Mark Sanchez carefully decides which six footballs will be used in the game
By Ben Malcolmson
USCRipsIt
PeteCarroll.com
There can only be six.
Getting to that point isn’t as easy as you’d think.
Each team supplies six game balls for each contest, and a few days before every game, it’s up to the USC starting quarterback to pick which footballs the team will use that Saturday.
It’s a precious process that can take as long as 15 minutes after a Wednesday or Thursday practice, as Mark Sanchez carefully feels, massages, throws and then plucks his favorite footballs in what’s become known as “picking the peaches.”
How does he decide?
“You just know,” Sanchez said. “You feel them out and then you can just tell.”
Sanchez gets to choose from about 25 footballs that the team uses during practice. The balls are then marked and bagged, not to be touched until game day.
The footballs are all the same specifications, so why does the process take such detailed consideration?
“They technically should be the same size,” Sanchez shrugged, “but they’re all just a little different.”
Here’s a look at Sanchez “picking the peaches” following the Wednesday practice prior to the Virginia game:
Mark Sanchez feels a football while trying to decide whether to keep it as a game ball or not.
Mark Sanchez flips the ball in the air to get a feel for it in his hands.
Mark Sanchez discards a ball he doesn’t like.
After narrowing the pile down to about 10 balls, Mark Sanchez inspects a football from head to toe as he tries to pick only six.
After Sanchez has selected the six game balls, student equipment manager David “Flash” Toper marks the footballs with “1” for the game number.
• Ben Malcolmson is the Director of Online Media for USCRipsIt/PeteCarroll.com. You can contact him at Ben@PeteCarroll.com.
