KANNAPOLIS — It’s November 1998 and Kings Mountain head football coach Ron Massey is dissecting film of his upcoming opponent in the third round of the state 3A playoffs — A.L. Brown. He’s searching for a weak spot on the unbeaten Wonders, who have scored 87 points in their two previous playoff games.

Then suddenly, Massey believes he’s found exactly what he’s looking for.

“Aubrey!” yells Massey to defensive whiz Aubrey Hollifield. “Come over here. You’ve got to see this.”

“This” is a bowling-ball shaped sophomore guard who wears No. 62. Massey’s Wonder program identifies that round-mound-who’s-close-to-the-ground as Chad Tuttle. Tuttle just has to be the soft underbelly that the huge, quick Mountaineers can take advantage of. Well, doesn’t he?

“Aubrey, check out this guy and see that we can do,” says Massey.

Hollifield keeps his eyes glued on Tuttle for the next 15 minutes, as the tape rolls. Finally, he says, “Not that much. That kid’s better than he looks. He runs real good.”

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Two years later, Tuttle, Massey and Hollifield are all on the same side — all wearing A.L. Brown green and white on Friday nights.

Two years later, Tuttle still has those same stubby legs, that same disappearing neck and that same angelic grin that makes him look like a prime candidate for the church choir.

Oh, yeah, and he can still run. And he can play like crazy.

Tuttle’s legend started during that sophomore year Massey was watching on tape. The ‘98 season was still young when veterans like Quincy Pedew and Nick Maddox admitted they couldn’t get over the new kid on the offensive line.

“He’s little, but he’s good,” praised Maddox.

“Because he’s not intimidated,” said Pedew. “Tuttle — he ain’t scared of nothing.”

Tuttle went maybe 185 pounds as a soph. Now, as a senior, the official program lists him at 5-foot-9, 215. The 215 is accurate, because Tuttle has muscled up. But if Tuttle’s 5-9, than the Golden Gate Bridge is in Georgia.

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When Massey started coaching football at Brown this summer, Tuttle wasn’t around. He was the star first baseman for the Kannapolis American Legion baseball team that surprised the world by reaching the state tournament. Massey occasionally checked out Legion practice.

“It wasn’t hard to figure out which one was Tuttle,” chuckles Massey. “I said, ‘Well, there’s old squatty body.’”

“Squatty body” finally reported after baseball —well behind in conditioning and well behind in learning Massey’s complex new offense. Intense new offensive line coach Tim Hagler was completely unimpressed.

“Geez, this is the guy I’ve been hearing so much about? Are you sure this is Tuttle?’’ says Hagler, chuckling at the memory.

“His lack of height didn’t bother me all that much, but the way he looked — you know, sort of squatty — did bother me. He just didn’t look athletic.”

Hagler said he wasn’t sold on Tuttle until the Wonders put on the pads for the first time.

“Then I found out he moves a whole lot better than he looks,” Hagler said. “He proved me wrong. He’s a tremendous athlete.”

Hagler has been a strength-and-conditioning coach at UNC and an assistant at 4A kingpin Richmond County, so he knows something about offensive linemen.

“Tuttle may not have the ideal height to be a college lineman,” he said. “But he moves like a college lineman and he’s as intelligent as one. Plus, he’s a leader. A coach on the field and a great kid to be around.”

Tuttle’s brain is as big an asset as his surprising wheels. He modestly reports that he’s “eighth or ninth” in the senior class.

“He makes the right calls,” said Hagler. “He’s sharp.”

And then there’s Tuttle’s personality.

Massey theorizes that offensive linemen are either stupid or crazy because they sweat and grunt and do their thing without publicity. We know from his grades that Tuttle isn’t stupid, so that leaves crazy.

“Everywhere I’ve ever been, the offensive linemen are the characters — and I mean that in a good way,” says Massey. “Tuttle has got something to say in every single huddle. I like that.”

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If you visit the Wonder campus looking for Tuttle, don’t ask for “Chad.” He’s known to coaches and teammates as “Wally.”

“The first few days he was out, I was calling him ‘Chad,’” said Hagler. “They told me if I wanted to get his attention, better call him ‘Wally.’”

Rumors persist that “Wally” was hung on Tuttle because he resembles a character in that National Lampoon movie in which Chevy Chase took his family to visit “Wally World.”

But Tuttle isn’t buying.

“All I know,” he says, “is that Coach (Buddy) Amerson put it on me in the fourth grade in youth baseball and it stuck.”

Wherever the name came from, there’s no doubt that Tuttle is a little off-center. His athletic hero, for instance, is rotund Toronto pitcher David Wells.

“I like Wells because he goes out there with the attitude that he’s gonna beat people,” says Tuttle. “So do I.”

Tuttle insists that his favorite sports moment came when Josh Lee, now the Wonders’ quarterback, hit him with a touchdown pass on a tackle-eligible play in the 8th grade.

Come on, Wally. A middle school TD was better than blocking for Maddox’s state-record 114th touchdown in ‘98?

“Yeah,” says Tuttle playfully. “Because it was a high pass — a real bad pass — from Lee. I had to jump way up there to get it. And I got hit hard after the catch, but held on.”

That story tells you a little something about Wally’s world. Loose off the field, Focused and tough on it. He has to be, because he’s giving up pounds — not to mention a whole bunch of inches — every Friday.

“It would be nice to see someone across from me who’s my size,” said Tuttle. “But that’s not likely to happen.”

It likely won’t matter. Tuttle can move his deceptively chunky body 40 yards in a respectable 4.9 seconds. So he’ll keep right on surprising the people who doubt him, keep opening holes for Eric Caldwell and Chris Carter and keep Lee standing tall in the pocket.

Of course, somewhere there’s someone watching Wonder game tape and forming the opinion that No. 62 is the guy that can be taken advantage of.

Maybe that’s why Massey and Hagler are smiling.

And so is Wally.