Ever Been in a Huddle??

[RashanGary]

One of my biggest regrets in highschool was not playing football. I played backyard football my whole life growing up, but I was too busy smoking pot and skipping school to play football by the time I was in highschool.

[swede]

First play in 8th grade football, as a strapping 160 pounder, I lined up across from a kid from Einstein Jr. High that weighed 200 pounds. The rumour was that he hadn't been allowed to practice because he had hurt two teammates before the season started.

I was like "Well here we go. We get to play in a real football game".

He was like "I'm gonna break your frickin' raga maga zshigga higga HYUNGGH!"

He hit me so hard under my face mask that my chin snapped back and I received what I only later came to know as a stinger. I cared little that the 200 pounder was on top of my quarterback. I had my own issues.

Stinger is such an inadequate word to describe this injury. Your skull is basically thrown back at such an extreme angle that your neck vertbrae pinch your spinal cord. This creates a brief feeling of excruciating, electrical, flaming pain followed by numbness. In my case my arm hung limply at my side.

Picking my self up with some difficulty I started scuttling toward the sideline like Quasimodo. The coach screamed at me to get back on the field. Nobody does the vacant "huh?" better than me, but my coach was like blowing spittle as he screamed for me to return to the huddle.

Once in the huddle my quarterback directed me to keep my man out of his backfield.

"I can't feel my arm!"

"Use your other arm!"

On the next play I was not a better football player, but certainly a smarter football player, as I bravely dived at the ankles of my Brobdigagnian opponent and lay there quietly until the referees blew the injury time-out whistle.

The special ed kid on the team came and looked down at me as I lay on the ground with an ice pack under my neck. He had a charming speech articulation issue. "Shweed," he said, "You're letthing your man get by hyou!"

"I nearly had him the second time," I replied. "The chicken shit jumped over me!"

[GrnBay007]

Volleyball and Basketball

No audibles :P

[Guiness]

Played university ball. Offense ran the option, and we pitched to the HB maybe 80% of the time. Only wrinkle put in was that we had a really athletic guard who would sometimes pull instead of straight ahead blocking.

I played D, but got into the O huddle a couple of time during preaseason, as stand in WR. All that got said was - "HB strong side" or "HB weak side" and "Tom, seal that corner" if the guard was pulling. Then a couple words of encouragement..."everybody block hard!" Occasionally, a TE or WR would pipe in "look my way, would ya? There's nobody near me" which the QB would ignore, and call the option.

Because we exclusively ran the option, there was no traditional play calling, with alignment, hole assignment, etc. Never heard "I left 213" or anything. In the very rare case that the QB was considering a pass (2nd down and 15 was a running down! And there's only three downs in Canadian ball) he'd assign a receiver a route - "Ken, run a 3"

Oh ya, if the D went to 5 down linemen, we'd sometimes go to the Veer, which our FB loved, cause he could get the ball as the dive back.

Defensive 'huddles' were a little looser, because we had to watch the O to see if they were breaking up and heading to the line. Play calls were relayed from the sideline to either the Rover (FS) or MLB, whoever was captain of the D.

We rarely changed personel, running 4-4-4 (12 men on field in Canadian ball) only occasionally changing out a DL or LB for an extra DB. With the wider field, it's too easy to get gashed for 10 if you take a big man off the field.

Captain would remind of of down and tell us approx distance, and which side of the field was the strong side. Then he would bark out the play, which was divided three parts, one for each unit (in this order: DL, LB, DB). That was the order, because if the O broke before that was done, we broke and headed to the line. DB's played man on the corners, with safety help deep almost exclusively, so if they didn't get a call, that's what we did.

After the call, if the O was still in the huddle, the units would talk amongst themselves, especially the DL if they were given a 4 or 5 (slants).

[Bossman641]

I played 7th and 8th grade. I played cornerback and special teams. I wasn't the greatest but it was still fun to go out and hit people and just get the feeling of playing football.

[Kiwon]

"Have you ever been in a huddle?"

I was expecting a joke thread.

My mind must be in the gutter or something. Either that or this is what I have come to expect of the PR community.

[superfan]

Outstanding story, Swede. Thanks for sharing.

[Fred's Slacks]

I have one of the more diverse football experiences. In ninth grade, I played fullback and linebacker for our freshman and JV teams. Our high school had around 300 kids in it and we were one of the biggest in the area. To this day I think freshman football was the most fun. There is such a big gap in talent at that age that if you were good you could completely dominate a game. I remember games have 25+ tackles and 3+ touchdowns. Kick punt/kick returns for touchdowns were common.

As a sophmore and junior I had the oppurtunity to start on our varsity team at LB and at a wopping 165 lbs dripping wet I started at left guard (not a joke). We had very good running backs in the grade above me so the only way I could play offense on varsity was to play guard. I just wanted to play so I did.

On offense, the play call was just a formation, a number representing the position that was getting the ball, another number indicating the gap the ball was going to and then the blocking scheme. So "I right 33 trap" meant we were lining up in the I formation with the tight end to the right. The fullback (3) was getting the ball in the 3 whole and the guards and center were trap blocking.

On defense again it was simple, basically just announced the formation, followed by the coverage followed by any blitzes. Since I played MLB I got to call out the signals.

My senior year, my patience was rewarded by moving me to tailback (I still played linebacker). I responded by setting our school record by rushing for just under 1500 yards and returned 3 kicks for scores.

That got some schools interested but I was too small to be considered for any scholarships. So I went to a D3 school were I was red shirted my first year at RB then switched the following year to WR. My sophomore year was highlighted by a TD that sealed our conference championship. Unfortunately that was my only TD in my college career. I battled a hamstring injury that year and afterward I decided that I had a chance to be all american if I just concentrated on track. I haven't played football since. I never did get that all american honor in track despite spending all football season training but at least I know I did all I could.

In college we ran a version of the WCO. I believe it was simplified quite a bit. I really liked that offense and once you understood the concepts it was actually pretty easy to learn. You could run any play from any formation. The play call was a formation (represented by a color) then the protection (represented by a number) then any motion then the pass route. So "red right 22 zip sail" meant we were in red formation (split backs) with the TE to the right, 22 was the protection (not quite sure what that means and as a WR I didn't care), zip meant that the Z receiver was going in motion and sail meant you had a play side go, sail and flat route with a backside post.

We went undefeated that last season until we lost in the national playoffs. We had 2 guys go on to play in the NFL and one them still plays for the Lions. It was alot of fun.

Sorry for rambling so much but you got me thinking of some fun times. Hope that give you a little flavor of being in the huddle.

[Deputy Nutz]

I was always a bigger kid and played QB my freshman year, Thats right Tarlam I ran the huddle bitch!!!! Only problem is I would call the wrong play, or twisted the play and messed it all up on several occasions. My sophomore year I moved to running back, when I played on varsity I played defensive line, and halfway through my junior year our offensive line sucked so I moved to guard where I became an all-conference and all-county on a State Championship team.

[MJZiggy]

I was always a bigger kid and played QB my freshman year, Thats right Tarlam I ran the huddle bitch!!!! Only problem is I would call the wrong play, or twisted the play and messed it all up on several occasions. My sophomore year I moved to running back, when I played on varsity I played defensive line, and halfway through my junior year our offensive line sucked so I moved to guard where I became an all-conference and all-county on a State Championship team.

I can see that happening. All these stories are great because the most I've ever heard in the huddle is "ok, you go run over that way and then I'll throw you the ball and you catch it and run as fast as you can, ok?"

[superfan]

I was always a bigger kid and played QB my freshman year, Thats right Tarlam I ran the huddle bitch!!!! Only problem is I would call the wrong play, or twisted the play and messed it all up on several occasions. My sophomore year I moved to running back, when I played on varsity I played defensive line, and halfway through my junior year our offensive line sucked so I moved to guard where I became an all-conference and all-county on a State Championship team.

Cool - you were Jared Lorenzen.

[Deputy Nutz]

I was always a bigger kid and played QB my freshman year, Thats right Tarlam I ran the huddle bitch!!!! Only problem is I would call the wrong play, or twisted the play and messed it all up on several occasions. My sophomore year I moved to running back, when I played on varsity I played defensive line, and halfway through my junior year our offensive line sucked so I moved to guard where I became an all-conference and all-county on a State Championship team.

Cool - you were Jared Lorenzen.

I didn't get that fat until my mid twenties.

I played junior high ball and all these small little kids wanted to play QB, and the coaches let them even thought they couldn't throw, run or see over the line. I played QB in Juniors, and they made me play defense because everyone had to play and I was a starter on defense and to be fair to the shitty kids they had to have an opening somewhere else.

Now I ain't 6-4 or anything but damn it was depressing to see the 5-4 kid get ass raped on a football field.

[gex]

First play in 8th grade football, as a strapping 160 pounder, I lined up across from a kid from Einstein Jr. High that weighed 200 pounds. The rumour was that he hadn't been allowed to practice because he had hurt two teammates before the season started.

I was like "Well here we go. We get to play in a real football game".

He was like "I'm gonna break your frickin' raga maga zshigga higga HYUNGGH!"

He hit me so hard under my face mask that my chin snapped back and I received what I only later came to know as a stinger. I cared little that the 200 pounder was on top of my quarterback. I had my own issues.

Stinger is such an inadequate word to describe this injury. Your skull is basically thrown back at such an extreme angle that your neck vertbrae pinch your spinal cord. This creates a brief feeling of excruciating, electrical, flaming pain followed by numbness. In my case my arm hung limply at my side.

Picking my self up with some difficulty I started scuttling toward the sideline like Quasimodo. The coach screamed at me to get back on the field. Nobody does the vacant "huh?" better than me, but my coach was like blowing spittle as he screamed for me to return to the huddle.

Once in the huddle my quarterback directed me to keep my man out of his backfield.

"I can't feel my arm!"

"Use your other arm!"

On the next play I was not a better football player, but certainly a smarter football player, as I bravely dived at the ankles of my Brobdigagnian opponent and lay there quietly until the referees blew the injury time-out whistle.

The special ed kid on the team came and looked down at me as I lay on the ground with an ice pack under my neck. He had a charming speech articulation issue. "Shweed," he said, "You're letthing your man get by hyou!"

"I nearly had him the second time," I replied. "The chicken shit jumped over me!"

ROTFLOL! Man, that is funny

[Noodle]

Tar -- Don't lose any sleep over missing a huddle, you ain't missed much. Later in the game a lot of gasping and wheezing, sometimes some bitching, mostly direct and to-the-point play calling without all the rah rah crud you see in the movies.

I've played your game, and I played football up through high school, and I have to say your game is more fun. Better flow, more athletic, more creative, and the hitting is more honest. I ain't sayin you guys are choir boys, 'cause you're not, but it's more shoulder hitting and there ain't nearly as much leading with your friggin head.

[Carolina_Packer]

The title of the post struck me as funny. Made me think of a funny movie.



Captain Oveur: You ever been in a cockpit before?
Joey: No sir, I've never been up in a plane before.
Captain Oveur: You ever seen a grown man naked?