Tonopah daily bonanza. [volume] (Tonopah, Nev.) 1906-1929, 1907-10-13
FORWARD PASS IS
IMPROVING GAME
IMPROVING THE GAME.
PLAY WAS SCOFFED AT BIZ FOOT
BALL COACHES WHEN FIRST
ANNOUNCED.

football season will eclipse all its
predecessors in general interest and
the quality of the game played. Last
fall there was not a little adverse
criticism made of the game because
of the radical changes made by the
rules committee. The criticism was
not confined to the outside public,
but was INDUCED in generally by the
PLAYERS and coaches. Principal fault
was found with the forward pass, the
biggest innovation ever made in the
game. So disguised were many of
the coaches with this play, which
satisfactory from every standpoint,
that not few of them abandoned it,
temporarily, In mid-season. But the
success achieved at Yale and Prince
ton won friends everywhere, and it
was speedily reinstated, and before
the end of the season it was consid-
cred the most spectacular play of the
game.
This fall the forward pass is going
to be a feature of the game. The
coaches are training their candidates
to use it in the preliminary work,
thereby admitting it's mastery to be
as important as the rudiments of the
game. The general public is expect
ing great things from the coming sea-
son, and there is certain to be rec
ord breaking attendance at all the
big games.
With the development of the for
ward pass coaches are sure to spend
more attention than heretofore to the
kicking game. There were not a few
games last fall which were won
Solely through the ability of one man
to kick goals from the field. One of
the most notable examples of this
was the Pennsylvania-Swarth
game, which the latter team won by
4 to 0. Swarthmore was actually
outplayed in straight football, but be-
cause of the ability of her quarter
back to drop-kick, won the game
when a tumble punt put the ball
within scoring distance.
This year there is certain to be a
greater premium than ever placed on
the kicking game. Any coach who
has a proper appreciation of the val
lie of a good kicker will see that
there is one such man on the team,
no matter what his other defects are
Although the consent of all the
big colleges of the east has not yet
been secured to permit the central
board of officials to name the men
to ofiiciate at their football games, a
big step in this direction was taken
when some twenty-one institutions
held a meeting in New York with
CHS committee. and preliminary
steps We're taken to this end. 1t re-
mains to be seen how far the big UNI
iversities will be willing to trust the
committee in the selection of officials
for their championship games. If
Harvard. Yale and Princeton should
reverse themselves and permit the
committee to name their officials for
their big games, as Cornell and Mich
igan did last fall and will do again
this year there would be a great I'M
provement in the ethics of college
sport
Football candidates at the various
colleges. big and little, are appearing
in goodly quantities for practice
Varsity football squads are necessar-
lily not so large as they were up to
the beginning of last season, when
freshmen were barred from varsity
competition, but proportionately they
are larger than heretofore. And
therein lies significant state of az
fairs. At Harvard, Yale. Princeton
Carlisle, Brown and elsewhere the
readiness of candidates of all grades
of ability to respond to the call of the
pigskin indicates more enthusiasm
on the part of collegians for the game
itself than under the old rules. In
short, under the revised rules, they
would rather play the game. The
new game makes more men want tt
gettin it. Up at New Haven, for in
stance, the fact that candidates re
porting before college opens have hat
to pay their own expenses did MOI
prevent large number OF men from
being on hand for the first week O
practice. At Princeton the field |!
fairly covered with men.
There will be more candidates OF
the field when all the college term!
have begun and more when severa
, varsity probabilities have passed OF
conditions. Harvard, Yale, Prince
ton and Pennsylvania have been mor'
or less afflicted by the action of sterl
faculties in decreeing that those mel
who are behind in scholarship shall
not Dlay until they demonstrate tina