On The Road Again And Again...

Such a silly rule was made to be broken, Blood reasoned. So he hijacked the elevator.

"John just walked into the elevator," Haugsrud said, "handed the elevator girl some change and asked her to buy him cigarettes. When she went to the cigar stand, he stole the elevator. Of course, he didn't stop it at a men's floor."

The ensuing chase would have done credit to the Marx Brothers, as Haugsrud and Nevers went running up and down stairs, trying to catch the elevator. They finally corralled Blood on a fire escape and took him to his room.

During the tour, Haugsrud wore a uniform to make it look as if the Eskimos had more players than they did, and he practiced kicking before the games. He began to think he was pretty good. "Sometime we'll let you kick the extra point, Ole," said Nevers kiddingly.

Their stretch of five games in eight days began on a Saturday in St. Louis. They were ahead of the Gunners 52-0 when Nevers waved Haugsrud in to kick a field goal. But it was a joke: The Eskimo linemen didn't block anybody, and Haugsrud was buried beneath St. Louis players. He got his revenge, though. He put his right arm in a sling and said it had been broken; he wouldn't be able to sign any paychecks until it healed. It took two weeks.

Two players were hurt in Detroit on Sunday, and the Eskimos went to New York for a Thursday game against the Giants with a squad of only 14 men. Still, the Giants barely won 14-13. On Saturday the Eskimos lost to the Frankford (Pa.) Yellowjackets, then went to Pottsville, Pa., for a Sunday game against the Maroons.

Blood, Walt Kiesling and Cobb Rooney found the local speakeasy, which was in a firehouse. Late that night, Blood and Rooney got into a friendly argument about which of them would win if they had a fight. Kiesling was to referee, and they went out into an alley. The only punch that landed was a roundhouse right from Blood that hit a brick wall. Blood's hand was broken.

Haugsrud was furious. "I fired all three of them," he said. "But that was in the morning. Well, I knew I needed them for the game, so I hired them back at noontime. Kies and Johnny are both in the Hall of Fame. I'm probably the only manager who ever fired two Hall of Famers in one day."

"When we got to the field for the game," Nevers said, "the whole damn fire department was soaking the field with water. I guess they figured the only way they could beat us was to slow us down." Nevers completed 17 consecutive passes, three of them caught one-handed by Blood, and the Eskimos won.

Haugsrud, Nevers and Blood all agreed that the next game, in Providence, was the dirtiest football game ever played. The hometown officials kept penalizing Duluth, while the Steamroller got away with everything. The culmination came about halfway through the fourth quarter, when Blood caught a pass from Nevers and was knocked out of bounds on the five-yard line. The Eskimos were promptly hit with three consecutive 15-yard penalties, moving them back to the 50.