Bull in the Ring or you're a pussy

[Guest]

In your football experience, did your coaches ever do "Bull in the Ring" in practice or otherwise?  The way I witnessed/ lived it, was the team formed a large circle with one poor soul in the middle.  Coach would have every player count off from 1 to whatever it was, say 40.  Then he would call off a random number and the player whose number was called would rush the guy in the center and attempt to tackle them. If the effort was good, Coach would call another player to replace the guy in the middle for his turn in the crucible.  Sometimes( mostly) you faced more than one attacker.  It was a big deal to take on 4-5 tacklers.  If Coach didn't like the effort, he'd just start riddling off numbers, "5-7-13-15-31- GO!!!"  Yeah at the same time.

I actually liked Bull In the Ring to see how many I could handle.  When you were a Sophomore or whatever, it sucked balls.  As a Senior, it was like, "Come at me motherfuckers..."  Oklahoma Drills were good.  Bull in the Ring was seemingly more of a Spring Practice/ 2-a-days thing.  Not so much during the season for obvious reasons.  I think people would lose their fucking minds if coaches did it now.

Did y'all do 'Bull In The Ring, or what was the toughest challenge you had and at what level?"

[Royalfan5 2348]

We Oklahomaed a lot. Never did bull in the ring. Our conditioning was always worse than the hitting since we were an 8-man team and our coach believed that running equaled depth. Had to run station to station around the entire school ground with a 60 yard cockle burred hill to bear crawl at the end. He loved Indian runs too. 

[Bevo 13526]

Air raids - Run 100s - Every 10 yards jump on the ground with your arms out - in Houston with steam coming off the ground. Keep going until the fat linemen start throwing up.

[Homesickhorn 2202]

We did Bull in the ring during two a days, and we’d run “the long gauntlet”. That one would for sure get a coach canned on the spot today.

[Had Enough 2057]

Don’t remember ever doing bull in the ring.

[Texzilla58 4717]

We did bull in the ring from fourth grade on though always one or two in one. Did Oklahoma drills as well. I was fine with all hitting drills as I was a big guy on the team. And much of the drill was spent as a spectator.

I hated any kind of running, mainly because if you weren’t within about a five yard radius from me I wasn’t running to you. Laps for any of a million infractions. And one season besides the usual windsprints and bellyslammers of regular practice, we had a coach that made us run a 60 yard sprint for every point given up win or lose. So if we won 56-28 we an 28 of those.

This was back when nothing was known of hydration. Salt tablets to start practice which are probably the cause of my GERD later in life. No water at all until end of practice and you could get it out of a dirty hose. I bet a ton of us had heat strokes that were ignored.

[Hpara759 1777]

Didn't see "Bull in the ring" 2 times a day when we went went full pads second week of 2-a-days along with "Alley drill" and "across the bow" as a choice.....

We went "Alley drill" until Coach Fields saw blood 2 times a day for 11 practices.

literally saw concussion's daily....and I'm not exaggerating 

Edited July 17, 2023 by Hpara759

[Guest]

19 minutes ago, Had Enough said:

Don’t remember ever doing bull in the ring.

That doesn't mean it didn't happen...

[ousux 5586]

Bull in the ring and chokelahoma drills as well. My coach was a bit of a sadist who didn't like fair matchups. Pretty much got my ass kicked until I was a senior and put on a little weight and muscle.

[TreatyOak 16150]

Does breaking in new shoes that really cut into your heels count? 

 

[msucolt45 3989]

My Dad was my HS HC and we did a lot of 3 (offense) vs 2 (defense). Sometimes both defenders were down linemen, sometimes we had a LB behind them. Mid-80’s we “progressed” from rail road ties as the boundaries to actual padded boundaries.

SETX memories- less than a month and they’ll be doing 2-a Days!

Hook’em!!!

[msucolt45 3989]

Didn't see "Bull in the ring" 2 times a day when we went went full pads second week of 2-a-days along with "Alley drill" and "across the bow" as a choice.....
We went "Alley drill" until Coach Fields saw blood 2 times a day for 11 practices.
literally saw concussion's daily....and I'm not exaggerating 

We had a “lineman Shute” that was maybe 3’ off the ground that we ran drills through, as OL personnel. We were taught to “wear out” the thighs of the opponent. Always blocking from the knees to below their numbers. We were “smaller” and slower to most of our District, so we ran the Wishbone and variations of that.

I was our Center in ‘87 at 5’9 and 205. I wasn’t the biggest, nor the smallest.

Hook’em!!!

[Dennis Taylor 18706]

Bull- yep

Oklahoma- yep

12 minute run in pads wearing cleats the school bought from the lowest bidder- yep

Our LB coach devised a hitting drill called The Triangle. One LB in 2 pt, 3 blockers about 2 yards in front of him about a yard apart. Coach stands behind the defender and points at 1 or 2 of the blockers and LB has to take on with correct shoulder or split the double team. I forgot to mention there's a guy on all 4s about 3 inches behind the LB so if you get driven you're on your ass with at least one blocker on top of you. If that happens you unpile and the backer has to get back to his spot asap because blocker(s) keep coming. And it didn't matter if the LB was "ready", you better get your ass ready Stat. That drill definitely inspired a few to pursue other activities and definitely would have to be modified today

[Dennis Taylor 18706]

This is a mofo as well

 

 

 

[Bevo 13526]

The only things that smelled worse than my practice jerseys were my anatomy lab scrubs.

[closetojumping 62231]

We did plank/board drills, which were basically a one on one fight between people of mostly equal size while maintaining balance over a long board. Winner gets to take the next man up. 

We did Oklahoma all the time. 

Did Bull in the Ring in junior high. Honestly, the two above mentioned drills were more brutal. 

To me that most brutal was what our freshman coaches had us do - punt and kick return at full speed repeatedly for 30 minutes to close practice. You got the conditioning in, and the contact. That said, as someone that returned the fucking punts, it was nightmare fuel. Fielding a gosh damned punt with 11 guys bearing down on you at full speed and not being able to fair catch, like 8 times a day, was disturbing. Give me any other drill over that shit. 

[SimonBolivar 10914]

Worst were the 1x1 drills, also Oklahoma drill hurt more at LB than RB.

[Bevo 13526]

3 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

To me that most brutal was what our freshman coaches had us do - punt and kick return at full speed repeatedly for 30 minutes to close practice. You got the conditioning in, and the contact. That said, as someone that returned the fucking punts, it was nightmare fuel. Fielding a gosh damned punt with 11 guys bearing down on you at full speed and not being able to fair catch, like 8 times a day, was disturbing. Give me any other drill over that shit. 

Do you think they did that drill every year or just when you were a senior?

[msucolt45 3989]

When I was in HS my Dad was hesitant to put any Freshmen or Sophomores on the Varsity. So as youngsters, we were the “opponent” every week during practice. Sometimes we’d whip their ass, yes “we’re talking practice”, but the coaches would get all over their ass and all we could do was smile through our face masks. My JV team went 9-1, with a roster of 22 players, while the Varsity went 6-4 that year - no playoffs.

Hook’em!!!

[msucolt45 3989]

To my suggestion, my Dad actually put a “pirates skull and crossbones” decal on our JV helmets as we considered ourselves the Band of Brothers, prior to the book or movie.

Hook’em!!!

[Zepol87 9171]

Bull in the ring was fun as fuck 

[Jkwellborn 6653]

We did Air Raids the length of the field. Snaked the length of the field, every 5 damn yards. Burpees in pads, carried fucking tires over our heads.

Bloody alley. We always practiced JV versus varsity too. We had to run snakes on the bleachers too. Shit was hell in pads and cleats.

Coach got pissed at the variety once because they got stomped, made everyone run 2 miles before conditioning and 1 after.

[Guest]

That LSU video made me tired AF

[msucolt45 3989]

That LSU video made me tired AF

That LSU drill would make me hate practice - “Yes, we’re talking practice!”

Hook’em!!!

[msucolt45 3989]

In the mid to late ‘80s I really don’t think that my Dad, as HC, “abused” us as players. The heat and humidity of SETX was enough to get anyone in Game shape, if they weren’t prior to August.

Nothing like the Beaumont PM rain showers and looking out for the fire ant beds on your practice field afterwards.

We had a “Hawk Mile” that everyone had to beat 7:45, prior to even starting 2-a-days.

Hook’em!!!

[Jkwellborn 6653]

In the mid to late ‘80s I really don’t think that my Dad, as HC, “abused” us as players. The heat and humidity of SETX was enough to get anyone in Game shape, if they weren’t prior to August.

Nothing like the Beaumont PM rain showers and looking out for the fire ant beds on your practice field afterwards.

We had a “Hawk Mile” that everyone had to beat 7:45, prior to even starting 2-a-days.

Hook’em!!!

We normally had practice in the afternoon and evening. I worked doing HVAC and electrical work anywhere from 5-8 hours a day before practice. Always got tickled at the guys that bitched about the heat. It wasn’t a damn attic and had a breeze so it didn’t bother me.

We had a thing called the Mustang Mile too. Shit was stupid.

[Hermanator 6939]

Not only did we do bull in the ring but we did a different form of it too where the same circle existed but 2 guys were called to the middle and a short piece of rope was grasped on each end by the two guys. When the whistle blew whoever walked out of the circle with the rope didn't have to do the 10-20-30 yd yo-yos the loser had to do. Brutal shit

[closetojumping 62231]

56 minutes ago, Bevo said:

Do you think they did that drill every year or just when you were a senior?

Hahaha. I set myself up for that one, but I already said it was freshman year. After the first 6 weeks of grades and fail outs, I played every snap of every game for the last 6 weeks of freshman year. Returning punts and kicks as part of that was a motherfucker. 

[Slacks 6791]

My HS  DC was a Marine that fought in Vietnam. He had scars on his face from a grenade blast. We did all kinds of crazy shit. We did everything on that has been mentioned.. Oklahoma, Bull in the ring, Air Raids, Bear Crawls, Belly Crawls, Burpees (up downs), and combinations of all that shit. 

Even in the off season we had "survival drills" and whatnot. Even if you didn't play  defense, you thought you were a killer. It kinda worked.My shoulders have been grinding since 8th grade., though. 

[ChiTownDoc 21098]

I don’t really remember.  Coincidence?

[Wiler77 1558]

Buncha women's shoe salesmen on this site.

[Wilcox Cummingtonite 2868]

Fuuuuck air raids and gassers. That is all.

[Sal 1088]

57 minutes ago, Jkwellborn said:

We normally had practice in the afternoon and evening. I worked doing HVAC and electrical work anywhere from 5-8 hours a day before practice. Always got tickled at the guys that bitched about the heat. It wasn’t a damn attic and had a breeze so it didn’t bother me.

We had a thing called the Mustang Mile too. Shit was stupid.

Friendswood?

[cochamps 1876]

We had bull in the ring from 7th grade all the way thru 12.  What above poster called air raid sounds a lot like what we called belly slammers, which sucked donkey balls.

[Trojan Man 429]

During two a days in high school we always did bull in the ring and Oklahomas.  We did the "start on your feet" 2v2 or 3v3 Oklahomas as well as the "start on your back" 1v1 version.  Our coaches usually matched up guys of similar size/speed/age.  That way we wouldn't have the all conference senior defensive tackle murdering the sophomore receiver who is still learning how to put on his pads.  I'm in my 30s so this isn't ancient history, but I'm pretty sure I am one of the last to regularly do those drills during all 4 years in high school.  I distinctly remember one time where I got concussed during bull in the ring at the beginning of practice and I was still a full participant for the remainder of practice.  Anyways, I liked these drills.  They helped to weed out the baseball players and the basketball players and the track & field guys from the football players.

[Jkwellborn 6653]

My HS  DC was a Marine that fought in Vietnam. He had scars on his face from a grenade blast. We did all kinds of crazy shit. We did everything on that has been mentioned.. Oklahoma, Bull in the ring, Air Raids, Bear Crawls, Belly Crawls, Burpees (up downs), and combinations of all that shit. 
Even in the off season we had "survival drills" and whatnot. Even if you didn't play  defense, you thought you were a killer. It kinda worked.My shoulders have been grinding since 8th grade., though. 

Our OL coach most of the time I was in school was supposedly a Green Beret or something. Dude was nuts either way.

[Al_4_ISU 12409]

Oklahomas all the time.

Wednesday was always our hardest hitting practice.  We finished those off with 1,000 Yard Club.  Start at the goal line and sprint to the 10 and back, then the 20 and back, and so on until you sprinted goal line to goal line and back.  I never bothered to check the map.

The drill I hated the most was Jug Mondays.  Every Monday, during position group work, the linemen would have to hold milk jugs full of water out in front of us until our arms couldn’t take it any more.  I went to a Catholic HS in Minnesota where my mom worked, but we lived in Iowa.  My nickname through HS was simply “Iowa” as a result.  My DL coach looked like Slash if he were going bald and had a massive beer gut, and he had an extremely shrill voice.  I can still hear him yelling “EYE-UH-WUHHH!!!” at me every chance he got, whether he was complimenting me or chewing my ass.  Especially on Jug Mondays as my damn arms were ready to give out.

[SimonBolivar 10914]

One time we messed up something or another so we had the pleasure of pencil rolling the entire field 4x over. Almost everyone was puking and the coaches thought it was hilarious.

 

I guess the hard hits were worse for us in the long run than shit like that, but this kind of thing was feared more than the one on one's and we actually looked forward to the Oklahoma Drill.

[CooterBrown 17905]

We had a drill called machine gun. IIRC, it was mostly used for punishment.

All the players lined up and one by one ran full speed at the one player receiving the machine gun fire. After getting hit 50+ times, you had to tackle the final bullet who was carrying the ball. If you missed the tackle, you had to instantly run a lap of the practice field.

[RollLeft 5040]

Bull Ring from little league thru 8th.  It disappeared after that. We did not call it "oklahoma" drill but did it all years.  One year we did it under a cage so as to "teach" you to not go high.  As some have mentioned we also did a drill called "bloody board" which was a 1v1 drill where both players, each at the end of the 10ft 2x4, were to get up, run and smash the other person.  I felt sorry for the slower guys as coaches weren't keen on physics back then.  Monkey drills on training days were fun.  "Down Ups" were never called burpees or navy drills. Gassers (horses during basketball season) were fun.  The one drill I hated, on mat drill day, was one where you put your hands behind your back and belly-flopped on the mat.  Coaches didn't want to see you slide, sadistic fks. 

All that said one of the tougher(ok maybe embarassing) challenge, was your birthday or the last day of 2-days for the fish.  Regarding your birthday that was the day you either purposely did not show up or you chose violence.  It was some long-held team tradition to get wrestled down by the linemen and get spanked with wet-weight belts.  In later years, I hear the glee generation added the strip them down part.  

There was always also a long-standing tradition that the last day of 2-day varsity practice ended early and the one for the fish went long due to extra gassers.  The coaches turned a blind eye to whatever the varsity had planned for the freshman.  That year the entire fish team leapfrogged the length of the field solely in their jock straps and bear crawled the entire way back.  Did i mention that the dance team and cheerleaders were invited to watch? They got it easy.  

Edited July 17, 2023 by RollLeft

[SHOOTER12 8789]

13 hours ago, Texzilla58 said:

We did bull in the ring from fourth grade on though always one or two in one. Did Oklahoma drills as well. I was fine with all hitting drills as I was a big guy on the team. And much of the drill was spent as a spectator.

I hated any kind of running, mainly because if you weren’t within about a five yard radius from me I wasn’t running to you. Laps for any of a million infractions. And one season besides the usual windsprints and bellyslammers of regular practice, we had a coach that made us run a 60 yard sprint for every point given up win or lose. So if we won 56-28 we an 28 of those.

This was back when nothing was known of hydration. Salt tablets to start practice which are probably the cause of my GERD later in life. No water at all until end of practice and you could get it out of a dirty hose. I bet a ton of us had heat strokes that were ignored.

Yep back in the day water was for pussies. Only my senior year did we ever get water, sometimes Gatorade during 2-a-days, usually one 4 Oz cup per practice.

[Guest]

Guess I was lucky, from JH through High School all in the 80's- always had coaches that would give you all the damned water you wanted; and in that same vein, we didn't let up because it was hot or whatever.  The work/ drills were getting done regardless. Witnessed very few heat injuries throughout my time.

The first 4 days of 2-a-days when we were just in headgear and shirts/ shorts; I always got a kick out of the dumbasses who didn't do any conditioning all summer.  You dumbasses...

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

Alexa, play Glory Days by Bruce Springsteen.

[Guest]

Just now, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

Alexa, play Glory Days by Bruce Springsteen.

That's baseball.

Varsity Blues was on this weekend though.

[SHOOTER12 8789]

2 minutes ago, slorch said:

Guess I was lucky, from JH through High School all in the 80's- always had coaches that would give you all the damned water you wanted; and in that same vein, we didn't let up because it was hot or whatever.  The work/ drills were getting done regardless. Witnessed very few heat injuries throughout my time.

The first 4 days of 2-a-days when we were just in headgear and shirts/ shorts; I always got a kick out of the dumbasses who didn't do any conditioning all summer.  You dumbasses...

All through Jr High and high school we never had a coach worth pissing on.

OC? DC?  WTF was that? Aside from torture drills and calisthenics all we did was full speed scrimmage for the entire practice.

[RollLeft 5040]

14 minutes ago, slorch said:

Guess I was lucky, from JH through High School all in the 80's- always had coaches that would give you all the damned water you wanted; and in that same vein, we didn't let up because it was hot or whatever.  The work/ drills were getting done regardless. Witnessed very few heat injuries throughout my time.

The first 4 days of 2-a-days when we were just in headgear and shirts/ shorts; I always got a kick out of the dumbasses who didn't do any conditioning all summer.  You dumbasses...

[SHOOTER12 8789]

12 hours ago, msucolt45 said:

My Dad was my HS HC and we did a lot of 3 (offense) vs 2 (defense). Sometimes both defenders were down linemen, sometimes we had a LB behind them. Mid-80’s we “progressed” from rail road ties as the boundaries to actual padded boundaries.

SETX memories- less than a month and they’ll be doing 2-a Days!

Hook’em!!!

No they won't. Not allowed these days.

[Slacks 6791]

 Water? Wtf is that? 

We had buckets of ice with ammonia in them. You could rub ice on yourself to cool, but if you drank from the bucket, you'd get the shits (allegedly}. 

Me, being the thirsty intellectual that I am, realized that if you fill a helmet with ice, sweaty water with little to no ammonia comes out the other side. (same if you held it on your hand and let it melt.) 

And yes, we called it Bull in the Ring... And yes, it started in 2nd grade and continued through college... On top of all the other shit that makes football the greatest team sport in the history of team sports.

I'd do it all again right now... 

[Saint Austin 745]

Remember doing bull-in-the-ring a few times in jr high (mid-90s), but that seemed to have been phased out by the time I entered HS. Oklahoma was common place (and still is for my boys).

[Incredulity 11564]

All of the above.

Conditioning that I hated the worst they called "Burma Road"

Tackling dummy on the sidelines alternating every 5 yards.  Sprint across width the field and tackle the dummy.  First few you flew into, by the end you were just falling over on the dummy.