The Iconoclast

The best college football player in the U.S. this season is a gangling, astigmatic, pigeon-toed son of a shoemaker who sleeps on the floor, runs in the street, dances The Twist, and quotes Sociologist David Riesman. On or off the field, Michigan State Junior George Saimes is something of an iconoclast: a B-plus student who shuns "snap" courses, scoffs at fraternities ("They only do what society tells them to"), and rouses himself to fever pitch with a kind of self-hypnosis. "Every time they send me in," says Fullback Saimes, 20, "I tell myself that the next play is going to be the last of my career, and I ought to do the very best I can."

Largely because log-legged George Saimes has been doing his very best all season long, unbeaten Michigan State is the nation's top-ranked team. Against powerful Michigan, Saimes played on both defense and offense, spent more time on the field than any other Michigan State player, and scored one touchdown on a brilliant, 17-yd. run. In the locker room just before the Notre Dame game, Saimes lost his contact lenses. But his sight was keen enough to throw six key blocks in the last half and to find holes so effectively that he scored two touchdowns in a frenzied third quarter that buried Irish hopes (17-7). Last week against Indiana, Saimes, though nursing a painfully bruised right leg, bulled his way for one touchdown, intercepted a pass, and stormed up from the secondary to slam down Hoosier ball carriers as the Spartans won easily 35-0.

Underfed Boy. At a rock-hard 187 Ibs., Saimes looks like an underfed boy alongside such hulking Big Ten fullbacks as his own Spartan rival, Ron Hatcher (220 Ibs.), and Ohio State's Bob Ferguson (225 lbs.). Coach Duffy Daugherty insists that Saimes is the finest fullback he has ever coached at Michigan State. "I've said it before, and I'll say it again," says Daugherty. "George Saimes could play any position on this team--including quarterback and tackle--and I know he would if I asked him to."

On offense, Fullback Saimes is a scuttling, crablike runner, deceptively fast and agile. "He runs like Groucho Marx walks." says Michigan Line Coach Bob Hollaway. "Thump, thump, thump." Says

Daugherty: "George runs with his legs wide apart, almost at a gallop. That's what makes him so hard to bring down. If you get only one leg and the other's still moving, he jerks it away and he's gone." A bone-rattling blocker, Saimes enjoys banging shoulder pads with defensive ends who outweigh him by 25 lbs. or more. "I like to go at an end straight up," he says, "as though I were carrying the ball. When I hit him, I try to play my helmet right under his chin as hard as I can. That shocks him."

On defense. Saimes has what coaches call a "sense for the ball"--he knows instinctively where the play is going, and he gets there in time. "When I see that halfback or end come into the secondary," says Saimes, "I say to myself, 'Easy now, George, don't go too fast.' I want to rush up and get him, but it's got to be clean. I don't want to miss. If it's a short-yardage situation. I'll aim right for his shoulders to hold him back. If it's a pass completion, I keep my eyes glued to his belt buckle: he can't do much faking there. Then I go for both legs."

A superb all-around athlete, Saimes was a hurdler, a pole vaulter and an all-star fullback at Lincoln High School in Canton, Ohio, fielded scholarship offers from no fewer than four Big Ten schools. He decided on Michigan State, he says, "because I wanted to go some place close to home. Some place where if I got fed up with it all, I could pack up and get home in a day."

Need Case. Classified as a "need case," Saimes gets a full scholarship (board, room, books, tuition), works as a lifeguard during the summer to pick up money for clothes and incidentals. Quiet and shy, he occasionally does nocturnal road work to keep his legs in shape; otherwise he sticks close to his books. "I figure you've got to make sacrifices for anything you get," he says. A social-sciences major, Saimes is still undecided about his future. "I'd like to get a teaching certificate," he says, "so I'll have something behind me. But I don't know whether I want to teach, play pro football, or go into government or business. I don't want to follow what other people say is right. But if you go it on your own and don't make it, your world can come down with an awful crash."

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