Hail to the (Editor in) Chief! For 70 years, Herman L. Masin has been the foundation of the best coaching magazine in the world.COACH: How did you become Editor in Chief of Scholastic Coach & Athletic Director Athletic director (commonly, "athletics director") is a position at many American colleges and universities, as well as in larger high schools and middle schools, which oversees the work of the coaches and related staff involved in intercollegiate or interscholastic athletic magazine? [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] MASIN: Anytime you hear of a magazine with a 93-year-old editor who has just published his 700th issue in a row (1936-2006), you are entitled to a press release. Actually, there is only one way this could have been done. It had to be the first and only job that the editor has ever had--especially since he types with only two fingers (the digit fingers). The miracle began in early June of 1936. Jack Lippert, editor of Scholastic Coach is leaving to start a new magazine. He is having all kinds of trouble finding a successor ... until, pop! A brainstorm. He has a friend at the school of physical education at NYU NYU New York University NYU New York Undercover (TV show) . His name is Floyd Eastwood, he is a professor, and he is very good at job replacement. "Hey, Floyd. We have a hang-up at Scholastic Coach. We're looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. a young person with a background in both athletics and writing. Would you have any recent graduate who might fill that bill?" "We have all kinds of athletes who could do it easily. But the only writer I am aware of is the sports editor Noun 1. sports editor - the newspaper editor responsible for sports news newspaper editor - the editor of a newspaper of the school newspaper. He is personable PERSONABLE. Having the capacities of a person; for example, the defendant was judged personable to maintain this action. Old Nat. Brev. 142. This word is obsolete. , ambitious, and writes a great sports column." "What's his name?" "Herman L. Masin." COACH: You graduated from New York University New York University, mainly in New York City; coeducational; chartered 1831, opened 1832 as the Univ. of the City of New York, renamed 1896. It comprises 13 schools and colleges, maintaining 4 main centers (including the Medical Center) in the city, as well as the in 1936 as a physical education major. If not for your long, distinguished career at Coach & AD, what other profession would you have chosen? MASIN: It's a funny thing. We all went to the School of Physical Education but we received our degree in Science. That was our major course, by the way, but not my favorite My Favorite is an independent synthpop band from Long Island, New York. They released two CDs: Love at Absolute Zero and Happiest Days of Our Lives. My Favorite broke up on September 14, 2005, when singer Andrea Vaughn left the band. interest. That had to be sports: writing and coaching. So very definitely it would have been one of those two things. I knew I would never be good enough to be a ballplayer in the major leagues. I never had any illusions about those things. The first time I got involved in writing was when I joined the school paper at NYU. Then my whole life just opened up right there. I knew what I wanted to be. COACH: Some people may be surprised, but to this day you still edit with a pencil and use a typewriter to make the corrections, forgoing the modern technology of word processors and computers. And you literally cut and paste To move an object from one location to another. When the operation is complete, there is nothing left in the original location. It may refer to relocating files from one folder to another or to relocating selected text or images from one document to another. . Why have you stuck to your guns and resisted change? MASIN: Because I guess I was dumb. That's part of my nature, resisting change. I don't make a lot of changes in my life. When I look back, I remember when the changes were taking place at Scholastic Coach. I was one of the guys who were responsible for holding it back for a while. We had people come in to help us changeover from typewriters to word processors. I tried to prove to them, from a purely personal angle, and I think I won out. The way I edit and type, the computer would have never worked out for me. COACH: What qualities do you admire in coaches? MASIN: Their brightness. There is so much to it. What you have to know these days is remarkable. When I look at the present-day coaches and how they work and compare it to coaches in the past, there is no comparison. The modern coach is so far more sophisticated and intelligent when it comes to the X's and O's. When you look at the coaches in the old days and how they taught, nothing can compare to modern days. Just look at how basketball is played for example. The way they play that game now is so incredible. Because the coaching is there. It is so far ahead. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The talent level is so amazing that sometimes I ask myself, "Who is keeping up to whom?" It may be a mutual thing. When I see the improvement in the coaches, I see the same with the players. They've both made great jumps, really. Coaches are much more involved now, too. The coaching articles I used to edit from years ago, there's no comparison to the ones I edit now. The stories I edit now are much better written. And they are much deeper, without question. They are more technical and the quality is impressive. COACH: You have developed many coaching relationships and remain friendly through the years with many of them. One in particular that stands out is with Al Davis For other persons named Al Davis, see Al Davis (disambiguation). Allen "Al" Davis (born July 4, 1929 in Brockton, Massachusetts) is an American football executive, who currently serves as the president and managing general partner of the NFL's Oakland Raiders. , the owner of the Oakland Raiders This article is about an American football team. For other uses, see Raider. The Oakland Raiders are a professional American football team based in the city of Oakland, California. . Tell us about what intrigued you about him, from his days at Adelphi College in New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of to coaching in the American Football League For other uses of "AFL", see AFL. ''Note: There were three earlier and unrelated American professional football leagues of the same name: One in 1926, one in 1936-1937 and one in 1940-1941. They are listed at the end of this article. ? MASIN: When I needed a headline for this excerpt, I felt obliged to repeat a statement I had made about Al Davis several years before: "Al Davis has the most brilliant mind in football." People always think I'm exaggerating when I come out with statements like that. Maybe so. But I'd never do it deliberately, and I knew Al Davis too long and too well to play such games with him. I vividly recall the first time I ever saw him run a professional practice. It was with the Oakland Raiders and I remember how totally efficient he was. After completing his section of practice--passing and receiving--Al took a stroll over the entire field. He'd stop at every section where a coach would be working with his players. He'd watch the section for a while and then begin correcting all the errors he had spotted. It was incredible. He seemed to know every position and exactly how the players were making their moves! He would then show the players exactly what they were doing wrong. COACH: What is your personal favorite decade for sports? MASIN: For anyone like me who loved sports and could never get enough of them, "The Roaring Twenties Roaring Twenties decade of exuberance (1920s). [Am. Hist.: Flexner, 309] See : Highspiritedness " were a dream. There never had been--and probably never would be again--a decade like it. Babe Ruth made baseball heaven of the home run. A running back named Red Grange Harold Edward (Red) Grange (June 13, 1903 – January 28, 1991) was a professional and college American football player. He was a charter member of both the College and Pro Football Hall of Fame. Early life Grange was born in Forksville, Pennsylvania. from the U. of Illinois was so great that a whole professional league was built around him. A famous basketball team named the Original Celtics The Original Celtics, no relation to the equally famous Boston Celtics, were an outstanding barnstorming professional basketball team in the 1920s. The team's roots lay in the New York Celtics team which disbanded during World War I. started beating everyone, and made professional basketball the country's third biggest sport. A tall, skinny, tennis wonder named Bill Tilden William Tatem Tilden II (February 10, 1893 – June 5, 1953), often called "Big Bill", was an American tennis player who was the World No. 1 player for 7 years, the last time when he was 38 years old. was so unbeatable that he had to turn pro--and professional tennis joined the other pro sports. Johnny Weissmuller Johnny Weissmuller (June 2 1904 – January 20 1984) was an American swimmer and actor who was one of the world's best swimmers in the 1920s, winning five Olympic gold medals and one bronze medal. He won fifty-two US National Championships and set sixty-seven world records. , the twin gold sprint medalist of the 1924 and 1928 Olympic Games Olympic games, premier athletic meeting of ancient Greece, and, in modern times, series of international sports contests. The Olympics of Ancient Greece Although records cannot verify games earlier than 776 B.C. and star of the movie, Tarzan of the Apes Noun 1. Tarzan of the Apes - a man raised by apes who was the hero of a series of novels by Edgar Rice Burroughs Tarzan , put swimming on the map. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Man o' War was the glamour thoroughbred of the decade. Jack Dempsey, the king of the heavyweight boxing champions This is a chronological list of world heavyweight boxing champions, as recognized by the following organizations:
Charlie Paddock Charles ("Charlie") William Paddock (August 11, 1900 – July 21, 1943) was an American athlete and two-fold Olympic champion. After serving in World War I as a lieutenant of field artillery, Paddock - a native of Gainesville, Texas - studied at the University of , the first of the "world's fastest humans." COACH: In your opinion, who is the greatest football coach of all-time? MASIN: Between Alonzo Stagg and Joe Paterno Joseph Vincent Paterno (born December 21, 1926, in Brooklyn, New York), nicknamed JoePa, is the head coach of Pennsylvania State University's college football team, a position he has held since 1966. , we'd have to believe that there are at least 75 football coaches you could call either "the greatest" or "the most glamorous" of all time. We've known most of them casually and quite a few very well. But the one who impressed us the most had to be Bear Bryant Paul William "Bear" Bryant (September 11, 1913–January 26, 1983) was an American college football coach. He was best known as the longtime head coach of the University of Alabama football team, and is the namesake of the Paul W. Bryant Museum. . It figured. We met him late in life, when he had developed into a very special person you could work with. Our first experience with him was at a football clinic being sponsored by a small group of Southern Cal football people. They had brought together six of the country's top coaches, with Bear Bryant as the star attraction star attraction n → atracción f principal star attraction n → grande attraction star attraction star n → . (We were the moderators.) The clinic was a Friday evening to Monday morning affair with the Bear coming in on Friday evening and lecturing on Saturday and Sunday. We had no trouble picking him up. He was a tall, strongly built man with cold, piercing blue eyes Blue eyes are eyes that have blue irises (see eye color), and may also refer to:
It was about nine in the evening, and the Bear stood there watching everyone. We noticed that three of the clinic speakers from Deep South universities detached themselves from the group and surrounded the Bear. They had a bellboy take the laundry sacks away from the Bear and started taking them up to his room. The Bear and his buddies then departed for a midnight whirl on the town. We went upstairs to get our charts ready for Saturday. At breakfast the next morning, our Southern Cal friends had a few wild stories about the party in town and the police calls it had provoked. When we proceeded to the clinic hall, we spotted the Bear sitting quietly in the end seat of the second row, thumbing through his clinic notebook. He looked calm, perfectly groomed, and rested. The two clinic days went perfectly. Excellent speakers, excellent lectures. The Bear, in that rumbling voice, was outstanding. Our clinic officers met on Monday morning to make out the expense checks and we all agreed that the clinic had gone excellently, though we could have used a few more students. About a week later, we received a letter on University of Alabama The University of Alabama (also known as Alabama, UA or colloquially as 'Bama) is a public coeducational university located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, USA. Founded in 1831, UA is the flagship campus of the University of Alabama System. stationery. It was from the Bear: "Dear Guys, thanks much for the check. It was very generous and I deeply appreciated it. I also enjoyed the clinic very much, though it really wasn't a financial success. "So I would like to make a deal--tear up your check and then return the favor by inviting me to return as a speaker. (P.B.)" COACH: One of your favorite baseball people is former Braves pitcher and Yankees pitching coach Johnny Sain MASIN: Long before I ever met Johnny Sain or Warren Spahn
Major League Baseball (MLB) is the highest level of play in North American professional baseball. : "Spahn, Sain, plus two days of rain." Their club didn't appear to have enough to win the pennant that year, but with Spahn and Sain and the possibilities of rain, they could beat anyone. I still believe that Sain was the greatest pitching coach there ever was. Nobody ever did more with his pitchers, and he awed us when he started making 20-games winners out of pitchers who had never done it before. We got along great. We'd publish his articles on techniques and practice devices, and he'd drop in on us every time he was in town and wanted to talk pitching. The last time we called him had to be about nine or ten years ago. He was living in Chicago with his second wife and was now struggling with a back problem that was taking a lot of him. He had built a pitching target in his backyard and he'd work at it every day. We asked him how he was doing and he said: "Great! I've got my fast ball back again!" COACH: The use of profanity Irreverence towards sacred things; particularly, an irreverent or blasphemous use of the name of God. Vulgar, irreverent, or coarse language. The use of certain profane or obscene language on the radio or television is a federal offense, but in other situations, profanity seems to be rampant in sports these days. Tell us about one of your earliest recollections involving legendary coach, Joe Lapchick Joseph Bohomiel Lapchick (b. April 12, 1900 in Yonkers, New York – d. August 10, 1970 in New York City) was a professional basketball player, mostly known for playing with the Original Celtics in the 1920s and 30s. ? MASIN: One of the surest things that happen in ball games now and then is a spray of foul language. It is a sickening thing that, crazily, can produce a hero. That is how I remember Joe Lapchick, the legendary 6-5 center of the Original Celtics. After retiring from the pros, he became one of the country's prime coaches, first at St. John's and later with the New York Knicks. It was at St. John's that I saw Big Joe do a remarkable thing--go after his own crowd for spraying the court with racial slurs. After listening to them long enough, the big fellow raised his 77 inches off the bench and edged over to the floor mike: "Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "I think we've had enough of all that foul-mouthing out there. "This is St. John's and we don't do such things on our court. Please stop it immediately. My next call will be for the police." [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] COACH: Readers of Coach & AD are very familiar with your monthly column, Here Below, which reflects your views and opinions of the sporting world. How and when did the idea for Here Below begin and from where do you draw your inspiration? MASIN: That's a very easy question. The whole thing started with Jack Lippert, who became editor of Scholastic Coach in 1931. He was the editor until 1935 and his column was Here Below. The name came about because literally, the title was on top. When I came along, I wasn't even thinking about what it meant until someone mentioned it to me. Jack Lippert was such a fabulous writer and editor. He had a marvelous light touch. And that light touch was reflected in his Here Below's. I absolutely tried to use that light touch in my columns, sometimes a little too much. Eventually, it became a column of humor, but tough humor. I made it a little grittier. The inspiration comes from myself. I read and read and read and read. I'm always looking for a twist of some kind. COACH: What has been the secret to your longevity at Coach & AD? Is it your love of editing, your love of sports, or the relationships you have with the coaching fraternity? MASIN: I never wanted to be anything else. I never even thought of being anything else. There's only one real answer: You love the thing. Editing for example. It's a crazy thing. I try to explain it to people and they find it hard to believe. I enjoy editing so much. To me, it's not a hard job. It's an enjoyable job. When I edit articles, I love it. I plunge into that kind of stuff. I actually enjoy it. COACH: What single achievement are you most proud of when you look back and reflect on your 70 years as Editor in Chief? MASIN: The look and the sound of Scholastic Coach. I never yet read an issue that I disliked and said, "I could have done better." Never. Obviously, some issues are better than others. But I've always been pleased with the quality of the magazine. I've never been deeply disappointed by anything in it. Interview by Kevin Newell |
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