A small piece of football history has passed. Howard “Red” Hickey, the man who invented the shotgun formation while he was head coach of the San Francisco 49ers in 1960, died yesterday at the age of 89. Hickey used the formation for only one season in San Francisco, but after he became an assistant for the Dallas Cowboys, he managed to get Tom Landry to use it, and that helped the formation spread throughout football.
No word yet on whether Junior Walker and the All-Stars will be playing at the funeral.
