By JOE HOLTZAPFEL
There were many instances where Coach had things happen at practice that became one of those did you hear what Bob said at practice today. I do remember two that I thought were his best. I will tell you what they are without revealing the players names.
There was a player having a really bad day. It was the Tiger's star running back. He was missing the hole he was supposed to be running through and also missing his blocking assignments as well. Coach was all over him and he became really frustrated. At one point he took off his helmet turned around and started to walk off the practice field. As you may know there was a track the encased the field. As he was walking off the field toward the locker room Bob yelled at him, "You cross that track you will never be back." Needless to say he turned around put his helmet back on and came back. He knew Coach was a man of his word.
The second also involved a running back. His problems were basically the same as the first. He was missing his blocking assignment. The running back he was to block for was getting killed due to his missing his assignment. Coach was furious and he yelled at the player, "xxx You miss another block and you won't be dancing in my end zone."
Before the new turf was laid a group of us would go down to the field on Friday morning to line the field. Coach Lutz was very particular when it came to the field. He would pickup every leaf off the surface because it had to be immaculate. If we played back to back home games the lines were still visible. Still when you put down the lines you better use the templates if you knew what was good for you. Lou Mains pretty much kept us all in line as he knew where everything went. Tim Collins also knew where all the pegs were. There was one time when Lou wasn't there and Mark Lutz and I painted the kickoff Xs on the 35 yard line by mistake. To this day I can't remember if they were changed before game time or not.
Rusty White and I painted the goal posts orange not only on the field at The Tank but also on the practice field. Coach came out and told us they can't be orange. He said they had to be White or Yellow. We informed him that they were going to stay orange and if everyone remembers right they were always orange. How many years were they illegal.
Stay tuned for the final chapter on Coach Lutz.
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