Judge, 1932-12 · page 11 of 38
Judge — December 1932 — page 11: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# "Judging the Sports" - Judge Magazine This article argues that **professional football** (specifically teams like the Green Bay Packers, Chicago Bears, and Portsmouth Spartans) is superior to college football. The author, writing as "Professor Miliken," compares the difference to professional vs. amateur boxing: college players are enthusiastic but clumsy; professionals execute plays with precision and maturity. The piece names real athletes from the era—Lou Gehrig, Jimmy Foxx, Bill Terry (baseball stars)—and boxers Jack Britton, Gene Tunney, and others, suggesting these men debate sports endlessly during winter months. The satire targets the reverence for college football and the **"All-American Teams"** selection system, which the author dismisses as meaningless hype. He claims professional players would "spot the best college team...about three touchdowns," and that college stars often fail their first pro game against defensive lines like Green Bay's. The cartoons illustrate these arguments with exaggerated depictions of football players in action. The overall message: ignore the romantic college tradition—pro football shows the true, technical mastery of the game.
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Judge JUDGING ™ SPORT liken! Make a place on the bench Herr Einstein, you’ve got competition of grade A calibre. No, I haven’t split an atom but I have made a discovery of major import. Ihave found out what those guys, sho sit around all summer arguing whether Lou Gehrig, Jimmy Foxx or Bill Terry is the best first baseman, do with themselves in the win- ter time. Well, sir, they meet in warm speaks, cold alleys, subway turnstiles, and organ lofts, and de- bate which is the best game, college or pro- fessional football. In the course of my dinical work I ferried over to Staten Island. { hurried up to the Polo Grounds and caught the Giants at play,and even once journeyed to far off Frankford, Pa., to watch those old Yellowjackets buzzing, around. The partisan thrills of collegiate byalty were missing of course, the grandstand stuff,and the old do-or- die pepper-uppers’ were conspicuous by their absence, and I say thank Heaven. Simple, fundamental, bone crushing plays are spread out before jou by these cash-and-carry pigskin boys. And believe you me, these plays as executed by the Green Bay Packers. f’rinstance, are poems of dfectiveness to watch. The best comparison between the two kinds of football I know is the following. You must have all seen a series of first class amateur boxing bouts at some time or another. The boys go in there winging away with all they’ve got for three short rounds and then drop exhausted in their stools, A _The crowd loves it . . . what the simon pures lack in skill they make Mii over, please, Professor Mil- up for in earnestness to please. All right, now take the other side of the picture. Supposing Jack Britton, Gene Tunney, Tommy Loughran or Sammy Mandell are booked to go . fifteen rounds. What would you see? Conservation of energy, effortless rolling from lethal punches, maybe a little clinching when the going gets tough, but in the long run you'll get perfect examples of timing, deadly hitting, offensive spurts, and ideal rating over the distance. Topnotch fighters like the above correspond to teams like the Chicago Bears, Green Bay Packers, Ports- mouth Spartans and others. Every movement with them counts, each play is devastatingly thorough in its crushing power. Professional matur- ity and the wisdom of experience ver- sus eager, unbalanced youth. I stand before you and aver, without shame or evena slight bow to my head, that the above named pro- fessional teams could spot the best college team you ever saw about three touch- downs and then chase them to the showers! It takes the average college star about two seasons to get hep to the ways of the money game. The gulf be- tween the two games is almost as wide as that between big league and sand lot baseball. Many a rotogravure hero has found himself back on the bench with tears of angry frustration in his eyes after his first tilt against that 240-Ib. line of the Green Bay Packers, Your best girl and your old raccoon coat may not like it so well, but the pro game is where you will see the finer points of the game demon- strated by experts. But if for no other reason than this I love the game. It has shown up in its full measure of futility the so called system of choosing All American Teams. I can recall but two or three of these syndicate picked laddies who have cut any big- ger piece of ice than plain Ole Olsen from some mid-Western ploughing academy, Perhaps, as the late Knute Rockne almost said, the stars forget to take their press clippings into the game with them. —Rex DEANE, eee names comicbooks -com