The Gauntlet – Pain and Humiliation

      During one practice session, our head coach and Dano decided that four of us had been slacking and needed to be punished. Actually, the head coach picked two guys that he thought were slacking.  Perhaps the guys that he picked were not putting out to the best of their ability. Perhaps they slacked because the guys he picked were so large, they could easily push through the line – even in their sleep.

      Mr. Dano picked me and this other kid to be punished. We were not the natural football players that the first two guys were. The first two guys had the size and the stuff to eventually play college ball, me and this other kid only had the stuff to do well in High School…and that’s it! I thought with more than a little rancor that if was an amazing coincidence that Mr. Dano picked us, since I knew that both John and me had been on Mr. Dano’s bad side since eighth grade.

      Our punishment was to be the gauntlet. The gauntlet was made up of two rows of football players. The football players were set about arms width from each other. The four of us had to go through one at a time. The two rows made up the entire varsity and Junior Varsity Teams. The four of us who were getting punished was required to run through the entire gauntlet.

      The gauntlet is set up so that as the player gets to the first two football players, there would be one on your left and another on your right. The players were only supposed to block you and keep blocking you to keep you from going past them.

      If you made it past the first two, then they were suppose to leave you alone, and then it was up to the next two to keep you from going through. If the next two football players managed to knock you back far enough to the players before them, then they were suppose to stop and the duty of knocking you back was up to the previous blockers again. Our mission was to try our best to get through the entire line.

      Joe DeMarco was chosen to go first. He was a huge kid. He had been held back for two years, he was huge for sixteen with a heavy beard and he looked like a man. He ran through, and everyone in the line did exactly as I described, no more, no less.

      Monk was next. Monk was also a kid that was older; he was built like the Monk character in the pulp fiction books ‘Doc Savage.’ John Spritz was assigned to go next. Mr. Dano was yelling out, calling those guys that had to stand in the rows of the gauntlet that they were pussies if they could not stop one guy running through.

      He threatened that the slackers in the gauntlet may be next. The kids in the line steeled themselves to do better. John ran through and it was very tough for him. Instead of the usual protocol he had kids further up the line coming down to lend aid to the kids that were right in front of John. Once he had four to six kids trying to push him back. John was very tough and he finally made it through … barely.

      Mr. Dano, was very angry, he started threatening to put half the kids on the gauntlet through the gauntlet also. I was the last one to run, and he again threatened to put most of the team through the ordeal if they let a little guy like me get through. The head coach was pacing back and forth. He did not say anything.

      His face looked like granite and he reminded me of Vince Lombardo. Overall he was a very tough but fair coach. However, Mr. Dano said he caught me slacking and that was good enough for him.

      I was scared and angry. I vowed that no matter what, I would make it through. I would die before failing. The whistle was blown and I went all out. I got through the first two guys easily. The second two guy also easy, the next two, also easy. However each successive set of guys became increasingly tougher to get through, which of course was the whole point of the gauntlet. Used correctly, it could have been great for an additional drill for all of us to use now and then.

      As I was going through, Mr. Dano was going nuts. I was in such overdrive and so focused to get through the gauntlet that I was not aware of this. I was told this by my teammates the next day.

      It was said that he was frothing at the mouth and he was screaming at the other players ridiculing them for allowing such a small guy like me to get through.

      He took some of the bigger and stronger guys that were in the beginning of the gauntlet and dragged them further up the line so I would have to face them again. He then started to push guys several positions up to charge me. I was not aware of any of this until the next day. I was aware that I was getting hit from all sides, even from behind. I fell several times which was dismaying since I was only just a bit over half way through.

      I redoubled my efforts and as I got up to charge again. I was hit from behind at the same time I was hit from the sides and as my knees were buckling, Anton, the fastest kid in the school, and very powerful talented star running back ran full speed driving his muscular shoulder into my solar plexus.

      All the air was forced out of my burning lungs and if I had any lunch, I would have lost it. I dropped like a wet sack of laundry, which invited a huge pile up of bodies on top of me.

      I was so beaten down that I was unable to walk of the field myself. I had to be carried off. It was very painful and humiliating. The humiliation was by far the worse. The head coach came over to see if I was okay. His granite face seemed to soften.

      He just looked at me and then he said, “Do you need a ride home.”

      I told him, “I would be fine.”

      He said, “You have guts Chimera. You kept trying to get through.”

He didn’t know how close my guts almost failed me. I was ready to bawl from the humiliations.”

      All I could say in a quavering voice was, “Yeah but I didn’t!”

      He said, “Yeah but you kept on trying and that’s what counts son.”  “Practice is almost over, go hit the showers son.”

      As I was getting my equipment together, I looked around, and I saw what appeared to be my head coach reading Mr. Dano the riot act. I just heard the head coach yelling at Mr. Dano, although I could not hear what he was saying. Mr. Dano was looking pretty cowed and more than a little contrite. I got the sense that the head coach saw what had happened and chewed out Mr. Dano. I really don’t know if he talked about me, however, Mr. Dano seemed to tone down the frequency of riding my ass.