the quarterback on the back facing away from the line of scrimmage. And they could call the play. Most of the team could see the defense and what they were doing. And so that was kind of a cool way to do it. Then, the next one that came along, the late 40s, is the best I could tell. There's a guy named Tom Nugent who was a coach at VMI. Later, he became Lee Corso's coach in Miami. And so he had what was called either the open classroom or typewriter Huddle. And so that was one where, and it's very, teams still use this one, commonly today, quarterback faces away from the line of scrimmage. Sometimes, they turn it around, but he's facing away from the line of scrimmage. And then initially, they'd have the lineman facing the quarterback bent over, and then the backs and ends were facing towards the line of scrimmage standing up, right? That's where almost everybody stands now, but that's probably the most common Huddle today.

Darin Hayes
I see a lot of teams resurging. They're doing that, but the quarterback is standing behind the linemen who are facing the defense, which is kind of interesting—talking in the ear holes or something, I guess.

Timothy Brown
Yeah, in some way, it's always made more sense to have the quarterback facing the defense. He's the one who's calling the place, or he can potentially spot something. But, again, this all is based on the assumption that the quarterback is calling the place, as opposed to a coach on the sideline calling the place. And so all these huddling things were happening when quarterbacks called the place. And, you know, then those rules went away in the early 60s. So, coaching from the sideline, that whole thing disappeared in the early 60s. And so all of a sudden, some people like, you know, Sam, I believe it's white, or white, white, I don't even know how to pronounce his last name, white, white. So, you know, Bengals coach in the 80s. He's the guy who pioneered the no-huddle offense. It's just like, why do we have them huddle anymore? We'll just put them somewhere in the lawn of scrimmage and signal in the general formations that they can get the right spot, and then they can watch us watch our signal, the baseball-style signals from the sideline. And then they've used numbers, you know, all kinds of coaches assistance on the wrists and, you know, the different signage that teams hold up. So you got all that stuff going on, in terms of just ways to signal and plays, but it's a big difference from the days of quarterbacks calling the plays versus the coaches calling the place. So now, just one other thing that I just wanted to add that I mentioned in the tidbit, but I think this is going to make some of them are coaches listening to the podcast, some of them are going to be angered by what I'm about to say or just.

Darin Hayes
Wait a second. Is the coach getting angry?

Timothy Brown
Yeah.

Darin Hayes
This is the first I've heard of this.

Timothy Brown
Well, well, okay. And so one of the things that they used to get angry about, they used to spend all kinds of stupid practice time perfecting, was the Huddle. You know, coaches would go nuts about you having to stand up the right way or you have to snap out of the Huddle. I know, you know, at least in my high school conference, I remember there was a team that when they left the Huddle, the linemen so that they would huddle so like the correct tackle was on the left side of the Huddle and then he would lead people out and as the right card would be next to him. And then so they had this like chain thing where they came out in formation, and it was just a wasted damn time. And so coaches used to spend unnecessary time trying to get a nice neat huddle. It was like making sure your socks are pulled up or make, you know, whatever, you know, it's just like either you can either you make the play, or you don't, either you follow the play call, or you don't execute your assignment, or you don't, I don't care what you look like. Thankfully, like my high school coach was a guy who was, in many ways, a crusty old dude. But he was; he didn't care what color you were, what your background was, what you wore; he just either ran fast, you didn't jump far, or you didn't. And you either made the tackle, or you didn't. So he didn't, you know, concern himself much with what I consider the stupid stuff that many coaches hang on to.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, we, I had a coach; I think it must've been grade school. He was very anal. We were the old, you know, the quarterback would, he, after you get done calling a plate, say, you know, ready. And we'd all go break and have to clap, you know, and break the Huddle that way. And I think, which I think a lot of teams still do. And, uh, if we didn't all clap or he couldn't hear us, like if you're in practice, he stands behind the Huddle and doesn't hear you say break. Oh my God, you, it was an ass-chewing coming from probably some laps being run. So they're anal.

Timothy Brown
I mean, I get, you know, being anal, but that's just being anal about the wrong thing as far as I'm concerned, but

Darin Hayes
Especially when you're in the fourth quarter in a game in August, when it's like 85 degrees, and the last thing you want to do is be yelling, break, and clap, and you wish to, you know, try to get through the rest of this game. Cause you're, you're sweating bullets, and you know, you're tired.

Timothy Brown
Yeah, well, again, at least any negative comments about this will come to you, not because it's on your podcast, not because it's on my site.

Darin Hayes
That's true. So, you know, I've got a couple of interesting comments from some guests that I've had over the years, some claims, you know, you're talking, you know, 1921 with the, you know, this being formalized by Zupke, which is like a few years before Red Green Shop played with Illinois, interesting enough. But we have an author, Jennifer Taylor Hall, who wrote a book on Amos Alonzo's Stag, and she has some claims in her book that give credit to Stag possibly being one of the innovators of the Huddle, using it here and there, not as a formal, you know, every play type of thing. When I just heard recently we had an author, Sam Hatcher, who wrote the book Iceman's First Trophy; it was about the Cumberland Georgia Tech debacle, the 22 and 22 to nothing game, where the Cumberland players didn't want to go up to the line any faster than they had to, so they were sort of hanging back and, you know, catching their breath, licking their wounds, whatever you want to call it, before going up. So he gave some nods to that; I just wanted to mention some of those things, but, as I said, they were not formalized huddles like you're talking about that happened in the 20s.

Timothy Brown
You know, so this is like almost anything else. Amos Lanza Sttag was an absolute coaching pioneer and stud who invented many things. He also gets credit for about 75 things that he should have done. Right? I've done enough research on this stuff, and I'm confident that Subkey is the first one who used it regularly. I know there was a guy named Hargis. I think I have it. Well, anyway, he was a coach at Oregon State. He was a guy from Emporia or one of those schools in Kansas. He ended up at Oregon State in 1919. And, the evidence is he used a huddle in at least one game. There's something unique about about that. So yeah, there were some people who periodically or once or whatever used it, but in terms of using a systematic game after game, using play after play. As far as I know, no one has any evidence of anybody other than Zuppke being the first to do that. So if somebody else has more information, get a hold of me on football archaeology comm, and I will be happy to add a postscript.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, I wasn't saying they were arguing with what you're saying. I was just, cause the, the Huddle has had a bit of history, whether, you know, I, I don't have it confirmed or not, but I'm just saying they, they made mention of it in their writing. So it's just,

Timothy Brown
And yeah, there are all kinds of things like that, like who the first face mask was. What was the first face mask? Okay, define face mask, right? What is a face mask? What's the difference between the old nose guards, some of which became pretty huge, and a face mask, you know, or like, so what's a huddle? What does it mean to huddle? Right, so depending on how you define that, you might go, you know, in a different direction. I'm using huddling the way we use it today.

Darin Hayes
Call it calling the play. You have a gathering to call it the play. Here's what, yeah, okay. Well, very, very good, enjoyable as always, Tim. We appreciate it. No, you have a lot of fascinating tidbits and pieces of information that are Built on what we know of as football today and some of the elements of it in foot-on football archaeology. You could share with the listeners how they can find your site and what to expect.

Timothy Brown
Yeah, go to footballarchaeology .com. It's a Substack site or newsletter. You can go there any time you want. But also, you can subscribe. You'll get an email every time that I open or that I create a new story. There's a paid version. There's an unpaid version. You can also follow me on Twitter, threads, or the Substack app. And if you're somebody like this, you can follow them on the Substack app. And if you want to follow but have yet to get the emails, well, you'll get it that way by a Substack. So, whatever suits your fancy works for you.

Darin Hayes
All right, well, that's very good. As always, this is a fascinating topic, and we really appreciate you coming on here and sharing with us. We'd love to talk to you again next week.

Timothy Brown
Very good. I look forward to seeing you.

---

The brand of football played North of the border is closer to the original football formation than our American game. Rugby's very roots are still evident in the game, even in some of the scoring, such as the "single" or "rouge."

Timothy Brown of Football Archaeology joins us to explain the history and scoring of the Rouge and the two-point conversions of North American football. This discussion is based on Tim's post from over a year ago titled The Rouge and the Two Point Conversion.

A podcast version of our conversation can be found at Rouge and Two-Point Conversion History with Tim Brown

A Brief History of Canada's Unique Scoring Play

The Canadian Football League (CFL) is known for its exciting, fast-paced brand of football, featuring more expansive fields, three downs, and a unique scoring system. One element that sets the CFL apart is the "rouge," a single point awarded under specific circumstances. Here's a look at the history of this fascinating scoring play.

The exact origin of the Rouge remains a mystery. Theories suggest that in the early days of Canadian football (derived from rugby in the mid-1800s), a red flag might have been used to signal the awarding of a single point. Unfortunately, concrete evidence for this practice is scarce.

While the red flag may be a matter of speculation, the official definition of the Rouge in the CFL rulebook is clear. It is awarded when:

-The offensive team advances the ball into the opponent's end zone, either through a punt, a missed field goal attempt, or a kickoff that goes out of bounds in the end zone (without being returned by the receiving team).

-The receiving team does not attempt to recover the ball in the end zone.

The Rouge adds a strategic layer to the CFL game. Teams often employ intentional punts or "coffin corner" kicks to force a rouge if they believe a touchdown is unlikely. This can create exciting situations where the receiving team must weigh the risk of attempting a potentially game-changing return against the guaranteed single point awarded by a rouge.

Full Transcription of conversation with Timothy Brown

Darin Hayes
We have a great episode for you tonight. It's Tuesday and we have Timothy P. Brown of footballarcheology .com joining us to talk about another one of his tidbits on football history. Tim, welcome back to The Pig Pen.

Timothy Brown
Hey Darin, look forward to chatting once again about the Rouge or the single.

Darin Hayes
Rouge or a single! We have some Canadian football terms coming at us that many of us Americans are not as familiar with as the Rouge is in a single, and maybe you know some of that explanation will come in here with your article that you wrote a little over a year ago I believe Rouge and two-point conversion was the title of it and boy we'd love to hear your tale.

Timothy Brown
Yeah. So, uh, following up on what you just said, I would encourage people to watch Canadian football. Um, I mean, I think it's a really fun brand of football, very talented athletes. And I give in arguments with some Canadian folks online from time to time; they are not as good as the NFL players. That's all there is to it. But they're supremely talented, you know, athletes, they're really, they're really good. And it's just a fun, open game. It has played in an atmosphere that, to me, feels more like a college atmosphere than a pro atmosphere than an NFL atmosphere, which means I like it. So

Darin Hayes
It's fun, and you get to see a lot more. There are a lot of Americans at play; I think they're allowed to have, like, one -one-third of their team or something.

Timothy Brown
They have, kind of.

Darin Hayes
Go for it, but I know just from my area, you know, we had a couple of, uh, I think, uh, Trevor Harris is still quarterback, he, he quarterbacked at Edinburgh or my Alma mater, which was a few miles from here and Jovan Johnson is originally from Erie. I officiated when he played, and he was a cornerback for multiple teams up there and had a successful Canadian career. So that's a great game; it's wide-open, with three downs and a lot of passing. So it's, it's fun.

Timothy Brown
Well, so what's interesting is that you mentioned the Americans playing there, and it's the fact that I wrote this tidbit in reaction to a mistake made by an American player playing in Canada. So he's relatively, you know, a rookie, and relatively, you know, his early season game may have even been a preseason game. But so, you know, in Canadian football, when the ball, when a live ball goes into your end zone, that you know, the end zone or the end zone that you are defending, you have to get that ball out of there. Or else, the opposing team scores a point, which is kind of similar to safety. But Canadian football doesn't have a touchback. You know, they have safeties. However, what we would consider a touchback is the Rouge or the single; they get one point instead of two. And so it's kind of a, now, there are other rule changes that help that, you know, they've got the five-yard circle around somebody catching a punt. They also still have the return kick, which you don't see that often. But American football had the return kick until the mid-60s; at least colleges did. The return kick is any time a team gets possession of a ball; it could be from a fumble, it could be an intercepted pass, but most often, it came on a punt return. If you caught the punt, you could turn around and immediately kick the ball back to the team that punted it because it was all just a field possession kind of thing. And it was all a remnant of rugby. And so American football got rid of it because people stopped using it. But, you know, Canadian football hung on to it. So anyways, one way to get the ball out of the end zone is to boot, you know, pump it out. So anyways, so, again, the Rouge or single is scored when a live ball goes into the end zone, on a punt kickoff, field goal attempt, extra play attempt, and you know, you're responsible for getting it out of the end zone. If it goes into the end zone, it rolls out of the sideline, then the Rouge is automatic, or the single is automatic. But so it's really, I mean if you think about it at the core, it's a way to reward a team for gaining favorable field position. I mean, that's really what it's about.

Darin Hayes
Now, just to make this clear, this does not apply to a fumble recovery or an interception in the end zone, correct? Just the kicking game?

Timothy Brown
Uh, no, it's it's possible. I'm showing my ignorance, but no, I think anytime the ball enters the end zone.

Darin Hayes
OK, all right.

Timothy Brown
So yeah, so it's possible, and I could be wrong about that, but you know, that's.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, I'm not sure either.

Timothy Brown
As I've watched that, you know, sometimes somebody asked me a question like that about Canada. It's like, I'm not sure. I got to look it up. But so, so then let's switch to two-point conversion, which is why I'm trying to make a connection here that, like, you could add the Rouge to American football. And Americans would say, No, you can't add the Rouge. That's silly. Do you know why we would add the Rouge? We don't need it. But, you know, back in 1959, Fritz Kreisler was on, you know, he was a coach, and then he was AD at Michigan for years. He had been on the rules committee, you know, for at least 15 years by that time. He had been pushing for American football or for college football to add a two-point conversion because he thought the extra-point kick was just boring. He thought playing football was the most boring thing. So he was trying to end, you know, there were too many tie games back then he had he had it. So, you know, he thought it made sense to add the two-point conversion. Now, the two-point conversion actually originated in American football with six-man football. Because what? It was kind of the opposite. So, the two-point conversion is supposed to be a reward for doing it the hard way, right? So, supposedly, running or passing the ball into the end zone is harder than kicking. And so, in six-man football, it was the opposite. If you kicked it, you got two points. If you ran or passed it, you got one point because that was supposed to be harder. You know, you just had fewer players, less skilled players, you know, you had to have somebody who could snap the ball, somebody who could hold it, and somebody who could kick it. So I guess that's three things you need. So anyway, Chrysler finally convinced everybody to add the two-point conversion in 1958. And here's the crazy thing. This is how much football has changed, at least the kicking side of things. So, if you want, here's a quiz for you. In 1958, what percentage of kicked conversions were good? Or, you know, we're. Yeah, I'll just leave it at that.

Darin Hayes
So, so kicked conversion percentage, successful kicks in a college game in 58. I don't know. I'd say 50%.

Timothy Brown
Well, that's a pretty good guess, 48.6. So, what was the two-point conversion percentage?

Darin Hayes
Uh, I'm going to say maybe 25%.

Timothy Brown
51 .8. Really? Yeah, so teams were able to convert the two points at a higher rate than the kicked extra point.

Darin Hayes
Now, were they going from the three-yard line back then or from the two-yard line?

Timothy Brown
I'm not sure. I think it was the three.

Darin Hayes
Three, OK.

Timothy Brown
But what it really points to is how bad kicking was. I mean, I think in the late 50s, there were times, like in the entirety of college football, when there were less than 100 field goals made, at least among what we'd consider divisional on-team sound. I mean, mostly, they just didn't attempt to kick field goals very often because to kick a field goal, you needed a snapper, you needed a holder, and you needed a kicker. And all of them had to be on the field. This is before a lot of open substitution. So they had to all be on the field when you scored, with limited exceptions. And there were times when teams would substitute. But so teams just sucked at the extra point conversions. And at field goals, so they didn't try them very often. So anyway, it's just one of those things that now with specialist long snappers, and typically, it's the punter that is your holder nowadays. And you've got specialist kickers who are also soccer-style kickers, which very few were in 1958. The game is just the kicking game in particular. It's just changed so dramatically since then. So I don't know; it's just part of the reason I think the two-point conversion is great. In part, the Rouge is great because it forces coaches to make decisions. There's a strategic element to it. It's like pinch-hitting in baseball. There's an element of coaches having to make a choice. Then, the players have to be able to execute it. And so if you get the American rookie, he doesn't understand; he's got to get all out of the end zone. Then, the best lead coaching plan sometimes just doesn't work out.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, it's interesting that you say, you know, the specialist of the long snapper. I had a conversation; I had the honor of talking to Craig Colquitt. He was a punter for the Steelers in the late seventies and won a couple of Super Bowls with them. His two sons have both recently won Super Bowls in the NFL. And he was telling me we were talking, and he was, you know, he being the punter, he was first the holder for Roy Gerella and Matt Barr during those Steelers teams we played. And I asked him, I said, well, who's your long snapper then? And Mike Webster, you know, the Hall of Fame center who he was the long snapper and the center. And we forget, you know, that's not that long ago, you know, 40 years ago, that those guys were staying on the field and even doing special teams snapping the ball, whereas today, that's unheard of. I don't think there's any starting center that is the long snapper. And that's just odd how that's changed.

Timothy Brown
Yeah, well, I mean, and so it's even so when, you know, when I was in grad school, I had a chance to coach a couple of different colleges. And, and we didn't, you know, this is like, the early to mid-80s, we didn't have long snappers, you know, it wasn't an offensive tackle, or, you know, whoever it was, you know, sometimes you had a fullback who had learned to snap in high school. And so he was a snapper. It wasn't like, you know, you didn't have extra guys do that. Yeah. And so, you know, it's just one of those things.

Darin Hayes
But you would think today, I mean, there's a lot more shotgun and pistol formations where they're, they're long snapping on regular scrimmage plays. So these centers are used to putting everything back there.

Timothy Brown
It's a whole different thing. Tossing on a short snap on a shotgun versus a long snap. Long snap, both for a place kick or for punts especially. That's a whole different animal.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, that's a funny thing.

Timothy Brown
It's really a specialized technique, so I'm glad these guys make money doing it.

Darin Hayes
Yeah, that's for sure. They're making a lot of money doing it.

Timothy Brown
Yeah. Give me the NFL minimum salary any time you want. I'll take it.

Darin Hayes
Right? Yeah, I don't believe.

Timothy Brown
a

Darin Hayes
They don't let middle-aged men go into a fella and snappy specialist anymore. Tom Brady was pretty much that.

Timothy Brown
and NFL history.

Darin Hayes
right. Go back to what was the guy who wrote paper lions when he went back. He was a little younger than us, I think, when he did it. But George, that's a George pumpkin. Tim, you know, fascinating stuff, a very enjoyable, very interesting. And, you know, thank you for that explanation and give us a little look at Canadian football but also talking about the history of our game, which is always fascinating. And you do a lot of this in your tidbits and some of your other posts on your website. And if you can share with the listeners how they can take a look at your stuff and maybe, you know, subscribe to it and become a regular reader. We appreciate that.

Timothy Brown
As you know, my site is footballarchaeology.com. It's a Substack site. And so you can just go there and subscribe. If you subscribe, there are free and paid versions. You'll get an email every time I send out a new story. Alternatively, you can follow me on Substack app on threads or on Twitter. So on Twitter, I, you know, I post, you know, or respond to other people who are talking football. So there's some benefit to that, at least if you think I have anything to say. But, you know, I don't, yeah, that's it. I don't; everything I post is about football.

Darin Hayes
OK, well Tim, we really appreciate you coming on here and sharing this information and sharing the knowledge and preserving football history and we'd love to talk to you again next week.

Timothy Brown
All right. Very good. Look forward to it. Thanks.