TWO
THE DAILY TAR HEEL
SATURDAY ...
f
E BIG-TIME BOYS
IT
i he
Ohio
brar.
birppy:
Win
w
1 1
- j
-J
Robert Shaplen
Sports Illustrated
.4 big-time football coach is' a lonely man. Just how lonely
these pressured men are tee never realized until reading this
article about Woody' 'JIayesy footbalV coach at Ohio State.
: Caught hi a system rhefe iduninq is the on! a virtue, Coach
Hayes must every Suturdcy;in the seasonneither icin a gaine or
be puslicd one step out of his job. ,
if he doesn't talk too much, a habit he's had considerable difficulty
controlling in the past (last winter at a Cleveland alumni meeting
he couldn't resist asking, "How many of you were here last
year?" and demanding a show of hands), the consensus is. that he
earned himself enough insurance in '54 to survive a likely so-so
'55 record. -
The Fickle Flatlands
should
As this article from Sports W is'tra(ed magazine says: "If h
ild fcjl 'tuo y'eczrs in a row to win " more games than h
le
ie
losesf he vill automatically be a flcp as a coach and a foolish
fellow to boot. That's' how it is in these fickle flatlands, and that's
ho-w it xcill be, tcith tlayes simply a Frankenstein of the system, until
football ceases to be a vast profit-making amusement enterprise
icith amateur dressing."
(Such is the picture at Ohio State, where they win gnmes.
We leave it to the reader's own campus observations to realize
what the situation is here, where xoe are losing games. For here,
top, there are lonely men who lack security, and pressures which
say; "Win or else." Editors.) '
EVERY SATURDAY AFTERNOON during the football season,
while a scarlet - jerjseyed quarterback iof Ohio State University
barks signals on the field, ;425?000j additional quarterbacks in
Columbus and another 8 million throughout the state are sure to
think, at some point during th game, that each of them could do a
better job. By Monday morning, the traditional time for quarter
back sniping, these millions of signal callers will have replayed
the game several times over in their own minds, and will then start
replaying it in'-grotips, Along about Wednesday or Thursday the
coming Saturday's game will come up for discussion, and all of Ohio
will decide in advance just how that one ought to be played.
To a . certain degree this sort of thing goes on all over the
country, but in Ohio foctball is super serious business. Few are the
games at Onto Stadium, rain or shine, that are not attended by
capacity crowds. 'of 82,000 screaming, back pounding, bottle-sipping,
t pigskin-pixilated customers. The rest of the quarterbacks in the
state those who couldn't get tickets do their second guessing on
radio or TV (a half dozen radio stations make sure the game
is brought into every home). And if OSU loses, the separate and
collective wratii of these millions of proprietary partisans wll be
leveled against t.e man behind the quarterback the Coach.
o
' Big Brother To AH
Big Broth rr to everybody when he's on top, but candidate of
cand:dates for th- salt m'nes when he's not, a head football coach
at OSU has been described as having next to the Presidency, the
toug'i s. job in the United States. Not only does he have to direct
tie fortunes if his 'squad, but he is at the constant beck and call
of all the quarterback organizations in Ohio, to whom he must
make full accountings. The Coach's postgame confessions of sins
are regularly delivered in a manner reminiscent of a defendant
at a Soviet triar,"I was wrong there?' he will say, hanging his head
abjectly. "I shouldn'ta done that." The fact he may have been
right, or that the point in question is at least debatable, makes
no difference. The boys in the back room want blood.
The man-on trial this week (for losing 20-14 to Duke) is oddly
woundup individual named Wayne Woodrow (Woody) Hayes, who
is both a charming and frightening product of what, in these years
of postwar prosperity, is more of a bountiful big business and a
mass hysteria than it ever was before. In many respects Hayes
is the perfect man for the job. Beyond replaying the game cozily
wjth the manifold quarterbacks in mufti, he is bumptiously tough
and is far from a hypocrite. Hayes is completely, in fact devastat
ing! aware that in the struggle for survival he must produce
a winning team or lose his $15,000-a-year position and, even more
important his prestige as big-time coach, which happens to
be W oody's total raison d'etre. . - . -.
"I love football," Hayes says, witfi his slight lisp and almost
with tears in his eyes. " I think it's the most wonderful game in
the world, and I despise to lose. I've hated to lose ever since I was
a kid and threw away the mallets when I lost at croquet "
This perhaps unadmirable trait has the unalterable approval
of every man Buckeye, but Hayes gets no points for mere enthusi
asm Each week of the season brings on-a public reincarnation
of himself, ,n the image of hero or villain. If, as usual, there are
nine games to the schedule, he-lives nine unpredictable, breath
taking spine-tinging lives. Depending on how much of a winning
edge he has at the end of November, the reincarnations can be ter
minated in one tremendous, popularly applied postseason kick-after-Iack-of-touchdowns
OUT!
,Sr,ufar' Ha- haS hun2 on but its been close. He is now in
his fifth season and until last year he was more often a bumbling
devil incarnate than a grid-iron Galahad. But in 1954 he dismayed '
his most ardent detractors by producing an unbeaten team of na-
trated fairer Mattys in. Ohio had to stay on the bench.
r.y the end of this season, Hayes may be in for fresh trouble. But
Mje -Bm'lp tjj'ar Heel
' ,r ; ; where it is. published
' J -. ""ty except Monday
,.y " V K and examination and
1, 1 " acat''fn periods and
y.. summer terms. Enter
i( Pd as second- class
matter in' the post of-
Hco in Chapel Hill, N.
, C. under the -Act of
n iarch 8, 1879. Sub-
i 'cription rates: mail-
"d. $4 per year, $2.50
f a semester; delivered.
(
Editors :
Managing Editor
Tiester.
LOUIS KRAAR, ED YODER
FRED POWLEDGE
In four and a half years at OSU, Hayes has won 28, lost 11 and
tied two. If he should fail two years in a row to win more games
than he loses, he will automatically be a 'flop as a coach and a
foolish fellow to boot. That's how it is in these fickle flatlands,
and that's how it will be, with Hayes simply a Frankenstein of
' the system, until football ceases to be a vast profit-making amuse
ment enterprise with amateur dressing.
There unquestionably is a great demand for this kind of game.
The demand isn't hard to diagnose. Ohio is a heavily populated state
,ibut, unlike New York or California, it has comparatively little
outlet for the hungry and abundant entertainment dollar. SincelOSU
now claims to have the biggest single campus enrollment in the
country, more than 21,000 students, it seems only natural to Ohioans
that it also ought to have the best football team, year in and year
out; that, in the immortal words of one college president, repeated
tongue-in-cheek by OSU's President Howard L. Bevis, "We should ,
have a university of which the football team can be proud." Not
only do the alumni demand perpetual gridiron greatness, but so
does everyone else, which is where things get blurred. When the
barber, the cab driver and the waitress all express themselves
firmly on the matter, they are doing more than getting a vicarious
thrill out of identifying themselves with the university they were
never able to attend. They are helping form what is obviously a
professional atmosphere and it is the atmosphere and the at
titudes that are important in which Dem Bucks (and dem
bucks) play a role highly similar in the mass mind to Dem Bums
in Brooklyn.
t4If football is a plaything for the community and nothing
more, if we can't prove that the program is three fourths educa
tion and one fourth circus, then we should cut it out," says Dick
Larkins, the university's personable and efficient athletic director.
"But we think we can steer the ship in such a way that we have
a fair measure of success and still uphold the best principles of
academic life." Somewhat defensively, Larkins adds: "I don't
know of any football player who doesn't go to class."
Jack Fullen, the alumni secretary, who is an outspoken oppon
ent of big-time football, turns the argument around. "The football
tail is wagging the college dog," he maintains.' "Larkins has to meet
an S800,000-a-year budget in the athletic department. If he doesn't
fill the stadium every Saturday, he won't be able to make ends meet.
Like Woody, Dick is a creature of the, system. Little by1 little his
ideals are disintegrating as he has to use football receipts to pay
off the bond issue on the new field house. We'll never be off the
hook until we stop worrying about attendance."
Since attendance depends on the quality of the football, both
Larkins and Hayes are staunch defenders of the recruiting methods
that each year bring two or three dozen of Ohio's best hjgh
school players to the university. Says Larkins: "If athletics are
forced, to pay the fr.eight for a program that ought to be defrayed
by the state, then you've got to produce a winning team for the
community as well as for the alumni." To which Hayes adds- "The
only way we can justify college football is to see that' the kids
get their due educationally, that
they g here and then stay
here." f
If a high school football star
does meet OSU's academic re
quirements, he can get himself a
state scholarship of a few hundred-dollars
a year and either
a part-time state office job, pay-.,
ing about $60 a month or a con
siderably better one working for
such wealthy alumni as John Gal
breath, the real estate man and
sportsman, or Leo Yassenoff , a
Columbus contractor.
Galbreath and Yassenoff arp
probably the two best-known
members of the Frontliners, an
organization comprising some
hundred . alumni in the .state
whose prime function it is. to recruit young high school stars.
Ironically, the Frontliners were organized eight years ago by
Fullen, who figured if he couldn't beat the system he'd string
along with it and at least "try to sell OSU to players instead
of trying to purchase them." - '
The fact that there have been abuses of tlie system of en- '
couraging and supporting players is essentially the public's fault,.
Fullen feels. Because football is a state-wide institution, with
everybody getting in on the act or wanting to, the opportunities
for evil begin back, in the lower echelons. "What we've got in
Ohio is the guaranteed annual B for high school football stars"
Fullen says. "Can he run, can he pass,' can he punt? that is the
question. If he can. the-wherewithal and the consciences can be
easily provided and appeased." " - ; v "
Fullen may exaggerate, but a. couple of recent, celebrated
cases would seem to prove his point, and perhaps as an axiom
that abuses are inevitable onee the coal (real toiirhrfnwnv 1
lished in the image-of a constantly victorious football machine. -The
first concerns a young man with the odd name of Hubert
Bobo, a handsome, Atlas-type fullback who came from the tou-S
, little town of Chauncey, Ohio. There, according to Fullen's re
search, he seldom went to classes more than three days a week
and was awarded his high school diploma by the school board over
the protests of the principal because Bobo promised to put Chaun
cey on the map. At OSU he was a terror, both on the field and off
, A tremendous blocker and an astonishing fast, helter-skelter run-n-r
for a big lad, he played a big role in OSU's great '54 recoYd tt .
also openlv boasted of having four tutors ("modern indoor record")
and he got involved in a paternity suit. Bobo finally flunked him
self out, and since he's turned down some-good Canadian pro and
southern college offers. Today he has a job and Haves, sore beset as
he. is would be delighted to welcome a reformed Bobo back to OSU
The other case has to do with Russ Bwrmaster. a voung end
.tnJrA n' Bnwnrmastef plaved fin. freshman football
at OSU laset year but then he too flunked ont. This past summer he
failed a make-up course, so he wasn't available this fall. While he
would hardly seem to be meeting the academic standards Dick
Larkms and Haves proclaim, Vatience is called for because a,
Woodv says, ..This kid,s a hplluva fQotball eause, a,
Bobo, Eowermaster is expected back when he finally catchy that
elusive academic pass. . 5 ina?
Ms ml
News Editor
JACKIE GOODMAN
Classes Too
Despite the Bobos and the Bowermaste
Night Editor For This Issue
tend classes,, and some of th
rs,manv gridmen do at-
J. A. C. DUNN
em, Hopalong Cassady included,, get
Vicf 4i "K'"uiii; i.assaay
.! LCr.,IM" .arer2Se marks-1" Particularly seeks
won't have to worry about
with sfrainhf.A - T"""" ftceKS quarterbacks
. . a- "'"w i,o ne ai ieast
their flunking out. "Woody is refreshing in his frankness," Fullen
adds, "but his conscience, like that of all the others involved in this
mess, is caught in the compulsions of survival. 'Don't give me any
of that character building business,' he's told me. 'I could build
all the characters in the world and lose enough games, and I'd be
out of here, but fast.' "
In recruiting, Hayes gets some help from his wife and some
from the frank expenditure of the approximately $4,000 a year he
earns doing a TV" stint in Columbus. The Hayeses often entertain
prospects in their home (Big Ten rules forbid coaches to recruit
outside). Once signed, a recruit can count oh some financial help
from Hayes if he is "in jieed." Woody insists that he never forks
up for a luxury anotfier narrow line - but it's certainly also
true that he makes sure he won't lose any valuable men by financial
default.
Hayes his all the respect in the world for the bona fide bird
- dogs in Ohio. His trouble springs from the fact that so many of
them turn into wolves. Actually, the wolves were prowling at his
doorstep the moment he talked himself into the job his best friends
warned him not to take. ,
He came into a climate that was anything hut congenial. A
powerful alumni faction had demanded the return of Paul Brown,
who had coached at OSU before going off to the Navy and subse
. ' quently a pro coach and if Brown wasn't available another big
time coach was wanted. Hayes, these alumni contended, was pretty
small potatoes when you looked at his record.
Who, indeed, was Hayes?
"
At least, he was. unadulterated Ohio. Born in Clifton in 1913,
he grew up in Newcomerstown, where his self-educated father was
superintendent of schools. Both his parents were adamant, as far
back as Woody can remember, about his getting a college education.
As a pair of husky country boys, Hayes and brother Ike were nat
urally interested. in more robust pursuits. Stemming from a line of
tough mountaineer fighters, they carried on the tradition. One even
ing Superintendent Hayes went out' to deliver a speech and found
himself in an empty meeting hall. He was told about "the big
fight" going on, and rushed over to discover that his competitibn
was his two sons, putting on a bout under assumed names.
Woody went to Denison University in Granville, where he mar
jored in English and History he was a top-grade history stu
dent and played varsity football as a tackle and varsity baseball
as an outfielder; After graduating from Denison, Hayes spent a
year as assistant football coach at Mingo Junction High School and
then took a similar job at New
Philadelphia. - The head , 'coach
there was John Brickels, whom
Hayes credits with teaching him
more than anyone else about the
game.
"Woody was always subject to
temperamental outbursts," Bric
kels recalls. "Maybe it's because
he was smart, quick and a per
fectionist. I'd let him know what
I wanted done and he'd do it,
pronto. He lacked patience. I
tried to tell him that when he
corrected a kid he shouldn't
make an enemy of the boy, but
Woody had a hard time controll
ing himself and he drove the
kids too hard. He'd swear a lot,
and I also told him h wac tu
last guy who should, that it didm fit hjs personality, what with
that little lisp of his. He kept improving, though, and when I left
I recommended him for the top job."
t- T,Ugh 1938 3nd 1939 Hayes won 18' lost one and tied one at
Philadelphia. In 1940 he won only once though, and got into
trouble with the superintendent over his harsh methods. At the
end of the1 season he went into the Navy.
During the war Hayes commanded a patrol chaser and a des
troyer escort. When he was discharged, as a lieutenant commander,
he got the football coaching job at his alma mater, Denison, and
after a poor first season his teams won 19 games in a row over
two years.
Hayes still had his troubles though. His nerves were strung
tant r.vb',11 n mre than 0ne -asion WVS
tant coach, Rix Yard, and his close friend, Mike Gregory, a local
l:?md:nThiVp 10 int6rVene " intai onbetween
17ve SeCTet f.hiS SUCCeSS has always been tha e sticks to what
'football 'One f S T Wf0ng- He StPPed tHinkin2
mIn I aftfn he caught me reading. "What the hell d'you
mean, reading a book during football season?' he shouted."
where ITt 11 yeS n tG Miami Univeity in Oxford, Ohio,
where, he won five and lost four. "Woody will have trouble in his
irst year wherever he goes," his friends say. "It takes time o gel
lird hlS.wAys" The ne saso seemed to prove the
Zuu' c , C18m 0ut of n,ne and climaxed the
with a Salad Bowl vietory over Arizona State.
season
' As far back as Denison, Hayes had his cap set on OSU "In 1951
when, the job was -open, I spent an hour and a half trying to dis-
h? T,lf '?g him abUt the W0lve'" Mik Gregory says 4ut
he wouldn't listen. It was a challenge."
After 71 days of deliberation, the OSU trustees were won over
byIIayes's oratory (later Hayes said: "Before I went to Zl them
I didn't think I had a chance, but after talking to them for thre
hours I knew I had the job").
He started building up public confidence in himself at once
"We may not win'em all, but we'll show you the fight team
you ve ever seen," he said in the first of many speeches "fpromLe
you we'll never be outconditioned." promise
VioW To Be Siire
ditinL1 W3f. an understament. Hayes's obsession for r
anion and discinline a mntt r..,; t.: .
on-
he continued ,o treat the Frontier a ,hVoe J, Z2 V? ?
gloves (more than one subdtied wolf was htard to mu ,ur 4f he
can coach like he can talk, maybe he will be our man") he L
h.s squad mercilessly. The players came to ha him drVe
. - -v,w.c giiiuiiicKs was gassers
session. "The fellows don't thin t .u , X . ir
Wnnrir ini - . V 11,uvu ul aii running
.7.' .rn e or. me downtown alumni ,thr;A u".
way
six or
ing practice
they'll .thank me for it once the
one hot afternoon, U
frorti heat exhaustion.
seaenn ctoWr. tv..: - ...
oneho, afternoon, far from 7 .1"'
puve 2?L r?"il!Jh!m d. Hayes was talking his
: ict-uru ior meetings," Tackle
Dick Logan
said later. "We had meetings about meeting
in a meeting we were out running some V t
running, we had a meeting about that too'"
The bitter feeling between Hayes and b'
an impasse that they locked him out of the -the
Illinois game, then went out and played'V!!",'
0-0 tie. Another tie, four victories and three 1 '
jv,mjuii vy -- -uiujv,iijiuii uoi uav.iv iOriV
winger, having been awkwardly switched to t '
said: "He had me so fouled up I didn't know
passed, he jerked me out and said run. If i r-J""'
said pass. You couldn't call the right play,"
added: "I'd rather be playing jayvee ball', li-r
with 82,000 fans screaming at you while vrT
rtnu me jduii nidyei raining ana ravmi
off it?"
After archrival Michigan clipped the -
xu'jujr uaiiueis wei e xiying over LOlumbus
of the wolf pack were talking about raisin r
Hayes's contract. One wolf kept calling the It'.. "
every day. Mrs. .Hayes would answer the phone' -;
say goodby," he'd say. "We're not going anvU
"Oh, yes, you are," the wolf would persist.
The next season didn't start off m,i,
"uu Ut:!)!
room between the halves of one game, a haUa
a sock at Hayes, missed him and crashed y-'i
.. .. . . . . i .
locxer. Mayoe it was tnen that Hayes began b r
any rate, he calmed "down. Wins over Ulinr ,a
end of the season saved his job, giving him a tpc
three losses.
But in '53 the clock was set back pvpn tv
record was the same. The team suffered from
that drives Hayes out of his mind ("It's just p -he
insists. "It's antisocial"). One practice en1
disastrous. Freshmen Fullback Eon Vicie had y -gains
through the varsitv line. As hp rinn ' T
, . - "rl'i-J (jii
vicious tacicie made him drop the ball.
In front of Larkins and several businessmen v
De watching, Hayes blew his top. "Get out of l
stormed. "We don't -stand for fumbling on our ie-
stay out until you learn how to hold the ball." Vict
mer a reply but Hayes raged on and finally res
tore off his helmet and tossed it in Hayes's direct:"'-
for the sidelines. Later Hayes saw him stretched en :
- uv.u.n.. uii "i-", nwiL, ne veiled. ,r
lie down? Vicic was ready to quit OSU that niih:
Coach Ernie Godfrey, who tries to maintain a h -
1 . w v umm. umi ut ma icunuus raa;o is.z
intervened. Vide
patched up. Tod:;,
best fullback.
At the pnd r,f :
Michigan 20-0. ($
erably and it 1.
was through. E.:
others rallied ri V
T - t. : , ... -i .
3l(U ICU iVUUi V
by talking to h:
uncle about terr.;.:
sideline gymnastics
punts and passes
and bv arran'ir? '
one of thp fin?;:
,i.
cuacnes in ine co
to OSU (he had t:
7 ' J 1947 to 1950 b:t
Minnesota with Wes Fesler, Woody's predecessor).
Fdr the first time in his lif" tthvpc hc-tn ritp
not only to Clark but also to othe rs nn his staff. With
' auijiii ilia 1UUK. i i . l .
a big-time coach, so I naturally grew accustomed ;;
thing myself," he says. "It's taken me a long t ne
I've still got a long way to go. But I'm geting there
As an offensive specialist in a rushing game ht
ground plays Hayes's delegation of authority to d :'
o vot-cLioi xiiipuxiani. ine uilierence in teenrnqut
to the naked eye in "54, as it has been this season'
for CaSSadv. whn ic .-. n n rvf tTo.rnt.'c -4r, rxm i ir' v -.-
r wv- vj. liaj CO O O I i Ui.V L a ... . -
not onlv deDth hut rnn
star in anyone's book, calls Hayes "tne best coach ir
but there are few others on the squad who would : -
a par with Bud Wilkinson of Oklahoma or Ivy W;i:
consin as a player's pal.
Hayes is still critized for working his men tot
loss td Stanford, in the second game of this seasons
tO flVPrWfirV ?nd ikr. onlf ,..T.j i l . .-
ducts far too manv meptin nr ton,?c tn ivf h;
uitu iv uv.i J iv i
blackboard. "He underestimates the intelligence of
one. his intensity doesn't allow him to get a go,:
problem."
ins dedication to football to the exclusiun ci -has
made Hayes a lonely man. He has no more ti n
"itiiua iu ne aoesn.t see tnem very oi'tn -contradictions
that he can charm an audience at a
a bad social mixer. "He hasn't got time for both i"
ball," says one of those who knows him well. -But i:
friend, he'll do anything for you, and so will you f - '
Hayes's wife is a football widow he calls h- '
"blocking back" and his son Steve, now 11. h virtu:
Away all day during preseason practice session
into the dorms with his players Hayes will s?cr.i
night during the season in his office, study in;
day's game. On Sunday, with the whole coach:".-
meres a re-run of the movies, and Mondav starts
grind.
v .
v With his fat season behind him, Haves is 3 r:
today even though the wolves are still" around sr.. ;
pulsions remain. But instead of being defensive, V.V-"-is
more like an absent-minded professor.
When a visitor spoke with him two week- sP-:;
a fine mood. He had just come from a luncheon
Club, another of the countless guarterback grn n
for President Eisenhower's quick recovery were '"V:
ers for an OSU victory the next dav over Illinois I:
Hayes had already decided that his team was fit
it proved to be the next afternoon. Strolling to 1
he stripped down to his shorts and undershirt, t-:k'"
Suddenly he stopped and, with a sheepish P "- '
head. "What the hell am I getting undressed for?" ht '
no practice today."
(Reprinted with permission.)
n
v.