Perhaps Jordan was prophetic in predicting that more emphasis on recruiting would result from a spring practice ban, and perhaps his statements penetrate to the core of the much-criticized recruiting violations in the Ivy League. His remarks represent one of the strong oppositional arguments in the controversy over the Ivy spring practice ban.

Last month the controversy was nourished by the much-publicized poll conducted by the Yale Dally News. In that poll, 62 Yale football players on last year's undefeated championship team were asked if they, would like spring football practice; 55 of them said yes.

Several sports news commentators in the East trumpeted the results of the poll, and reminded the Ivy Policy Committee that to many observers the present ban on spring practice is outdated, sissy, and bush. While the player opinion was being amplified, however, a significant fact was neglected: 43 out of the 55 had favored spring drills only if they were limited to freshmen. One must realize that reinstatement or continned denial of Ivy spring football is not a simple black and white matter -- even among the players there is considerable disagreement.

At Harvard, a random poll taken recently showed that 65 per cent of the players favor spring practice.

Only among the eternal grand-standers, who would welcome any improvement devices for Ivy League football, and among the coaches, as one would expect, is opinion in favor of spring drills. Crimson coach John Yovicsin said recently that a mere reminder of the Ivy coaches' unanimous appeals to the Policy Committee in 1958 and in 1959 for spring practices serve as a sufficient statement of the attitude of the Ivy coaches on the matter.

Although a preponderance of administrators endorse the present ban, a few members of the Ivy committee have expressed considerable disagreement with it. Robert J. Kane, athletic director at Cornell, for example, said last November that the press had made the correct inference of his statement on the firing of football coach George K. (Lefty) James -- that it was a "backhanded slap at the Ivy League's no-spring practice rule."

(Kane had said in a prepared statement, "Lefty was a competent teacher given too little time to teach.") Asked for an explicit state- ment on his feelings on spring practice in the Ivy League, Kane answered, "Td love it ... crews practice all fail, don't they?"

What in particular disturbs those people opposed to the present ban is that under the present system, Ivy coaches are forced to pick their teams in a ridiculously short period of about two weeks. Pre-season drills in the Ivy League cannot begin before September 1, leaving approximately three weeks for the coach to condition the players and pick first and second teams on which to focus attention for the first game. And those players on the top of the heap by the first game usually stay there; the coach must dwell on refining team coordination once the season has begun.

Consequently, it is possible for some players to get the nod over others because of distant high school reputations and early season breaks rather than because of proven superiority. And because coaches must devote time to basic instruction such as tackling and blocking -- the bulk of which could be handled in the spring -- much of the time for scrimmages, which determine the team's ladder, is cut down. Ivy coaches, many of whom agree that the present system is in this sense unfair, argue that they have too little time to develop players and turn out top rate football teams.

Players who develop late -- especially sophomores in their first varsity season -- often waste away holding a dummy and awaiting next fall's pre-season practice for another chance. It is no surprise, then, that many sophomores and JV players on last year's squad would welcome the opportunity to gain additional instruction and to prove themselves during the spring.

Curiously, opinion among the first-stringers is split. Charlie Ravenel, the legend that needs no explanation, said, "In my senior year (last fall) I felt that I was finally coming around as a football player -- spring football would have certainly accelerated the process." Ravenel, who "would have loved the additional chance to improve (himself) and the team," said that he would have given up baseball to play spring football. Meanwhile, one wonders how much Ravenel could have improved....

Terry Lensner, last fall's team captain, favored spring practice, but added that he might oppose the idea if "the sacrifices to be made were academic rather than social."

Tackle Darwin Wile said that many players like himself crave for spring workouts of one sort or another -- "We work out anyway. It might as well be on football." Many players agreed that if the league is to be on a par with other conferences, spring football must be reinstated. Ivy football was called "out-rate," "sloppy," etc.

One player said, "The way a player votes on spring practice reflects his love for the game," adding, "those gays on the team who don't want spring football are just lazy jerks anyway."

The arguments endorsing the present ban point out the quality of Ivy teams such as last fall's undefeated Yale eleven and assert that Ivy football is not inferior; call the league's present system a healthy and necessary balance between academics; and note to the players the idea of spring football is not as simple as -- "The crews practice all fall, don't they?"