Tubby

Recently I received a phone call from "Tubby" Raymond, my college football coach at the U. of Delaware.  The College Football Hall of Fame member, and one of the very few coaches of all time with 300 or more wins, had read the book.  The first thing he said was "Bobby, I never knew any of my players could read or write!"  After that he was extremely complimentary; he was very impressed by my effort (something he drilled into us all the time!), and said he was proud of me.

He had never known much about my father.  And he never knew that Swede and Iron Mike Purzycki were Newark's best athletes back in the day, and were direct rivals in high school.  Iron Mike's sons, Joe and Mike, were Delaware teammates of mine and life long friends.  In any event, I was excited to receive praise from Tubby...he's not one to throw it around lightly.

A couple of days ago my son Max's friend remarked that her mother started to read the book and found herself in tears.  (I assume she wasn't bored to tears!).  Seriously, I like that "SWEDE" means different things to different people.