Single-Bar Facemask Makes Final Stop in Cleveland

If you know your history of the National Football League, you know that Paul Brown was the inventor of the facemask when his star quarterback sustained a nasty facial injury and Brown, seeing a piece of spare plastic in Browns trainers bag, attached it to Graham's leather helmet. The single-bar facemask would make history and become standard practice in the NFL, giving way to the more modern facemask of today's game.

The single-bar facemask has actually gone out of circulation in the NFL nowadays. Like NHL players without helmets, and MLB batters who didn't wear flaps on the earpiece, the NFL has grandfathered the old facemask but no one in league wears it. Not until the Browns signed Scott Player as an emergency punter in case the injured Dave Zastudil (oblique) cannot perform his punting duties on Sunday.

The last time, to my recollection, that a player on the Browns wore a single-bar facemask was their long-time kicker Matt Bahr. The last placekicker to employ the ancient looking facemask was Gary Anderson who retired (this time for good in 2004). The league doesn't even make the single-bar helmet anymore, forcing Player to bring along his own equipment with him. So, take a good long look at Scott Player if he sees action on Sunday. It will be the last time you see a Brown with a device that was born here long ago.