I do not recall any man in recent years who has made more of this style of play than Ketcham, the husky Yale captain of 1913. A natural diagnostician, he was helped greatly by the post he assumed in that it enabled him to look over the line from his "stand-up" position and get a fair idea of the ultimate as well as the immediate objective of the play. A large proportion of the line plays that go outside of guard are temporarily checked, and the roving center has time to get up to the mass and lend efficient aid in bending the play back or piling it up. It was Ketcham, indeed, who in 1911 performed the all but incredible feat of catching a kick blocked by his own team, which is certainly a stellar example of covering ground from the pivot Roving center play is not for the man who tips the scale above 200 pounds or so, and the player who is not gifted with speed remotely comparable with that of the startled antelope would do well to adhere to the orthodox method.

There is a radical change in the situation on the fourth down, when the attacking team will be compelled to kick, or back of the 20-yard line, where every effort will have to be made to break up plays behind the scrimmage line, and where the attack will be less given to attempting what are known as the "long gainers," plays that if they make ground at all are apt to earn all the way from five to fifteen yards. In such circumstances the roving should give way to the fixed center, for in the orthodox position the center has the shortest path to the runner when the play is in its incipiency, and may depend upon his guards to make a hole for him and let him through on top of the attacking quarterback. It is behind the 20-yard line that it is advisable to bend every effort toward throwing the attacking team for losses, thus hurrying the inevitable attempt for a field goal, and perhaps compelling it from a position that presents an awkward angle to the kicker. In this zone everything possible should be done to force the hand of the attack, and the center should be in the forefront of the battle.

The possibilities of the roving center in other parts of the field, like the possibilities of the general "stand-up" defense, depend upon the possibilities of the individual player. The fast, strong man, who can keep his feet, may stand up and may play the loose defense; all others would do well to get down low, keeping their backs straight, and "get into it."

In the diagram of the line-up the men on the attacking line are shown at even intervals the one from the other, which is the customary style, save that the three center men are often more closely bunched than is possible to show clearly in the drawing. The defensive guards are well outside the positions occupied by their opponents, and the defensive tackles, taking plenty of room, are always careful to post themselves well outside the extremities of the opposing line. Save in a flank movement of the attack, which in football is an end or tackle run, and in which the full force of the secondary defense swings into action, the attack naturally works along interior lines, and this is accepted by the defense, which seeks to envelop the attacking force. The fundamental idea is to close up the attack, shut it up like a fan, and the tackles are relied upon to keep the play turned in. This is the generally accepted theory.

The clash among the coaches comes in the consideration of the best use of the ends. There are two radically different styles of end play, the "smashing" and the "waiting" end. With halfbacks playing outside the extremities of the defensive line, it is contended that the tackle may be depended upon to take care of the plays that swing wide, while the end goes straight in, careful to keep his feet as long as possible, to tear the play apart in its incipiency. There are thus two separate impacts with the attack, the first starting as fast as the play and meeting it behind the scrimmage line and while still in the process of formation, the second meeting it after it has been disorganized to some extent by the end, when it reaches the line of scrimmage. This double impact is in itself immensely effective according to the devotees of the smashing end style, and has the added advantage of acting as a double delayer in the event that the play cannot be stopped entirely by the forwards, thus giving the secondary defense an excellent chance to get up to the line of scrimmage from positions pretty well back of it.

A Harvard-Yale game incident. The tackier, indicated by the cross (X) mark, has "set" himself to meet the runner, and has the advantage whether the ran is to be inside or outside of his position. In either case the interference will not be able to upset the tackier.

The theory has been pretty thoroughly tested in important games by first-class elevens, and has proved sound, to my way of thinking. In the diagram, Fig 1, the course of the smashing ends, who play close to their tackles, is indicated by the solid arrows. Proponents of the waiting end style (their course indicated in the diagram, Fig. 1, by the dotted arrows) claim greater safety for their method, and maintain that by this system more plays will be stopped at the line by ends who do actual tackling with greater frequency than by the smashing wing men who, when not in position to tackle, must devote their entire attention to disorganizing the play as much as possible, so that nothing but a wreck shall reach the line.

Now it happens that even in the normal attacking formations the aggressive eleven will "waste" an end, in the hope of drawing wide a tackle who is playing the standard defensive position. This process will seldom trouble a well-coached defense, for the experienced tackle will refuse to follow his man out, but is often a stumbling block to smaller, especially schoolboy elevens, which seem to have a horror of letting a man go free outside the extremity of the line. As a rule the end should follow out a short distance, using his judgment as to when to let his man go free, the tackle standing fast, but should two members of the attacking line edge out, the end should take them just as far as they will go, for the defense is then wasting only one man to two of the attacking force, better than a fair exchange. A wasted end goes out for one of two purposes, as a rule; either to take a forward pass, or to act as a bluff to call attention away from the actual play. It will be seen, therefore, that to send a defensive end out with him is to waste one of the strongest features of the defense against a man who may have nothing to do with the play, and who at the worst will handle a forward pass, the defense against which is entrusted to the halfback, who has sufficient range to cover the loose end if necessary while the attacking team is making the preliminary delay which is one of the fundamental features of all forward passes. With the exception noted, therefore, the fundamental rule of line defense is to keep the tackles outside of the extremities of the attacking line and the ends close to them.