Chapter 9: Gotta Start Somewhere

A good hundred or so young men full of testosterone and desperate to show they were not afraid, were indeed afraid. Afraid of not fitting in. Afraid of being shown they were not good enough to make it on the freshman football team. Afraid they were good enough to make it on the freshman football team. Afraid of the high school girls. Afraid of the high school guys. Afraid of the work their new teachers were preparing to pile on them. Afraid they would not be able to finish the work their new teachers were going to pile on them.

Pretty much all hundred or so of the soon to be ninth grade boys were congregating outside of the school’s auditorium because that is where the introductory letter from their new coaches told them to be, three weeks before the first day of school. So at ten o’clock on a Monday morning, three weeks before the first day of school, all prospective members of the freshman football team were meeting their coaches and each other for the first time.

“Dude, this is kinda freaky. I mean I know the fellas from our team at Krueger, last year; but I also recognize some of these guys as the assholes from Ed White. It is totally strange to think we are all now on the same side,” Johnnie said while still looking around at everyone walking toward the auditorium.

He was walking side by side with Tim while Tony, Jeff and Mark were following right behind from the locker room to the auditorium. There were several head nods of recognition, and a few sneers, as former enemies began to adjust to the idea of now being teammates.

“Well don’t worry about it. I’m sure they are all whispering to each other ‘Ooh, that’s Johnnie Boynes. I wonder what the hell happened to him over the summer. He used to be a good player, now I bet he has trouble even putting on his shoes in the morning without sweating.’”

The three guys behind started giggling as Johnnie finally reasoned what Tim said and tried to push him hard into the wall lockers lining the hallway toward the auditorium. Johnnie actually could not believe it after he actually pushed Tim really hard and Tim did not move an inch out of the way.

“All right, girls, get inside and find yourself a seat up front,” Coach Alvarez said while waving the boys into the auditorium. “You guys ready to start playing, yet?”

Coach Alvarez was asking the group he had gotten to know over the last couple of weeks, since they came three times a week to help each other work out. Actually, they all went to get help from Tim while working out. Coach Alvarez has secretly told each of them it would be in their best interests to have Tim set a goal for lifting and working out for each one, and then work with him to hit that goal.

“Yessir, Coach! We are ready to start kicking ass, taking names and putting them in alphabetical order!” Johnnie said at a little higher than speech volume.

“Well, good. First we find out who has the sacks to actually play, then we make sure you know how.”

Coach Alvarez smiled as he patted each player on the shoulder. Coach knew that if it wasn’t for Tim, he would be working mainly with these four since they seemed to have the best attitudes and from early scouting reports, via the middle school coaches these four had the best shots to become good to great high school football players. But Tim Murphy was in a class all on his own. He could not wait to get Tim out on the practice field and to confirm the reports they were getting as to his athletic prowess or finding out it was all a bunch of bull. He hoped the reports were true, but was wary of such glowing accolades even before seeing him on a field for himself.

“Well, come on, ladies, get inside so we can get started.”

Walking down the main aisle of the school’s auditorium, the first thing you notice is the rich dark wood paneling of the walls, and the transition onto the stage. The stage curtain was a deep red with the ever-present ‘TR’ insignia in blue bordered in white right in the middle. It lined up perfectly with the aisle we were walking down to reach a seat. Guys were quickly filling up the front rows, not seat to seat but always leaving a seat or two empty between themselves.

At the end of the aisle at the first seat of the first row stood Coach Barrett armed with a clipboard and welcoming guys as they took a seat. Tim chose a seat next to Johnnie and the other guys took seats behind them.

“Hurry up, ladies, we don’t have all day now,” Coach Barrett used that louder than normal but not quite a yell voice which immediately garnered attention from the new football players.

“Okay, shut your traps. Gossiping time is over. Listen up.” Coach Barrett continued with the coach volume to reach everyone in the auditorium. A couple of other coaches took seats in the last row stage right. The side door to the auditorium clicked shut.

“For those of you I have not met yet, my name is Coach Barrett. I am the head freshman football coach and I will be coaching backs, receivers and corners,” he said then pointed his clipboard to his left. “And this is Coach Alvarez. He will be coaching all offensive and defensive lineman as well as linebackers. If you don’t know what position you will be playing, don’t worry we will find a place for you. Now let’s go over a few quick rules. On the first day of class, you will receive a Code of Conduct handbook from the school. Follow those rules. For the next two weeks, we will be trying to get you in shape to play Rough Rider football. When school begins, we will then be able to start teaching you how to play Rough Rider football. For these next two weeks, you will not like us. But that is okay, because we will not like you either. Let’s get this straight! When we sent out the invitations to come here today, for orientation, we suggested you get yourself acclimated to the weather. In San Antonio during this time of year, we will be practicing in hundred degree weather, and we will not take it easy on you.”

Coach Barrett pulled two sheets of paper from the clipboard then placed it on the empty seat in front of him. Reading from the first sheet, “Ed White Eagles win district championship with a 14 – 13 win over the Krueger Falcons, correcting an early season loss.”

Several of the former Ed White players cheered and congratulated each other. There were even a few disparaging remarks made by the former Eagle to the former Falcons. Coach Barrett waited out the showboating and when everyone’s attention focused on him again. He raised the sheet of paper over his head and tore it to shreds allowing several pieces to fall to the ground around him.

“Screw that! That MIDDLE SCHOOL nonsense is over! You are all now ROOSEVELT ROUGH RIDERS! No more Eagles! No more Falcons! Just ROUGH RIDERS!”

Tim couldn’t stop himself, stood and offered a returning and deep resonating “HA-OOH!” Johnnie Boynes apparently feeling the same way as Tim and sitting right next to him also stood up and yelled what would become his personal battle cry “YEAAAAAAAH BOYEEEEEE!” Tony Parker, Jeff Green and Mark Mazzurana while not as creative also let out shouts of agreement. The agreements quickly spread throughout the room as peer pressure tends to work its ways especially among already scared young men getting their first tastes of what high school athletics could be all about. Clapping and self-congratulating continued for a minute when the extra coaches made their way down to the front rows with the freshman football coaches.

Everyone settled back in their seats and quieted down and when the last couple of voices actually continued, Coach Barrett let loose a couple of bursts from the whistle around his neck. Not full blast but enough to get attention.

“Good I’m glad to hear we put that behind us and are now ready for other stuff we need to talk about. First of all, a couple more introductions right quick, this is Coach Fontana. He is the head varsity football coach, and the athletic director for the entire school. That means he is the boss for all Rough Rider athletics. He has a couple of words of encouragement for you, today.”

Coach Fontana stepped up in front of the rows and saw eager eyes staring back at him.

“Men, first of all, welcome to Roosevelt and welcome to high school. If you act like an adult, we will treat you like an adult. If you start acting like spoiled brats, we will treat you like spoiled little brats. Now positions on the football field are not given ... they are earned! You work hard and you get opportunities to advance. I’ll tell you all this right now, I have not even had a chance to tell this to Coach Barrett, since you guys got over here before I could tell him ... so, listen up! I just got off a conference call with the other AD’s in our district. They all have agreed to field two separate freshman football teams. The ‘A’ teams are the starters with a single backup player at each position. The ‘B’ teams are made up of the rest of the players in freshman football. This is done so everyone has an opportunity to play. If you practice everyday and keep your grades up ... then, yes, you will play at the end of the week.”

The applause was strong once again and took a few moments before winding down. Coach Fontana held his hand up motioning for the players to settle down.

“Yes, that’s good news! So, everyone work hard, and you will succeed!”

The applause kicked back up and Coach Fontana walked to the door he came through and both he and the other coach left.

While the head coach left out the side door, both freshman football coaches rolled their eyes at each other. They both knew the little story he just told these players was completely made up. Every year each school fields two teams. Coach Fontana had been lobbying the other athletic directors for the last few years to eliminate not only the two team freshman football system, but to actually cancel freshman football entirely!

His reason was he wanted to turn the first year football program into a hardcore exercise class; then force players who wanted to play varsity football to first go through an entire year of football conditioning at the high school level. He intended to not let them play a single down until they were ready for junior varsity football. Basically, no freshman football games just practices all year long. Luckily the other athletic directors were against this idea, citing it would be too difficult to keep the freshmen taking all that abuse, without any kind of payoff.

Every coach knows even with the two team system in freshman football, many very good players quit because of the discipline demanded by the coaches and teammates. Not to mention the regular school work got a lot harder to deal with. If you did not have at least a seventy percent grade in every class, you did not get to play until the grades were up to that mark. That was enough, often, to drive away young men with potential to play football. No Pass No Play was what the Texas Education Agency named in a new policy in 1984 where students must pass all their school courses with a grade of 70% or above, to be allowed to participate in any extracurricular activities such as athletics, band, orchestra or even the choir.

The majority of schools set their own guidelines where the numbers were skewed depending on the coach’s needs. If the football teams’ star running back had a grade of 60% in a math class, the coach ignored the grade and allowed him to play. With No Pass No Play, the student would be benched until the grade was back up to at least a 70%.

Some students just can not balance keeping their grades high enough to keep playing, and improving enough to actually play.

“Alright get one of these schedules for the next two weeks. Two-a-day practices start tomorrow. Make sure you get one before you leave today, or you will be in the wrong place at the wrong time. That will make it that much harder to get a starting spot on either team,” Coach Barrett announced. “Now let’s get over to the locker room, and get your equipment assigned to you. Move it on out, ladies.”

Tim and the other players made their way down the halls from the auditorium to the football locker room. To reach the locker room, everyone needed to pass by the school cafeteria, which was now serving as the practice area for the school dance team, the Patriots. These girls consider themselves the cream of the crop at Roosevelt high. The girls took a few minutes to examine the new meat entering their high school.

“Whoa, talk about not ready for prime time. These boys need a bit of cooking before they are ready to walk side by side with us.”

Several giggles confirmed Cindy Diefendorf’s place as queen of the girls who considered themselves the best that Roosevelt had to offer. Cindy, a senior and the captain of the Patriot’s dance squad was currently dating the soon to be starting quarterback for the varsity football team Troy Williams.

Cindy started setting everything in place for her ascension to the top of the pyramid of the Roosevelt elite after last year’s football season ended. The QB was a senior and moving onto college. She found out who was probably going to be the starting quarterback, and started placing clues for him to start dating her. She easily got Troy’s interest and she was able to claim him and thus got herself to the top of next year’s hierarchy. Once she let it be known she might be interested in dating him, Cindy used her feminine wiles and above average looks to ensnare her prey. The blonde haired, brown eyed Cindy was five foot six inches tall with a classic hourglass figure featuring 32DD natural breasts, keeping Troy’s interest was simple enough.

Cindy’s rise to the top of the Patriots was a fore gone conclusion, since she was hands down the best dancer of the group. Her election to Captain was never in question. Now Cindy was dating the presumed starting QB during the summer, and was the leader of the popular girls clique in high school. Cindy Diefendorf was the queen of Roosevelt High School!

While Cindy already had her place cemented among the Roosevelt elite, she still kept her senses open to what was happening between the insignificant peons below her. Just in case she needed to smack down another girl who threatened her reign as queen. Right now, with a break in their dance practices, Cindy and some of the other Patriots were busy looking over the new freshman footballers to see if there were any choice pieces of beef to keep their eyes on. The quick inhales and expressions of disbelief from her hangers-on caught Cindy’s attention. She was daydreaming about when she first had to perform oral sex on the starting offensive line when she was a freshman and not really paying attention to the current crop of freshman football players.

“Who is that?”

“Gawd, look at his body!”

“Wow, look at that smile! It’s, like ... almost perfect.”

“Holy crap, look at the bulge in front he’s packing!” With that last comment you can rest assured, every pair of eyes in the cafeteria suddenly panned down as they watched Tim walk down the hall. He was absentmindedly talking to Johnnie when his nanites alerted him to something he had absolutely no way to answer.

“A large group of females are focusing heavily on you and your companions from behind the mirrored windows at your left before the turn off to the locker room. Would you like to see,” appeared at the bottom of his periphery. Caught slightly off guard by the nanites warning, Tim said a quick yes and covered it up with a fake cough to keep everyone none the wiser.

“Affirmative.” A brief pause. “End of message.”

Suddenly, Tim could see the gaggle of sweaty and obviously excited dance squad watching him and the other guys as they walked down the hallway. A small smile appeared on his face as he looked at the girls. They noticed that he was now watching them, but the girls knew at this time of day the sun reflected off the windows, and made it impossible to see into the cafeteria until about three in the afternoon. That was why they always worked out their new dance moves in there, so no one could see them before they were perfected. This caused a few of the girls to retreat from the windows, as they were not made up to entice boys. But a few including Cindy Diefendorf stayed their ground and continued watching the future varsity football players as they continued onto their locker room.

Tim made no other indication to show anyone he could see into the cafeteria. No one would believe him, anyway, so he decided to continue on with the others to get he new equipment squared away and ready for the next day to start practicing. The thought of practicing for the first time got him away from thinking about the sweaty girls, and back to thinking about finally playing football.

“Did you see that guy? He looked like he should be in college or maybe even in a fashion magazine or something.”

“I’ll bet there isn’t an ounce of fat on his body. I, of course, am willing to find out ... and you, girls know, of course.”

The girls were now giggling ‘of course’ and a few more rather bawdy suggestions about what they would do to Tim if they ever got the chance.

Even the team sponsor had seen the young man walking by and had the same dirty thoughts run across her mind. Patricia Townsend was a former cheerleader at University of North Texas finishing with a Bachelors degree in Mathematics, and also deciding on a whim to get her teaching certification. She is also now twenty-six years old, as after college, she decided to see what would happen with her love of dancing. She worked as an accountant in Dallas, and used her love of dancing to become a Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader. For a couple of years, that was her life; but, with a rising feeling of homesickness and after a couple of failed relationships, Patricia decided it was time to come home to San Antonio.

She was working at Roosevelt as an Algebra teacher for two years, when the long time Patriots team sponsor announced she was ready to retire, and wanted to give up coaching the Patriots team. Patricia was a Patriot since her sophomore year, and became captain her senior year. The now retiring sponsor, of course remembered. It was quickly arranged and the torch was passed down to a former team captain.