Champ Pickens

William C. "Champ" Pickens (May 31, 1877 – September 18, 1963) was a prominent figure in Alabama and Southern football, the namesake of the Champ Pickens Cup awarded to the winner of the Southern Conference from 1923 to 1926. Pickens developed the idea for the Blue–Gray Football Classic, played between stars of the South versus the North from 1939 to 2003. He gave Alabama's band its name of the "Million Dollar Band." He wrote two of the earliest books on Alabama football. Pickens was manager of the 1896 Alabama team.