I am not sure how many of you follow high school football in Ohio or the Cleveland area real well, but yesterday Coach Bill Gutbrod passed away. He was the legendary coach at St. Joe's/VASJ for 40 years. He coached the Golics, Desmond Howard and Elvis Grbac. 11-12 years ago when I was in high school he was an assistant coach at my school. The stories he would tell were amazing. He faught in WWII and the way he could relate football to a battleground was great. Not the way Kellen Winslow Jr. calls himself a soldier, but Coach definitely could. During our big time rivals weeks he would bring out ketchup and put it on us to remember that we weren't playing hard enough until we saw blood. When he did see real blood you would see this 77 year old man turn into a little kid with excitement. He coached the running backs a lot and always stressed BYOB-be your own blocker. His way of saying sometimes you just got to put your shoulder down and run over a tackler. He definitely perferred the power run game over spread offenses.
Football coaches are definitely different in these days, but even though he was just an assistant on our team, I can say that he was one of the best in Cleveland and Ohio and was a privelige having him at practice every day.
http://www.cleveland.com/hssports/blog/index.ssf/2012/11/longtime_st_joseph_high_footba.html
R.I.P. Coach Gutbrod
Battles are sometimes won by generals; wars are nearly always won by sergeants and privates. Football is no different, the guys down in the trenches win the games, not the coach.
R.I.P. Coach Gutbrod