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Sid Brooks, long time friend of HOFMAG.com, passed away on Saturday, April 14th after an apparent fall and head injury. Please enjoy this excerpt from his book: Tales from the Chargers Locker Room as a tribute to "Doc." Gilbert, Arizona The following is an excerpt from the new book Tales from the San Diego Chargers Locker Room by Sid Brooks with Gerri Brooks The Secret of Hang Time If you've ever wondered in amazement at the flight of the ball that a punter sends sailing high above the field, seemingly hanging in the air longer than a helium-filled balloon at the fair, then here's a little secret about hang time never before revealed to the public. But let me first say that I have never been a conspirator in NFL sabotage. I plead the fifth to any wrongdoing, but I have always been on the side of the players on the Chargers' team. I helped them with whatever they needed in order to win the trophy, and when necessary, I was blind. Wilson Sporting Goods provided the official footballs used by NFL teams along with appropriate directions for preparing balls for game day. Each team is allotted 360 balls per season. Before each game at home, the home team equipment manager prepares 24 footballs for the game. The NFL rule states that all game balls must be prepared properly and consistently inflated with exactly 13 pounds of air. The rule strictly prohibits any person from altering the fundamental structure, defacing, or reshaping the surface characteristics of a football to be used in a game. If any individual alters the game balls, or if an inappropriate ball is used in a game, the person responsible is subject to a $25,000 fine.  After taking the Chargers into the Super Bowl, equipment manager Sid Brooks came out of retirement to lead USC to two national championships. Until the late '90s, a representative from the equipment department delivered these footballs to the officials' locker room two hours and 15 minutes before game time, at which point the referees checked the balls for final approval. Of all the football players, only the quarterback was allowed to handle the balls to be used in the game by briefly passing them during pre-game warm-ups. If one ball did not meet the quarterback's satisfaction, then another ball was issued. So the rest of the team could only warm up with balls that had been used during regular practice – not game balls. Rules are made to be broken, boys will be boys, and your grandmother's dose of turpentine and sugar proved good for something other than a stomachache. In a covert operation in the back room, kickers applied turpentine on the balls and rubbed off the new texture. The point of doing so was to improve the ball's hang time. Whether or not the turpentine worked is debatable, but the fact remains that at this time kickers and punters were kicking the ball higher than at any time before in NFL history. The NFL became aware that something was being done to the balls without knowing what or how. NFL headquarters sent memos to the equipment managers with the correct preparations for the game balls, and directed Wilson to send the balls directly to the equipment managers in sealed boxes to prevent anyone from tampering with the balls, and with a renewed warning to fine anyone who altered a ball. The punter, kicker, and some equipment managers unsealed the boxes with extreme care, worked the footballs over, then sealed the boxes as though they hadn't been touched. The application process was called the "Bolt Recipe," which follows in code: - Firmly wipe down potato (football) with very damp/wet brush (towel). Do not worry if potato gets too wet.
- Place five potatoes in a potato sack (cotton laundry bag).
- Do not use mesh bag; this will rub off the dimples on the potato.
- Dry in industrial oven (clothes dryer) for ten minutes on medium-high heat. If potato comes out really burnt, reduce heat. Take about five pounds of air out of the potato and work the seams and points with hands and knees. A good position to do this is to kneel on a couple of towels and lean over to press the potato against the floor. Place a towel on the floor under the potato.
- Using silverware (ball pump), pump up potato with approximately 20 pounds of air and leave overnight.
- In the morning bring potato back to 13 pounds of air.
- Brush with Wilson brush until tacky. Do not brush too much. If the potato becomes too shiny, you brushed too much.
- Now the potato is ready for the market.
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