So two-a-days are upon the Cougs, and while it is just five “doubles” this fall per NCAA mandate, some coaches still like ’em. Count Paul Wulff in the “Old School” belief, that two-a-days can be a really good thing, per Grippi’s recap from yesterday’s long day:
So are two-a-days still viable?
WSU coach Paul Wulff thinks so. In fact, he thinks some of the limits have had a detrimental effect.
“That just continues to kind of follow our society, and that is to get softer all the time,” Wulff said. “It challenges you mentally to get up, come out and prepare twice a day.”
Wulff admits the old ways might not have been best, but says you can’t limit the practice too much, because “we want to do what’s best for the body, but you also want to train that mind too.”
Ah yeah, OLD SCHOOL! Kids these days, just so soft, what with their internet/facebook/twitter and cell phones and microwaves…..but seriously, he makes a good point. The two-a-days exercise can in fact be a bonding experience, and it makes players go through some tough adversity. But it really isn’t that bad, is it? These days the NCAA has limited two-a-days to just five total prior to the start of the season, and no consecutive two-a-days at that. This is all part of the NCAA’s effort to police the practice times with coaches, and there is only so much time available for the coaches to work with their players. This isn’t exactly “Junction Boys”, you know?
If you recall, Junction Boys was the famous story of when Bear Bryant literally tried to kill his players by making them train in 100-degree heat for 10 consecutive days in some backwater berg called Junction, TX. From the official Junction Boys website:
Texas A&M University hired Bear Bryant as head football coach in 1954 replacing former coach Ray George. Bryant arrived in College Station, Texas in February of 1954 and began cleaning house. Bryant felt that many of the players on the team were weak and not properly trained or coached. He decided that his players needed a camp away from campus. He arranged for the camp to be held at the 411 acre adjunct campus of Texas A&M at the small town of Junction. At the time of the camp, the Texas hill country was experiencing an epic drought and record high temperatures. The drought, the worst in the recorded history of the region, had lasted four years and would last another two after the camp was over. All 10 days of the camp saw temperatures rise over 100 °F (38 °C).
The oppressive heat combined with the brutal practice schedule caused many players to drop out of the football program from illness or disgust. The situation was compounded by Bryant refusing to allow water breaks. This practice is now widely recognized as dangerous, but at the time was commonly employed by athletic coaches in an attempt to toughen up their players. The only relief provided the players were two towels soaked in cold water, one to be shared by the offensive players, one for the defense.
One of the Junction Boys, future NFL player and coach Jack Pardee would later say in an interview that losing 10% of your body weight in sweat in a day was not unusual.Practices began before dawn and usually lasted all day with meetings in the evening until 11:00 PM. The conditions were too much for many players and each day, there would be fewer and fewer players at practice as men would quit the team. By the end of the 10 day camp, only a fraction of those that started were left.
Now THAT, my friends, is OLD SCHOOL. 10 straight days in 100+ degree heat? A shared cold towel is all you got? So, uh, yeah, times have changed just a little bit! They’ll get through these two-a-days, no problem.
Read on for more recaps, plus video from yesterday.
- Cougfan has a full look at Friday’s action, via a premium story here. Since it’s premium we can’t give you everything, but among the highlights of the story were some really good showings by the kickers, some intense moments during 3rd down drills which included Marshall Lobbestael going after Dan Spitz, and some notable absences, with the likes of Bernard Wolfgramm and Brandon Rankin still sidelined.
- Joe Nickell has a recap of Friday at the WSUCougars.com blog, which includes appearances at practice by Cougs like Craig Ehlo, Paul Sorenson, Jim Walden and head baseball coach Donnie Marbut among others. On the field, Rickey Galvin looked good (again), Myron Beck played well on his birthday, and Jeff Tuel was pretty sharp overall.
- Video goodness, also from Joe. First, from coach Wulff after practice:[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ewLFP5iOYI&w=400&h=250]
Next, a question for Skylar Stormo:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDKYqKOVzmw&w=400&h=250]Keep the questions coming over at Joe’s blog, as he promises to do his best to get them answered by the players!
- Wanna feel insulted as a Coug fan? Look no further than Jon Wilner’s latest, which says this about what he calls the “Washington State Factor” for Pac-10 schedules this year:But let’s say the Cougars are as bad as they’ve been for two years — 1-17 in league play, outscored by more than 600 points — or just marginally better.
In that case, they’re basically a gimme win for everybody, which means the teams that play in Pullman have a gimme road win.
If you have five home games and a gimme on the road, you’ve got the edge on teams that play WSU at home and have five non-gimme road games.
So I wonder if teams even need to bother to show up to play WSU this year? Maybe they can just e-mail it in? Honestly, I HOPE STUFF LIKE THIS ends up inside the WSU locker room….don’t you?
- Finally, Ted Miller looks at the QB’s in the Pac-10, and ranks ’em 1-10. Jeff Tuel comes in at #7, which given that he only played less than half a season as a true frosh, well, that’s not too shabby. And when you consider that Jake Locker, Andrew Luck and Kevin Riley will all be out of the picture next year (or at least in Luck’s case, most likely will be out of the picture?), it’s not too much of a stretch to see that Tuel can elevate into that upper echelon in the conference in another year?
That’s it for now. Enjoy your Saturday, and as always, GO COUGS!
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