Badass Of The Day: Paul Brown

Paul Brown is arguably the most influential and important coach in professional football history. Born in 1909 in Ohio, he played quarterback in high school and college, at the Miami University of Ohio, but was too small for Ohio State or professionally (he was only 140 lbs). He returned to his high school alma mater as a football coach, with a 80 victories, 8 defeats and 2 ties over 9 seasons. Brown was nominated by the high-school coaches association to become the head coach for Ohio State in 1941, which many thought was to get him out of their league. He led Ohio State to a Big Ten championship before being commissioned into the navy in 1943.

After the war, Brown was signed to be coach and general manager of Cleavland's team in the new (and doomed) All-America Football Conference ("AAFC"), a rival to the NFL. The team was dubbed "the Browns" in honor of Brown, in a contest where fans named the team. The Browns won all four championships in the AAFC from 1946-49. Brown went on to found the Cincinnati Bengals and won seven NFL conference titles and three championships from 1950-62.

Brown's innovations changed the game of football, and included:

• Brown was the first to use game film to evaluate players and to teach new plays to players.
• Brown introduced playbooks and classroom instruction to professional football.
• Brown was the first to hire full-time, year-round assistant coaches, instead of part-time assistant coaches. He used these assistants' contacts at colleges to develop a scouting system.
• Brown was the first to give players intelligence and psychological tests to judge their ability to learn and improve.
• He was the first to test speed in the 40-yard dash.
• He was the first to use players as messengers to call plays to the quarterback.
• Brown was the first to station assistants high in the stadium to get a better view of the plays, with a telephone to the bench.
• Brown invented the face mask.
• Brown believed that the solid foundation of a football team was blocking and tackling.
• Brown was strict that his players be able to write out plays from memory. He once fired an All-American rookie who failed one of these tests.
• Brown insisted that his players clean up the image of professional football players, implementing rules against smoking, swearing and going to nightclubs. He required that his players wear coats and ties on the road.