Billy Bull

One of the truly great bacon-getters of the past is Yale’s Billy Bull.  Football history is full of his exploits when he played on the Yale team in ’85, ’86, ’87 and ’88.  Old-time players can sit up all night telling stories of the games in which he scored for Yale.  His kicking proved a winning card and in happy recollection the old-timers tell of Bull, the hero of many a game, being carried off the field on the shoulders of an admiring crowd of Yale men after a big victory.

“In the course of my years at Yale, six big games were played,” says Bull, “four with Princeton and two with Harvard.  I was fortunate in being able to go through all of them, sustaining no injury whatsoever, except in the last game with Princeton.  In this game, Channing came through to me in the fullback position and in tackling him I received a scalp wound which did not, however, necessitate my removal from the game.

“Of the six games played, only one was lost, and that was the Lamar game in the fall of ’85.  In the five games won I was the regular kicker in the last three, and, in two of these, kicking proved to be the deciding factor.  Thus in ’87—­Yale 17, Harvard 8—­two place kicks and one drop kick were scored in the three attempts, totaling nine points.  Considering the punting I did that day, and the fact that both place-kicks were scored from close to the side lines, I feel that that game represents my best work.

“The third year of my play was undoubtedly my best year; in fact the only year in which I might lay claim to being anything of a kicker.  Thus in the Rutgers game of ’87 I kicked twelve straight goals from placement.  Counting the two goals from touchdowns against Princeton I had a batting average of 1000 in three games.

“Through the last year I was handicapped with a lame kicking leg and was out of form, for in the final game with Princeton that year, ’88, I tried at least four times before scoring the first field goal of the game.  In the second half I had but one chance and that was successful.  This was the 10-0 game, in which all the points were scored by kicking, although the ground was wet and slippery.

“It is of interest to note, in connection with drop-kicking in the old days, that the proposition was not the simple matter it is to-day.  Then, the ball had to go through the quarter’s hands, and the kicker in consequence had so little time in which to get the ball away that he was really forced to kick in his tracks and immediately on receipt of the ball.  Fortunately I was able to do both, and I never had a try for a drop blocked, and only one punt, the latter due to the fact that the ball was down by the side line, and I could not run to the left (which would have taken me out of bounds) before kicking.