Neale, "Greasy" (Alfred Earle)
Football
b. Nov. 5, 1891, Parkersburg, WV
d. Nov. 2, 1973
As an end at West Virginia Wesleyan, Neale caught 14 passes when the school upset the University of West Virginia 19-14 in 1912. He graduated in 1914 and played for the Canton Bulldogs in the pre-NFL days, then went to Muskingum College as football coach in 1915.
Neale returned to West Virginia Wesleyan to coach in 1916 and 1917. After military service in World War I, he coached at Marietta College in 1919 and 1920; Washington and Jefferson in 1921 and 1922; the University of Virginia from 1923 through 1928; and West Virginia University from 1931 through 1933. His overall college record was 78-55-11.
In 1934, Neale became an assistant coach at Yale, where he worked mainly on offensive strategy. When Alexis Thompson bought the NFL's Philadelphia Eagles in 1941, he hired Neale as coach. Neale immediately installed the modern T formation, which had been developed just a year earlier by the Chicago Bears and Stanford University.
Under Neale's guidance, the Eagles had three straight second-place division finishes, from 1944 through 1946. They beat the Pittsburgh Steelers 21-0 for the Eastern Division championship in 1947, but lost 28-21 to the Chicago Cardinals in the league title game.
The Eagles then won two straight NFL championships with shutouts, beating the Cardinals 7-0 in 1948 and the Los Angeles Rams 14-0 in 1949. Neale's "chug" defense was a major reason for the victories. To combat the T formation's passing attack, he assigned linebackers to hold up the opposition's receivers at the line of scrimmage, preventing them from getting into pass patterns quickly.
Despite his success, Neale was fired after the Eagles slipped to a 6-6-0 record in 1950. His overall record in 10 seasons was 71 wins, 48 losses, and 6 ties.
Neale also played 8 seasons as a major-league outfielder, mostly with the Cincinnati Reds. In 768 games, he batted .259. Neale hit .357 for the Reds in the 1919 World Series, as Cincinnati beat the Chicago White Sox 5 games to 3. A year later, eight Chicago players were banned from baseball for allegedly conspiring with gamblers to throw the series.