The last Pop Warner game

On one of the walls in my office is a series of three photographs grouped together in one frame. To the left is a picture of the Branham Hughes football team from around 1917. My grandfather, without helmet, is crouching behind the front line. In the center is a picture of my father with his helmet, without facemask, he wore for the Clarksville High School Wildcats. At the right is a picture of the Washington and Lee football players in 1978 who were from Atlanta, Georgia: Stewart Atkinson (Lakeside High), Don Crossley (Henderson High), George West (Westminster High) and yours truly.

That's three generations of Tom Baynhams in their football gear. I have a picture of brother Frank and myself in our Dunwoody High School uniforms. I think they are both from our respective junior years. There have been numerous other football players in my family, particularly from the branch which lives near Aiken and North Augusta, South Carolina. Notably, Craig Baynham, who played for Georgia Tech before being drafted by the Dallas Cowboys. He had a son, Grant, who also played for Georgia Tech. There have been others. Football is a big part of our family history.

When I was nine years old, my mother let me out of the station wagon at Murphy Candler Park in North Atlanta to participate in my first football practice. I remember looking back at her as I walked toward the other boys and listening as she said, "Be aggressive." An odd admonition for my mother. Interestingly, it was fourteen years later, on the football field at Georgetown University, when my father was tearing up over my last football game and my mother grinned and said, " I am so glad that your career is finally over without a serious injury."

As you can see, my mother laid the bookends on my career with an admonition for my benefit and a final statement in which she let her true feelings show. I suppose all mothers of football players, no matter what size, age or level, worry about the possibility of harm to their little boys.

I had a lot of fun playing football. I remember way too much about the games and my teammates and the plays. I sometimes amaze my wife with my ability to remember minutiae of games that happened thirty to forty years ago. I remember one special year very vividly.

When I was twelve years old, I tried out for the 115 pound Atlanta Colts. It would be my last year in Pop Warner football and the Atlanta Colts was one of the premier leagues in the country. At one time we had more participants in that league than any other youth athletic league, of any sport.

A lot of my friends were on that team. Guys I had played with or against for four years prior. Guys I would play with or against in High School. I remember my last high school football. Jeff Meadows and myself, along with all the other seniors, were the team captains for that game. We walked out to call the coin toss. On the other side were Tony Cannaro, Blake Mitchell, Bud Schrieber, Gene Geeslin, maybe a couple of others I can't now remember, who all played with me on the same 115 pound Colts. We shook hands and smirked at each other.

But when we all finally made the 115 pound Colts team and the final cuts were made, the coaches met with our parents outside our hearing. In that meeting, the Head Football Coach, Bob Johnson, told our parents that he didn't necessarily expect much from this team, since it was so small and untested. I was playing at 104 pounds at right guard. We had very few members of that team who sweated the weigh-in before every game. Going into the season, nobody knew what we could do.

But that didn't stop the coaches from training us the same way they had trained all the others.
I remember that the word "pride" was the biggest word in all of our practices and pre-game speeches. We were following teams who had been bigger, who had gone on to play college football. And yet, not one 115 pound team had won the championship, the Bobby Dodd bowl.

So it was quite a surprise when we were flying south toward Fort Myers, Florida, after going undefeated and twice scored upon during the season, the champions of the 115 pound Bobby Dodd Bowl, played at College Park Stadium against the class of our league, the Midway Mighty Mites, and winners of the Atlanta Colt Classic against a team from Vienna, Virginia.

As we flew down to South Florida, the only thing we knew was that the team from Fort Myers was undefeated as well. As we arrived in Florida, we were parceled out to the families of the players on the other team. They were nice boys with nice families. They showed us around the area. By the time we played on a cool December night in South Florida, we were distracted, but ready to play.

That game went back and forth. We were inside their twenty twice in the first half, but our quarterback threw an interception into the end zone on one fourth down and then was tackled trying to run into the end zone on the second opportunity.

Late in the game, still tied at 0-0, we caught Fort Myers in a stunt away from our play on second and eight from the five yard line, a straight dive up the middle off my right hip, and Tommy Sheehan cut out and ran down the sidelines toward the other endzone. Unfortunately, Tommy ran out of steam and got caught from behind and fumbled the ball into the opponent's hands.

That was the last chance for either team to score. Fort Myers had never crossed our fifty yard line. The final whistle sounded and we went out to shake hands with the other team. Later, we ran sullenly off the field and on into the locker room. The coaches stayed inside, talking to the parents, not really knowing what to say to us. This would be the only negative on our record that year. As the coaches and parents talked outside the visitor's lockerroom, the team became little boys again and cried together.

I will never forget that night. Crying on the bench in the lockerroom. Watching as the coaches filed in, not really knowing what to say to us. There would be other final games. But that was definitely a memorable one. A milepost to remember.