Jack "Cactus Jack" Neumeier (19192004) was an American high school football coach from 1946 to 1978. He invented American football's modern

spread offense :''"Spread offense" may also refer to the four corners offense in basketball.'' The spread offense is an offensive scheme in gridiron football that typically places the quarterback in the shotgun formation, and "spreads" the defense horizontall ...

, also known as the one-back spread offense, and originated the phrase "basketball on grass" to describe this offense.

Career

Neumeier was head coach at

Granada Hills High School Granada Hills Charter (often abbreviated to GHCHS/GHC or simply Granada) is an independent charter school consisting of over 4,600 students in grades K–12, located in the Granada Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. It i ...

from 1960 to 1978 and won the Los Angeles City championship in 1970. He was California football Coach of the Year in 1970. His most famous player was

John Elway John Albert Elway Jr. (born June 28, 1960) is an American professional football executive and former quarterback who is the president of football operations for the Denver Broncos of the National Football League (NFL). Elway played college f ...

, who played for Neumeier from 1976 to 1978.

Dennis Erickson Dennis Brian Erickson (born March 24, 1947) is an American football coach who most recently served as the head coach for the Salt Lake Stallions of the Alliance of American Football league. He was also the head coach at the University of Idaho ( ...

, who first met Neumeier through

Jack Elway Jack may refer to: Places * Jack, Alabama, US, an unincorporated community * Jack, Missouri, US, an unincorporated community * Jack County, Texas, a county in Texas, USA People and fictional characters * Jack (given name), a male given name, ...

, while serving as Jack Elway's offensive coordinator at

San Jose State San José State University (San Jose State or SJSU) is a public university in San Jose, California. Established in 1857, SJSU is the oldest public university on the West Coast and the founding campus of the California State University (CSU) sy ...

, learned about the spread offense directly from Neumeier. Erickson,

Joe Tiller Joseph Henry Tiller (December 7, 1942 – September 30, 2017) was an American football player and coach. He was the head coach at the University of Wyoming from 1991 to 1996 and Purdue University from 1997 to 2008, with a career record of know ...

and other coaches subsequently coached national championship teams and Heisman Trophy winners using Neumeier's offense, which is now utilized in some form by almost every football team at every level of play, NFL, college, high school and youth football. He continued to mentor other coaches utilizing variations of his spread offense until Neumeier's death in 2004. 1919 births 2004 deaths High school football coaches in California People from Van Nuys, Los Angeles Sportspeople from Los Angeles Coaches of American football from California {{Amfoot-coach-stub