Bryan-College Station Eagle from Bryan, Texas • 38

The Daily Eagle Bryan College Station Texas Cowboy Insiders Newsletter riday Nov 5 1971 Page 2 BLACKIE SHERROD any Sports Columnist Dallas Morning News still a Cowboy said Mac who has kept his house in South Garland and lives there during off season keep up with them Of course when they play the Bears different SMITH AND THOMAS are now on the Cowboy taxi squad The Cowboy computer apparently considered none of these young quar PERCIVAL THOUGHT when De number came up he Mac might be put on the taxi squad He figured he could keep his job at South Garland and still work with the taxi squad or play for a semi pro club on weekends A funny thing happened to Mac Perci val on the way to that assumption coming true Mac was swapped to the Bears for a future high draft choice Ben Agajanian who helps coach the Cowboy kickers during training camp had told the Bears Mac was prospect Mac went to Chicago and beat out the regular kick er Roger Leclerc Mac has been the kicker ever since MAC REMEMBER was the as sistant coach at South Garland whose chief claim to athletic fame was as a basketball player at Texas Tech When the Kicking Karavan which swooped around the country looking for kickers in the damdest places started Mac tried out because of the urging of some of his compadres and finally because of his wife called Gil Brandt and put name on the list She knew it was something dreamed about Why not try it? Anyway everybody else was rom the first until the last of Cowboy training camp in 1967 Mac held the edge kicking When Dal las opened that year against Los Angeles Mac was tossed into the first football game played in since high school and yet kicked two out of two field goals furnishing Dal las with what turned out to be its only points All the Cowboys were pulling for Mac Mac stayed in front as the Dallas kicker though a guy named Harold Deters looked extremely good too inally it came down to the Green Bay game in the Cotton Bowl and Mac lost the edge The thought is of course that the Dallas Cowboys must draft a quar terback this very blessed year Of course that also was the thought last year and it perished on the desert Craig Morton is 28 Roger Stau bach is 29 Granted there is aposs ibility that both can play five or six years maybe more But in the meantime Tom Landry needs to be grooming a replacement if he is to stick by his old belief that it requires five years training for a quarterback to become a winner in pro football Also there is some feeling that at least one of the existing Cowboy quarterbacks will ask to be traded after this season Staubach already had made this feeling known after the Superbowl That if he regularly this year he would like to be swapped to another club There is reason to believe that Landry prom ised hiin that favor Now then per haps the Dual Quarterback System is the answer keeping both Morton and Staubach happy But this is indeed doubtful It probably keeps both unhappy and who knows maybe both will ask to be traded in his heart Landry felt that Mac was the better of the two hated to let Mac go more than anything said Landry at the time had the great potential and was the type person you love to have on your club But I just felt we have the time to watch his development We were 'going for the championship right I certainly have no animos ity at all towards the Cowboys They were terrific to me I owe everything to them They gave me my chance a chance never had So Mac Percival became at 27 what he used to wish he was It happen with the Dallas Cow boys like hoped but he proved he certainly wasn't charging windmills Executive Sports Editor Dallas Times Herald completely psyched myself out for that he once recalled felt really any pressure es pecially in the other preseason games but this one was back home I had my peopleand my friends pulling for me 4 1 felt like the whole stadium full of people were resting on my Mac was way off on his first try and then mis sed a gimme from close in In all due respect Tom Landry had to pick Deters who ironically retired after the season Harold HE PROSPECT seemingly draw ing the most attention again to the untrained ear would be John Reaves bi lorida This is a big sturdy youngster 6 3 and 210 andgrowing with huge hands one whose passing dejivery brings the ball far over hii helmet not the only style of parsing by own right earlobe As a sophomore he was a passing sensation The first varsity pass he threw was a 70 yard touch down bomb to Carlos Alvarez his fayorite receiver Then Doug Dickey replaced Ray Graves as the lorida coch and Dickey nearly as pass oriented When the Gators get a couple touchdowns ahead nowa days they sit on it they go into an offensive shell About the only time th0y throw much is when behind And when Alabama was thumping lorida good Reaves thlrew 40 times He completed 22 arjd had eight passes dropped love to play with the Cow Reaves told a Texas visitor Jast week are a first class outfit they mind spending the n)oney they have the material to go to the Superbowl year after year But of course there are other teams like to play with It take much imagination to figure some of the to be Baltimore and both New York teams They also are in need of young quarterbacks But the Cowboys figure to get a draft shot at Reaves Not unless they trade for it and this has not been their pattern And the Cowboys are most predictable when it comes to staying within a pattern ANYWAYS THE COWBOYS des perately need a young quarterback in the wings the reason the Vaunted Experts thought Dallas would choose a youngster from the lush crop of last year There were seven quarterbacks chosen in the first three rounds Jim Plunkett Archie Manning Lynn Dickey Dan Pastorini Karl Douglas Leo Hart and Ken Anderson Of course the Cowboys had no draft opportunity at some of these because they drafted No 25th But they could have traded for an early draft choice and some of us expected them to do just that Still when the Cowboys picked Tody Smith as their first round draft choice Dickey Hart Douglas and Anderson were still available along with Chuck Hixson the SMU passer on their own doorstep When Dallas made its second pick Ike Thomas of Bishop the same quarterbacks were still on the loose thrbacks worth the expense not in domparison to taxi squadders like Snith and Thomas But you must Wonder if the computer looked ahead tb this season and judged the value apd number of this college quarterbacks To the untrained eye mey seem nearly so plentiful saw a young man at lorida Slate Gary Huff who throws the ball very well indeed but he is a jijuor Pat Sullivan the Auburn quarterback is among national of fense leaders but Sullivan is but 640 and 190 and the Cowboy com piler spits those quarterback mea svements in the nearest waste bajsket CHICAGO WAS a gangster flick or an old Sears Roebuck catalogue in the attic It was place about as far away as oh say Shanghai and a nice song: cag oo Che cag oo that And Chicago certainly was not a place that fit into Mac big dream when he was Walter Mitty at South Garland High School But in professional sports as in love and war you fit the dream to the place and if ever the twain shall meet luckv bov real lucky I And Chicago has been THE place just missed a shot even if for Mac the 31 year old place kicker for the Chicago Bears You remember Mac Some five years ago he was teaching at dear SGHS and watching professional football on television Then along came the now defunk Kicking Kar avan Mac was the only guy to make it out of KK in 1967 while other mem bers were appearing as Don Quix ote all worked outgreat for Mac said Bears have been great to me and so have people in Chicago And doing what I set out to do was awfully hard to get used to Chicago the snow and all but now I like it sAti Bob St John Miscellaneous Records Mof Coniocutivo Patioi Don Meredith 10 vt Philadelphia Nov 17 1943 Craig Morton 10 vt Philadelphia Oct 19 1969 Wihouf Interception Don Meredith 166 Jvj Philo Doc 1965 ended vt St Louii Oct 16 1966) Moit Coniocutivo Gamoi to Ruth for'TD Dan Roovoi 4 in 1966 Moit Coniocutivo Gamoi to Catch TD Paiii rank Clarke 7 final game of 961 tooion tint nx gemot in Bob Hoyoi 7 (find throe gamoi of 1965 sooion firit four garnet in 1966) Moit Coniocutivo Gomel Intercept Pon Don Biihop 5 in 1961 Moit Con cutiv PAT Mike Clerk 10 loll 54 in 1961 end firif 26 in I Jo Moit Coniocutivo Gomel at tooit Ono Pon Lance Ronhol 36 (final nx gamoi of 1967 toaion all of 1 961 and 1969 fint two gamoi of 1970) 1969 ion fint game of IR7Q) on a Ml I I 3 I wb.