By Preston Williams
Thursday, November 1, 2007
The way Pete Snitzer, Roy Bartnek, Steve Burney and Don Rosenberger figure it, they have the best seats in the house, only, well, without the seats.
The quartet is better known as the Annandale High School varsity football chain crew. With each volunteer working on the crew for the past decade-plus, their sideline residency has become as much a part of the Annandale experience as the landscaping in the end zone or the sign outside the stadium trumpeting the school's six state championship teams.
Chain crews are a crucial, if overlooked, component of high school football. The chain gang personnel serve as deputized members of the officiating crew, though they are often the fathers of players from the home high school.
In Annandale's case, its chain crew members have stuck around long after their kids, and in Snitzer's case, grandson, have graduated. And for guys who get together on only five Friday nights a year, they have developed a comfortable choreography when it comes to managing the sticks and making the game hum.
"They know each other's moves," Annandale Athletic Director Angelo Hilios said. "It's unbelievable." A man on the sideline at a recent game compared them to the Hogettes at Washington Redskins games. He seemed to mean it as a compliment.
Let's meet the four guys (Charlie Palmer pinch-hits when necessary):
¿ Snitzer, 67: Retired from the CIA. Has put off knee surgery until next week, when his football and fall rec league softball seasons end. Has held University of Maryland season football tickets for the past 39 years. The senior member of the group at 19 years of service. Donated new chains to the football program last year. Handles the down marker, or "box," as it's called.
¿ Bartnek, 53: Works for the U.S. Postal Service. On one recent Friday night had a pouch of Big League Chew gum in his pocket. Tells elaborate pregame jokes with such punch lines as: "Oh, that's a knick-knack, Patty Whack, give that frog a loan. His old man is a Rolling Stone." Huge Packers fan. Holds one end of the 10-yard chain. In his 13th year on the sideline.
¿ Burney, 54: A superintendent for a construction company. Has built a wrestling awards stage and shelving units for a room the football team uses. The only Annandale graduate (Class of 1971) among the bunch, he had eight brothers and sisters who also attended the school. Holds an end of the 10-yard chain. Eleventh year on the crew.
¿ Rosenberger, 61: An elevator inspector who used to work at the White House; talked a colleague through an elevator repair at Camp David before the summit with Mikhail Gorbachev. Runs 10-mile races, a hobby that comes in handy when the hobbled Snitzer hands off the down marker for Rosenberger to skirt downfield after long runs. Gets picked on by crew mates when he wears black socks with shorts. Handles the "clip," which helps keep track of where the first-down mark is in case the sticks have to be dropped abruptly or have to be brought onto the field for a measurement. Tenth year on the crew.
Varsity Letter caught up with the Annandale crew Oct. 19 for the final regular-season home game, vs. Lake Braddock, on a night when the rain and wind kicked up so much in the fourth quarter that the kicking net on the sideline blew over.
The four rolled onto the field, separately, shortly after 7 p.m., donned their blaze-orange vests and awaited instructions from line judge Scott Asher. Officials deal with a different chain crew each game they call, so they have to assume they are dealing with novices. Asher's main message: Throw down the sticks and get out of the way when players are heading toward them out of bounds, and don't move to set up for a first down without Asher signaling.
The most important attribute of a chain crew member?
"Somebody who listens," said Dennis Hall, commissioner of the Northern Virginia Football Officials Association. "Sometimes it's even better to have people who don't know the game because they'll definitely wait for the official to wave them on. But most experienced ones are very good."
Chain crew members are in an awkward position. They stand on the visitors' sideline, because that's opposite the press box. But that puts them in the thick of the opposing teams' players and coaches. So rooting is a no-no, although sometimes a cheer might slip out.
Bartnek recalls one season when Annandale was clinging to a thread of a lead in the final minute against Gar-Field. His son, Chris, boomed a punt that was downed inside the 10-yard line, coaxing a curse word from a visiting coach. "That's my boy," Bartnek could not help but utter, but probably not so loud that the coach heard him.
In a recent change, chain crews must line up two yards behind the sideline, pushing them deeper into the opposing coaches and players. "If you've had beans and hot dogs for dinner, you can usually keep 'em back a ways," Rosenberg jokes. That can make sideline navigation difficult. It also can expose the crew members to key information that they are powerless to share, not that they would.
"When you know they've got a trick play running and there's nothing you can do about it," Burney said, "sometimes you want to scream, you see it coming the whole time. Or the players behind us are getting excited [saying], 'Here it comes, here it comes.' "
There are physical dangers, as well. Bartnek bruised both hips and hurt his hand this season while trying to elude a player headed his way on a tackle out of bounds. Sympathy? His crew mates accused him of trying to get attention from a female athletic trainer.
The reward is knowing you did a good job. After one game this season, an official approached the Annandale crew and said: "Hey, I have to go to Emory & Henry tomorrow and do their game. Want to come down and do their chains?"
That was nice to hear. But for now, and perhaps for years, they will stick with Annandale.
"Angelo keeps asking us if we want to come back," Rosenberger said. "You either die or resign or move out of the neighborhood before you break up a happy home, I guess."
Varsity Letter is a weekly column about high school sports in the Washington area.
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