This is the drill that scares kids away. One offensive lineman blocks one defensive lineman with a running back carrying the ball behind.
Bruises are guaranteed.
So in this group of 9- and 10-year-olds, up stepped John Miller. All 7 years old, 70 pounds of him. Miller wanted a piece of the hardest-hitting kid on this Pop Warner team in Miami, Fla., the one who terrified everybody else.
A whistle was blown and Miller shed his blocker with ease, meeting this running back head-on. His father, the team’s coach, remembers what happened next vividly.
“He almost knocked the kid out,” said Johnnie Green, Miller’s Dad.