Johnny Mack

It would not seem natural if one failed to see Johnny Mack on the side lines where Yale is playing.  In eleven years at New Haven Yale teams were never criticised on account of their condition.  The physical condition of the Yale team has always been left entirely in Johnny Mack’s hands, and the hard contests that they went through in the season of 1915 were enough to worry any trainer.  Johnny Mack was always optimistic.

There is much humor in Johnny Mack.  It is amusing to hear Johnny tell of the experience that he and Pooch Donovan had in a Paris restaurant, and I’m sure you can all imagine the rest.  Johnny said they got along pretty well with their French until they ordered potatoes and the waiters brought in a peck of peas.

It is a difficult task for a trainer to tell whether a player is fully conscious of all that is going on in a game.  Sometimes a hard tackle or a blow on the head will upset a man.  Johnny Mack tells a story that illustrates this fact: 

“There was a quarterback working in the game one day.  I thought he was going wrong.  I said to the coach:  ’I think something has happened to our quarterback.’  He told me to go out and look him over.  I went out and called the captain to one side after I had permission from the Referee.  I asked him if he thought the quarterback was going right.  He replied that he thought he was, but called out some signals to him to see if he knew them.  The quarter answered the captain’s questions after a fashion and the captain was satisfied, but, just the same, he didn’t look good to me.  I asked the captain to let me give him a signal; one we never used, and one the captain did not even know.

“Said I, ‘What’s this one—­48-16-32-12?’

“‘That’s me through the right end,’ he said.

“‘Not on your life, old man,’ said I, ’that’s you and me to the side lines!’

“I remember one fall,” says Johnny, “when we were very shy on big material at Yale.  The coaches told me to take a walk about the campus and hunt up some big fellows who might possibly come out for football.  While going along the Commons at noon, the first fellow I met was a big, fine looking man, a 210 pounder at least, with big, broad shoulders.  I stopped him and asked if he had ever played football.

“‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I played a little at school.  I’ll come out next week.’  I told him not to bother about next week, but to come out that afternoon—­that I’d meet him at the gym’ at one o’clock and have some clothes for him.  He came at one o’clock and I told one of the rubbers to have some clothes ready.  When I came back at 1:30 and looked around I couldn’t recognize him.  ‘Where in the world is my big fellow?’ I said to Jim the rubber.

“‘Your big fellow?  Why, he just passed you,’ said Jim.

“‘No,’ said I, ‘that can’t be the man; that must be some consumptive.’