“I brought the game I recorded,” she said. “I hear you’ve got playbooks, so I figure this is good timing.”
She was right. Both Seymour and I had begun to make sense of the X’s and O’s, which told all the players on the field how they should move to make the play work, but it would be neat to see if we could spot those kinds of movements in a real game.
Usually, when I watch a football game, I watch the ball. The TV camera follows the ball. That’s not what I watched this time, however. This time I watched my position.
The right offensive guard on each team was a great big guy who set up on the line exactly the way I was supposed to when I went into the set position. I could see him looking straight ahead at the players across from him. That’s what he’s supposed to do. He’s not supposed to give away anything by angling his body to one side or the other. When the ball was hiked I could see him pushing forward to open a hole for a runner or blocking to give the quarterback time to throw. It really did work!
He wasn’t always successful, of course, but even when the defense got past him, it was still interesting to watch.
I think Seymour was watching the defensive backs the same way. It was hard to tell because the tape had reminded him of the football web page he’d read earlier, and he started giving us all sorts of TV-type facts.
“That line across the field isn’t really there, you know,” he pointed out. “It’s a virtual line to show where the first-down markers are on the sidelines. It takes a tractor-trailer rig of equipment, eight computers and at least four people to superimpose it on the TV screen.”
“I thought it was added somehow,” said Gran. “But why doesn’t it draw stripes across the players when they cross it?”
“They have some way of adjusting it to allow for things like that,” said Seymour. “Hey, look. Eye-vision camera.”
At the top of the screen, a camera zipped along on a wire and was gone.
“There are about thirty of them all around the stadium and robotic platforms and all kinds of hardware and software and technical stuff to put everything together,” said Seymour.
“Instant replays from every angle in the world,” said Gran.
“Yup,” said Seymour.
“Blitz!” Gran called out. The next instant, the quarterback looked like he was being swarmed. A few moments later, Gran made another call. “Screen pass!”
The announcer confirmed, “Six yards on a nice little screen pass.”
“How did you know that?” I asked Gran.
“After a while you get to recognize plays even if you don’t understand the details,” said Gran.
“It’s about people’s brains being able to see patterns,” said Seymour. “Some athletes are especially good at it. The best hockey players know where the puck will be three seconds before it gets there. Of course, they have to play a lot before that happens, something like ten thousand hours of practice.”
Assuming that football would take about the same amount of practice as hockey, Seymour had 9,992 hours to go.
When Gran left, I realized I hadn’t seen the cats all afternoon so I went looking for them. I found them in my closet, curled up in the middle of all the wonderful dirty-sock and dried-sweat smells of my practice uniform.
Oh great… I’d be the only player on the field covered in cat hair.
Chapter 8
For the next two weeks, we practiced almost every day. On weekdays it was late in the afternoon because most of the coaches had day jobs. On Saturdays it was two a day—practices on the field both morning and afternoon. Even at lunch we didn’t have any time off. The coaches brought whiteboards onto the field and drew X’s, O’s and arrows to explain different plays, Sandy checked minor injuries and Amanda pushed the liquids at us. With all the gear players wear, dehydration is a big problem on a hot day.
It was a lot of practice, but Seymour said we needed it. His statistics were from a basketball study this time. A single move needs to be practiced at least two hundred thousand times before it becomes an automatic reflex. Why did every number he quoted have to be in the thousands? Or the hundreds of thousands?
Lugging the football gear back and forth wasn’t a huge amount of fun, so pretty soon different people started giving us rides home after practice.
Sometimes we rode home with Mr. G. and talked about the differences between American and Canadian football or why teams with kids our age don’t often try to kick field goals and conversions.
Sometimes we rode home with Meg’s family and argued about football and rugby. Meg said rugby was better because there was more action. Seymour said football was better because there was more strategy and it was more intense.
On Saturday, Seymour’s mom drove us home. She was alone, so maybe my second scenario was right. Maybe the boyfriend was someone Seymour didn’t like, and he was playing football to keep out of the house and prove he was different. If that was the case, it was working. No boyfriend in sight.
It was also pretty clear Seymour’s mom didn’t know much about sports. When Meg and Seymour started talking about “zone vs. man-to-man coverage,” she just kept shaking her head and saying, “I had no idea it was this complicated. I thought players just kicked or passed or whatever.”
One day Dad showed up as we were finishing.
“I was just a few blocks away at the accountant’s office,” he said. “I thought it was a good chance to see what you’re up to.”
Mr. G. introduced him to the other coaches. They had a couple of laughs together. I hadn’t heard Dad laugh much lately, and seeing him standing there with some half-bald guys with tanned heads made me realize that Dad didn’t see a lot of sun with the amount of time he spent in the store these days.
We drove Seymour and Meg home first. After that we needed some groceries so we dropped by the supermarket near the highway. I’d taken off my shoulder pads, but I was still wearing the rest of my gear so I decided to stay in the car while Dad was inside.
As I was sitting there, I noticed the big new store across the parking lot. It was the one that had been advertising in the local paper. That had been at least a week earlier, but more sale banners were plastered across the windows. Apparently life was one big SALE at that place. Before I could see much else, a huge number 55 blocked my window.
“Hey, TJ!”
It was Gibson. He’d lost his practice jersey and was wearing his uniform, complete with number. I could tell by the look on his face that he wanted to talk about something.
“Are you looking forward to tomorrow’s practice?” he asked.
The next day the coaches were going to run our offensive unit against our defensive unit. It would be a little like a real game, but we’d be playing against ourselves.
“I guess so—sure,” I said. Gibson seemed even larger than usual. Maybe it was because I was sitting in the car or maybe he had actually grown a few inches. I was just glad he lined up on the other side of center from me. Except that’s what he wanted to talk about.
“I think you should know,” said Gibson. “Coach moved me to left tackle, but don’t…”
“Gibson! Can you give me a hand? Quick!”
A woman was rolling a cart out of the new store with cartons stacked high.
“Uh-oh, Mom needs help. Gotta go.”
Gibson took off just as the stack began to tumble. I didn’t notice if he got there in time. You don’t notice things like that when you’ve just gone into a state of deep shock.
Gibson at defensive left tackle! He’d be lining up directly across from me. I couldn’t block Gibson. He’d flatten me!!
I phoned Seymour as soon as I got home. He agreed to come the next morning when I went to the store to talk to Mr. G. I even wrote out the physics on a scrap of paper so Mr. G. would believe me.
“125 newtons—that’s twice as much force as I’ve got!” I showed him. “You’ve got to move me!”
Mr. G. laughed. The book doesn’t even have a name for the kind of coach that
laughs when you tell him something important!
“It’s not funny,” I said. “He’ll destroy me!”
Mr. G. was shaking his head.
“F = ma. You’re getting caught up on the m part—the mass. You’ve got to remember the other part—the acceleration, the speed.”
“Gibson is faster and heavier than me!”
“Not that much faster,” said Mr. G. “You’re way off on your estimates, TJ. You’re slower than Seymour and Gibson, but it’s not anywhere near the “half as fast” figure you’re using. Your comparison with a pro player is way too low as well. And you’ve forgotten what I told you earlier. A second is five yards.”
“But that’s for runners,” I objected. “If a runner gets a one-second head start, he can be five yards farther down the field than anyone else. That won’t do me any good. I’m on the line!”
Mr. G. was being patient. I hate it when he goes deep into the Professor Football thing.
“It’s more than simple distance,” he said. “It’s about reaction time.”
“I’ve got an awful reaction time!” I told him.
We showed him the ruler test. When I dropped the ruler, Seymour caught it about a quarter of the way from the bottom, practically the moment it left my hand. When Seymour dropped the ruler, I was lucky if I caught it halfway along.
Mr. G. frowned. And then he frowned harder. And then his expression cleared and he smiled instead.
“Try it with a countdown,” he said.
Now he wanted us to do a bunch of rocket experiments!
Mr. G. picked up the ruler and handed it to Seymour.
“Seymour may have a better reaction time in cold situations, when no one knows the timing. Football isn’t like that. Offense knows when the ball is going to be hiked. You’re offense, TJ. Your reaction time will be as good as Seymour’s in this type of situation.” He nodded at Seymour. “Drop it on ‘two’.”
We knew he wasn’t actually going to say the number two, but that’s how you call things in the huddle, and Mr. G. was deep into football mode. He did the quarterback cadence just as you would in a game.
“Down. Set. Hut. Hut.”
Seymour dropped the ruler on the second hut. I caught it immediately, right at the lower tip. Even better than Seymour!
Of course we had to try it for Seymour. He caught it at the tip as well. We really did come out the same. Professor Football loved it.
“Offense knows when the ball will be hiked. Offense has about two-tenths of a second to build up momentum before defense can react. You’ll be accelerating while Gibson will almost be standing still.” Mr. G. began scribbling on the paper. “If we give Gibson an acceleration of one, then, using F = ma, all you need is an acceleration of one point three to equal him.”
I looked at his scribbling. I didn’t entirely believe it, but maybe, if I pulled out the “will to win,” there was hope.
I told Gran about it when she dropped by the house just before practice. She was interested, but not as interested as I thought she’d be.
“How were things at the store?” she asked instead.
“Slow,” I said. “Seymour and I had lots of time to talk things out with Mr. G.”
Gran was looking at me in a strange way. “Don’t you think that’s a little odd? The way it’s so slow around the store? I don’t imagine you’ve gone through a lot of pet supplies lately.”
“Nope. I’ve hardly had to order anything at all,” I said. “Lots of people away on summer holidays.”
“And yet the town seems pretty busy,” said Gran.
“Yeah, I guess so,” I said. “I haven’t really thought about it.”
Gran sighed.
“Maybe you should think about it when you have time,” she said. “Just kind of be prepared for possibilities.”
I was glad she said “when you have time” because I definitely couldn’t think about it at the moment. It was time to head over to the field.
Chapter 9
The practice began with full team warm-ups and stretches.
After that, the defensive unit headed to one bench with Coach Mac, and the offensive unit headed to the other bench with Coach G. Coach Winguard would practice special teams on another day.
Coach Billings was the referee. He blew the whistle and it was time to do our stuff.
Gabe was our quarterback, and we went into a huddle, just like we’d do for a real game. We’d already talked with Coach G. about our first couple of plays, but it was Gabe’s job to make sure we remembered, and if there were changes they’d come through Gabe.
The first play would be a running play. I wouldn’t just be trying to stop Gibson; I’d be trying to push him aside so Leroy could run through the hole. I’d need all the physics I could get. In my head, I repeated my own mantra.
“Force equals mass times acceleration.”
Down. Set.
“Mass times acceleration.”
Hut. Hut. Hut.
On the third hut I was off the line and headed for Gibson as hard as I could go. Mr. G. was right. I had a split-second advantage and it made a huge difference. Gibson barely had time to take a half step forward before I hit him as hard as I could.
I bowled Gibson over! The whistle blew right away because our runner only managed two yards, but Gibson was sitting on the ground looking up at me.
It was his turn to be shocked. I helped him up. And then I saw something even more unexpected. Behind his face guard, I saw a look of pure joy spread across Gibson’s face.
“Hey,” he said. “This is going to be fun after all.”
Gibson had been planning to take it easy on me! That’s what he’d been trying to tell me the other day. We’d become friends and he’d been planning to take it easy on me. Now that he knew I could take it, however, he was going to really try to flatten me. He was looking forward to it!
On the next play he came at me about ten times harder. Wham. I held him, but just barely. And I didn’t feel quite as friendly toward him as I had a few minutes before. In fact, by the time we’d run through five plays, I wasn’t feeling very friendly toward any of the players on our own defense. I was seeing everything in terms of “them” and “us.”
“Are you sure this is good for team-building?” I asked Coach G. when we stopped to regroup.
“Even the pros have trouble with this part of it,” he said. “Just remember you’re actually helping each other. If you don’t put up an honest challenge, you’re not helping your teammates get better.”
I went back on the field to help my teammate Gibson some more.
It was a tough practice. That was good. Saturday we’d take another step up the “learn to do by doing” ladder—a practice scrimmage against another team—and we now had some idea of how the plays would come together.
In honor of the occasion, Coach Billings gave his after-practice lecture both forward and backward. Good grief. I tried to listen but my brain kept veering off. It kept bringing up images of the big number 55 on Gibson’s shirt.
Why would I keep seeing the number 55? Playing against Gibson, or even someone the size of Gibson, was no longer a terrifying thought. And then I realized that the number 55 was actually blocking my vision and I was trying to peer around it.
It was like being shifted back in time twenty-four hours. The big number 55 outside the car window and beyond it, across the parking lot, the huge new store with SALE banners all over the windows. SALE flyers in the newspapers. People going in and out of the store while things got quieter and quieter down at Barnes Hardware.
All of a sudden I felt sick inside. Gran had been trying to tell me something that I should have seen all along.
Chapter 10
“Is the hardware store in trouble?” I asked.
It was suppertime. I’d been going to wait until we finished, but I stared at the food on my plate and knew I couldn’t eat, no matter how hungry I was. I had to know. Now.
Mom and Dad looked at each other without spe
aking. It wasn’t a good sign.
“Are we going broke?” I asked. “Are we going to lose the store?”
It was my mom who answered.
“We didn’t know how to tell you. We…”
The sound of my voice surprised me. The words just came flying out.
“You should have told me. I’m part of this family too. I work at the store!”
“It’s hard on everyone, TJ,” said Mom quietly. “And yelling isn’t going to help.”
Which took away the mad feeling and just left the rotten sick feeling.
“Then it’s true?” I asked. “We’re going to lose it?”
This time it was Dad who answered.
“The truth is that we’re not losing it,” he said. “We’re giving it up.”
I couldn’t believe what he was saying.
“But you can’t just give it up! You’ve both always wanted to run your own store. You’ve worked really hard. You can’t give up just because some big new place takes away a little business.”
“It’s more than a little business,” said Mom. “I think you know that. Our store is practically empty these days.”
“But people will get over the other place being new and gigantic,” I said. “They’ll come back to us.”
Dad was nodding his head but he wasn’t actually agreeing.
“Some of them will,” he said, “but it won’t be enough. This area is changing. The only smart thing to do is to close our store now before we lose a lot more money and a lot more time and still have to give it up down the road.”
“You can’t know that for sure,” I said. “You can’t see the future.”
“We can’t see the future but we can definitely see the present,” said Dad. “We can’t compete with their prices.”
“Or their inventory,” said Mom. “It’s not just building supplies and tools. People go there for housewares, paint, window coverings, carpet…”
“Amanda’s mother doesn’t,” I said.
TJ and the Sports Fanatic Page 4
