Stuff That I Have Noticed #23 George Allen

With the National Football League season under weigh I think it appropriate to share some stories about one of my two celebrated football coaches, the late great George Allen. (The coach who followed Allen at Whittier College was Don Coryell of whose proclivity – with the San Diego Chargers – for the passing game was born the term “Air Coryell”. But this is about Coach Allen.)

In chapter two of Three Stages I reported how a former Whittier College football player introduced me to Coach George Allen who arranged for me to get an athletic grant.

My first year I was on the Freshman team and had only minimal contact with The Man. But…

Excerpt From Chapter 3 – I’m A Poet: Whittier (1953-1956)

“Sophomore year I was on the varsity football team and as third string fullback and linebacker, I got to be the blocking dummy for the first and second strings in practice. At least I proved that I wasn’t gutless by time and again being run over by a blocking back and a pulling guard in “live meat” practices. No matter how many times they knocked me on my ass I just kept coming back. And once in a while I fended them off and made the tackle.

“I have to tell you about George Allen. He was a fabulous coach and a great character. Have you ever had an experience where you wished that you’d written something down, sealed it in a dated envelope and opened it ten years later? After the first week of practice I believed Coach Allen was destined for the NFL. And he was funny. Built with a broad ass and narrow shoulders he was nicknamed by the players “The Green Arrow”. Even then (when players had to play both offense and defense) he was a fanatic about defense. The two seasons I played under the Arrow we lead the NCAA in interceptions. We had designed plays for returning interceptions and fumble recoveries. And drills: interception drills, fumble drills, all sorts of drills. He was writing a book on drills.

Author Ben Bryant’s Coach George Allen

“And he used us to try them out. So practice was never boring and routine. We laughed a lot.

“Allen was not afraid to try outrageous things. I had become fascinated by the girls’ modern dance class and would sneak into the gym to watch these fine young specimens in their leotards go through their provocative moves. When the teacher caught me she suggested that if I could get four more guys to join, the class would become coed. Once I described the class to my buddies I soon had six recruits, mostly football players. We wore tee shirts and shorts. No respectable football player would be caught dead in tights. (This was long before the days of Broadway Joe Namath.) The Arrow wandered in one day as we were warming up. He watched for a while and at practice that afternoon he introduced several of the dance moves to our warm-up calisthenics.

“Coach Allen was also a great motivator. We had awards for ‘Bonus Blocks’. If you made your assigned block then another that gave you one point. Backs got bonus points for being tackled when we didn’t have the ball. Defensive players got bonus points for tackles behind the opponents’ line of scrimmage. If you fumbled in a game or scrimmage you had to carry a football to classes and all the other players were supposed to try and knock it out of your hand at every opportunity. We didn’t fumble often. [And I never fumbled in a game.] … Suffice to say he was a great innovator and beloved coach.

“When [in my sophomore year] we played Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, I didn’t make the traveling squad so I drove to the game with two or three other guys. It was a rainy, cold night and a close game until the third quarter when we blocked an Arizona punt. The ball bounced into their end zone and we recovered for a touchdown. But wait! Two of the four officials said touchdown and two said touchback, our ball on the twenty. George Allen marched onto the field waving the official NCAA rule book. Twenty-three minutes later (the longest argument delay in NCAA history) we were awarded a touchdown and all hell broke loose. There was a near riot in the stands and we feared for our lives. Fortunately our rain parkas covered our Whittier jackets so we managed to survive. We won the game and later that night the parking lot at our motel, where the team was housed, was invaded by pickup trucks equipped with gun racks and bearing Arizona fans. The cops came and ran them off and we were very glad to depart, unscathed, early the next morning.” (End excerpt)

George Allen became celebrated years later in the NFL as an innovator but his avant-garde proclivities were apparent even in his college years. (See above dance warmups.) He was one of the first coaches to opt to kickoff rather than receive when his team won the opening coin toss. In his case it was not the desire to begin the second half with the ball but rather he knew that an offense was more likely to make mistakes in the nervous first minutes of a game.

If you watch football at any level – either in the stands or on TV – you can’t miss noticing the screaming of the quarterbacks. Often in post-game interviews they are so hoarse it’s painful to hear them try to talk. In the incredibly noisy environment of the gridiron the vocal power of the signal caller – or lack thereof –can be one of an offense’s most crucial weapons or weaknesses. If his teammates can’t hear and understand his calls the play is doomed to failure.
Since Whittier College in 1954 was populated by only about a thousand students, outstanding or unusual characteristics possessed by any of us were pretty universally known. Coach Allen was aware that his third string, sophomore fullback was becoming recognized for having a well trained and powerful voice.

Author Ben Bryant College Fullback

Thus he instructed me to teach his signal callers how to bellow in such a way as to maximize audibility while minimizing vocal strain. Once or twice a week, half an hour before practice, I’d meet with the guys who sometimes called the signals at the line of scrimmage. I coached them on proper breathing techniques and voice placement. They all became louder, crisper of delivery and less prone to loosing their voice by the fourth quarter.

After college I don’t think I saw another football game until 1966 when the Green Arrow became head coach of the LA Rams. I actually bought my first TV in New York so I could watch his games. I was torn when he moved to the Redskins in ’71 because by then I had become a New York (ecumenical in that I rooted for both the Jets and Giants) football fan.

That forgivable Redskins sin notwithstanding, I am proud to have been a George Allen football player.

The book Three Stages containing this excerpt can be found here.