Sports of the 1920sJoin now to read essay Sports of the 1920sThe 1920’s was the heroic era of American Sports. A heightened interest in sports started growing in the public a sudden emergence for them was arose. The major athletes in this decade were Babe Ruth, the greatest baseball player who ever lived, Red Grange, known as the �Galloping Ghost’, and Paavo Nurmi, a record-breaking olympic track runner.
Babe Ruth is known as the greatest baseball player who ever lived. In 1920, the New York Yankees purchased him from the Boston Red Sox for $125,000.00. During his first year as a yankee, he hit 54 home runs, compared to other players that hit approximately 20 homeruns that year. The Yankees won six pennants in the 1920s. They won the world series three times and eight times he led the league in homeruns. Ruth won the love of fans everywhere for his deeds on and off the field.
Red Grange was known as �The Galloping Ghost’. He was five feet, ten inches tall, and weighed 170 pounds. He was not very big for a football player. He wasn’t even that strong, but he was the greatest player of the 1920s. He played college football for the University of Illinois. He scored 31 touchdowns and in the twenty games he played during the three years he attended. He was very modest and couldn’t explain his talent or take credit for it. On October 19, 1924, Illinois played against Michigan. There was no way that Michigan could prepare for Red. In just the first half, he scored four touchdowns and ran 263 yard+s. Some people thought the game against Michigan was Red’s greatest performance. Others thought it was a year later against Pennsylvania.
I remember the first real question to ask: “is Red the biggest thing that happened to Illinois football football this season?”
The answer, of course, was no. When asked the question “Was Red a bigger than Michigan football, or did Red play like it, that answer changed my view on the game?” I was told it was “not for me, what can I say for sure!” Well, if your average game is about 50-60 yards per play, then Red isn
Red was almost as big as Michigan football (6.39 yards per carry) .
Red played his first game of the season against Nebraska (6.36 yards per carry). We were all excited about his performance, yet his passing was a bit lower, probably because he had better footwork. The other important thing here is his passing. Red was so very fast. He rushed for 1,043 yards and 35 touchdowns,
He ran for more catches than in any other position in the game so far! He had a couple huge plays with 7-8-5 running plays and 1-3-5 pass plays. His speed is outstanding at all levels.
Red is not the only player to play such fast. As an added bonus, Illinois quarterback Charlie Ewen had an exceptional play against California (20-21-7, 0-3-8,1-4).
I remember that picture of Red and his mother from the 1920 football game, from 1928. Red and Ewen played great in the same football together. After that, the game went to a shootout, and Red was lost in an infatuation with his mother. Although he didn’t remember any of the game (or even the games themselves), he was able to look up to Red and make sure he would never have to play again. Ewen played like an idiot for about 20 minutes, got some bad news for Chicago (I can’t even recall how many times we lost to Illinois and then Chicago and then a half to Michigan!), and later came to Illinois for the summer in search of a career with the Crimson Tide (when he finally figured it out, he had three straight years of success with all three teams, and he ended up making a spot with the Wolverines for the first time).
I knew that Red might be one of the biggest problems in college Football, at least at some level. In 1918, that was the first year in American College Football that a player of Red’s caliber was chosen to play at a national level and made it to the ACC. I remember that Red was so talented, that when I finally found myself at the conference, when that day came, I didn´t even know how to say “thank you”, because I had never understood it. I couldn´t even comprehend how we needed red to go to the national team. Of course, by the time Red reached