SCORECARDnext week, reportedly kicking an
end zone camera pylon so hard that
it snapped off its wired base.)
In addition to the tackling dummy,
Neil’s dad, Marty Gilman, who died
in 1979, went on to pioneer several
practice-field mainstays, including
blocking sleds and handheld shields.
Eventually Neil joined the family
business as a Harvard freshman
in ’73, the same year Gilman Gear
began selling pylons to NFL teams.
The process of making a pylon
is simple enough. It starts with a
custom-made, preheated steel mold,
lubricated in Tef lon like an oiled
skillet. “When you make an egg, you
want it to slide right off,” Gilman
says. “Same with the foam in the
tool.” From there a steel weight isinserted into the mold and steadied
an inch from the bottom, “so it’s not
going to stick out. Then we have a
machine that calibrates the foam
and dispenses it through a special
orifice. After we pour it, we plug the
orifice, let it cure for like 15 minutes
at a certain temperature, pop it out
using an air extraction technique,
trim it and it’s done.”
The process requires a Chinese-
made “blowing agent” called
Solstice, which causes the foam to
expand and fill the mold, similar to
yeast in bread. “Without Solstice,
you can’t really use that foam
system,” Gilman says. “So we had to
start looking for an alternative.”
After two months of research—
not to mention much fretting over
unfilled backorders—the solution
to Gilman’s problem finally arrived
at his factories in late November,
in the form of a dozen 55-gallon
drums of a foam mixture with a
new blowing agent produced by a
St. Louis company. The foam aced
its test run, allowing hundreds of
pylons to be made.
It is clear that pylons aren’t
just a professional pursuit for the
66-year-old Gilman—they are a
passion, too. Every morning he
scours newspapers for pictures of
players stretching past them for
touchdowns. “Nine times out of
10 it’s a Gilman pylon,” he says.
“I always cut out the picture and
save it in a scrapbook.” He also
attends games in person whenever
possible, trawling the sidelines
during warmups to inspect
the fruits of his family’s work,
occasionally smarting when he
comes across a pylon that has been
nudged off its proper spot.
“I’m very sensitive to their
placement,” Gilman says. “They’re
kind of like my children.”
If nothing else, he figures, it’s a
matter of respect.WHAT HAPPENS
IN VEGAS...
CAN HELP YOUR
FANTASY TEAMBY THE
BOOK
SI SPORTSBOOK
EVERY WEEK of the
football season, SI.com’s
Michael Fabiano publishes
his top start/sits for each
position. It’s a must-read, but,
of course, it can’t take into
account your team. What if
you have four receivers that
are all on the must-start list?
Or he says all your running
backs should sit?
Sometimes I flip a coin and
sometimes I just go with my
gut, but most of the time I use
this hack: Vegas, baby!
In Week 10, SI Sportsbook
had a prop for the Broncos’
Javonte Williams over 48.
rushing yards. How many did
the running back gain? 48.
Teammate Melvin Gordon had
the same rushing prop. He
ran for 45, plus a touchdown.
And a Gordon anytime TD
paid +130, while a Williams
TD would have paid +165. So
the odds showed that Gordon
was more likely to find the
end zone. If you were deciding
between the two in your
fantasy lineup, the sportsbook
told you to start Gordon.
Remember: Books have
much more at stake than
a loss to their uncle in the
family league. They have to
be accurate or they’re out of
business. —Jennifer Piacenti14 SPORTS ILLUSTRATED | SI.COM
CO
UR
TE
SY(^) OF
(^) NE
IL
GIL
MA
N
FOAMIN’ EMPIRE
Gilman has been in the family
business for nearly 50 years,
joking, “My parents sent me to
Harvard so I could learn how to
make dummies.”