Jayhawk Insider: The Kansas Football Brotherhood
Signing day is one of the biggest days of the year in college football and not only is it about signing the nation’s top athletes, but bringing together past, present and future Jayhawks.
Dozens of former Kansas football players spent the day at the Anderson Family Football Complex reminiscing on past memories and sharing their excitement for the future of Kansas football.
“It’s so exciting to be back,” Bob Marshall said. “Everything is so much more sophisticated and well done than it was in our day.”
Marshall was a four-sport (baseball, basketball, football and track and field) athlete at the University of Kansas and a member of the football team from 1955-60, but it wouldn’t be until years later that he would meet two-sport (baseball and football) KU athlete Jeff Long.
Marshall and Long first met when Long was in junior high and Marshall was coaching a local YMCA football program. Long has looked up to Marshall ever since.
“Bob was a four-sport athlete, joined the marines after college, was a pilot for over 30 years, became the Athletics Director at Fort Scott Community College and then became a state Senator,” Long said. “He is a great man and someone I have always looked up to.”
Marshall was even part of the reason that Long pursued the military and became a pilot following his graduation from KU.
“I was in the Marine Corp and he (Long) was in the Air Force and that kind of developed our friendship,” Marshall said. “Then I started seeing him whenever we would come to Lawrence for football games and we just bonded through sports.”
With the excitement surrounding Kansas football following signing day, Marshall and Long have a lot to look forward to as the Kansas football brotherhood grew by nine on Signing Day 2019.
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