The Detroit times., 1913-02-20
NUMBERING THE
FOOTBALL MEN
HAS DEMERITS
Gives Hostile Scouts an Advan-
tage in Doping Out The
Formations
MUST BE TRIED BY ALL
THE TEAMS OR BY NONE
Eastern Universities May Use
. 1t to Better Advantage
Than Western

F.
Chances of western colleges avail
ing themselves OF the privilege Of
numbering their players NEXT football
season are remote according 70 those
closely In touch with AFFAIRS In the
big Nine"
The rule recently adopted at the
meeting OF the committee In New
York making IL optional with the
schools whether to number players Ii
not expected TO ind great favor Ia
the west, although IL is said many OF
the big eastern schools are going to-
try out the plan. The only reason
that any OF the big Nine" schools
might avail themselves OF the oppor-
tunity Is the passage of rule by the
conference committee making Il COM
pulsory upon Its members.
| Coach A.. "A. Stagg. OF the Uniyer-
sity or Chicago. was the originator or
the idea, bringing it before the i. g.
A. A. three years ago, when the ire
| formed rules were being tried out.
At that time Stage advocated having
numbers on the chest and back or
each playeAin order that spectators
I luiSnt 1itiC ICauliy Toll WMlIM MSM
were carrying the ball. Although the
scheme was considered. II never was
adopted us a rule and the following
season none OF the schools had the
temerlty 70 adopt Il OF their own
volition.
CS1cl: Stagg last fall eSpyessed
himself still in favor OF tne. sehespeI
and Ih1Uunted the objections whiciI'
made a impossible for Chicago to.
make The break" In adopting 1t.
"A he trouble is that IL one school
adopts the scheme, that school will be
! placed at a disadvantage he de-
clared. 1T might be feasible In the
east where conditions are different.
but doubt If 1t would prove so In,
the west. II adopted at ali, 1t will
, have to come as the result of a rule
making II compulsory upon all mem
I bers o. the big Nine"
Our system of scouting is what
makes IL impracticable in the west.
IL is customary for teams to send one
! or two graduate players or coaches
TO games in which future opponents
/ are working in hopes OF discovering
something about their formations.
While 1t would seem equally easy to
get these formations as easily with
unnumbered players as with nums
bered mel, this Is not the case.
"Oftentimes with the quick shifts,
such as marked the play Of Mime
sofa, wisconsin and other big west
ern teamg' in the last couple OF years,
liz was almost Impossible TO tell which
man received the bah and this made
it correspondingly difficult to build
defense for the formations.
IF all schools were obliged to
adopt the numbering system, Al would
put them on an equal plane Of ad-
vantage or disadvantage and the OBJ
iections [ have alluded to would be
swept away. would Like to- see tbs
, rule adopted. for ] feel we owe IL TO
the public to let them in on as much
football as we can. The frequent
changes I'm rules have made II diff
cult for spectators to follow the game
and If such a simple thing as mum
bering players would help them, am
heartily in favor OF the rule"
Eastern schools might easily
adopt the numbering system with less
; danger than the western, declared
local football man today. The big
eastern schools rely upon rudimen-
tary football until the last couple OF
games of the season, and singing OUT
the individuals In practice games
would do little harm. With -
longer training season. eastern
schools are able to devote months to
rudiments where western colleges are
limited to week or two at the most
Even the schools which play what
is known as formation footbalr sci.
dom use their best formations until
the end of the season and II then Is
&C. late for opponents TO build impreg-
nable Gefenses for the plays. As an
instance OF this. take the Yale team
OF 1911 which kept the famous Min
nesota shift" on which the men had
been working in practice for a month
in the background until the Princeton
game and was enabled TO tie the Tt
gers and Harvard. admittedly -
stronger teams merely becG-se th~'s
opponents had no tr@-"sr N--.
strong play.r
II