American Football

Life hit Pat and Tammy McLeod hard when their son Zach collapsed on a high school football field; he had sustained a severe brain injury. Facing the devastating possibility that things would never be the same for their beloved son, they committed to staying strong as a family and finding a way to maintain their footing. But the journey would reshape their faith, their family, and their future in ways they never saw coming.

The inside story of the most colorful decade in NFL history - pro football's raging, hormonal, hairy, druggy, immortal adolescence. Between the Immaculate Reception in 1972 and The Catch in 1982, pro football grew up. In 1972, Steelers star Franco Harris hitchhiked to practice. NFL teams roomed in skanky motels. They played on guts, painkillers, legal steroids, fury, and camaraderie. A decade later, Joe Montana's gleamingly efficient 49ers ushered in a new era: the corporate, scripted, multibillion-dollar NFL we watch today.

By 2002, The Streak - a historic 13-year run of consecutive wins by the Spartans, a high-school football team from Concord, California, that couldn't be beat - was still going strong. In this revised edition of When the Game Stands Tall, author Neil Hayes, who had unrestricted access to the De La Salle team, writes from the inside about the games, the players, and their visionary coach, Bob Ladouceur, who managed to amass the highest winning percentage in football history (.995) through standing for something greater than winning.

The Winners Manual: For the Game of Life shares Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel's "Big Ten" fundamentals for success: Attitude, Discipline, Faith, Handling Adversity & Success, Excellence, Love, Toughness, Responsibility, Team, and Hope. Peppered with personal stories from Tressel's storied coaching career, the book shares the fundamental lessons that he has been imparting to his players for the past 20 years.

The 1923 FA Cup final—aka the White Horse final—was the first football match played at the British Empire Exhibition Stadium. Although best-remembered for non-playing reasons that afternoon marked the historic opening chapter of the stadium’s long and eventful history, of the stadium soon to be known simply as Wembley. Nige Tassell chooses 100 matches—from the well known to the unusual—that have shaped Wembley's legacy and tells a lively and original alternative history of the past 100 years of football, and of Britain.

Warren St. John decided to find out why people care so much about the outcomes of games they're not playing in by joining a group where the particulars of the fan psyche would show themselves in sharp relief: the caravan of hundreds of RVs that follow the Alabama Crimson Tide across the South, taking over college towns with a moveable feast of Weber grills, karaoke machines, Igloo coolers, and fast-draining liquor bottles.

The Detroit Lions won their fourth and final NFL Championship in 1957. Since then, they’ve been a second-tier team that has won 42 percent of their games, earned just three division titles, posted a 1-12 playoff record, and suffered through a “perfect” 0-16 season. It hasn’t been all doom and gloom. The Lions have enjoyed a few successful seasons, and these are discussed. There have also been oddball moments, including losing twice to last-second record-setting field goals, being victims in the shortest (at the time) overtime game in history, and becoming involved with author George Plimpton.

In the 1980s, Neil Hornsby was one of very few National Football League fans in England. Never one to do anything casually, he began keeping hand-written score sheets of every game using his own tracking system. Soon he'd enlisted some fellow British super fans in his mission to take football information an extra layer deeper. This was the beginning of Pro Football Focus, an analytics company that now supplies data to all 32 NFL teams and every major broadcasting corporation. In Football Is a Numbers Game, Matthew Coller chronicles this improbable start-up tale with unprecedented access.

Roddy Collins is a football man—now in the sixth decade of a career as a player (at 16 clubs), manager (12 clubs) and commentator. And he is a funny man: an unequalled raconteur with a sharp eye for the absurdities of the professional game and spectacular recall. He has made friends wherever he has gone, along with some high-quality enemies. When John Delaney said he could get Roddy a job if he'd just stop criticising him, Roddy replied that he'd 'rather dig holes in the road'.

Revealing how an obscure young assistant coach, in less than a decade, progressed to become a head coach, general manager, league commissioner, and controlling partner of the Oakland Raiders franchise, this biography pays tribute to the late Al Davis. Contrary to Davis’s notoriously quirky and reclusive reputation, this account is based on the inside scoop he personally gave the author, lending his full cooperation to relate the account of his life and career.

Are you a fan of American football? Do you want to start following or playing the game and need to know more? This bundle is perfect for beginners to this great game! American football is one of the most popular sports on the planet and is played and watched every week by millions of people. From high schools and colleges, through to local and professional league, its popularity never ceases to diminish. Playing and watching is one thing, but mastering the game is another matter altogether.

How does a lower middle class kid, who suffered through school with undiagnosed dyslexia, get into Notre Dame and become the inspiration for millions in a Hollywood film that has become one of the most inspiring sport movies ever made? He never gave up. For the first time, read Daniel "Rudy" Ruettiger's real life story and learn the behind-the-scenes details of the ten years it took to make the movie and how that tossed him into a new career of public speaking that continues on stages today alongside world-class leaders and speakers.

Being a University of Michigan football fan should be joyful. Michigan is an elite academic institution whose football team boasts 43 Big Ten championships. But these days, college football is complicated. The NCAA is corrupt and exploitative, and Michigan keeps losing to Ohio State. It’s hard not to wonder, as Ben Mathis-Lilley does in this book: why are we doing this? The Hot Seat is a chronicle of one of the wildest years in Michigan football history, but also a search for the truth about fandom, from the pages of history books to the wilderness of online forums.

Who is Erik ten Hag? With an air of unperturbability, he ignores critics, follows his own methods and relentlessly pursues perfection on the pitch. His uncanny ability to analyse and solve problems—the 'process' as Ten Hag calls it—has unfailingly led to breakthrough. There is no magic. There is only intelligence at work, personal devotion to players and near-obsessive attention to detail. Maarten Meijer's definitive biography follows Erik ten Hag, from his upbringing in the Dutch countryside to his domestic triumphs and European victories.

To understand the differences between British and American culture, you must understand that the two countries have everything in common except the language itself. The line has been blurred in the technological age, as we see US English words crop up increasingly in the UK. However, the bulk of the British English language has stayed true to its original form. Across the entirety of the British Isles, the language shifts, and changes to suit the current town or city of the occupant.

There is nobody like Patrick Mahomes. In three seasons, he has won a Super Bowl and competed in another, earned the titles of First Team All-Pro, NFL Offensive Player of the Year, and league MVP, and turned the Kansas City Chiefs from famed playoff failures into the most successful team in the NFL. With his unique and groundbreaking playing style, and winning personality both on and off the field, Mahomes has become a truly transcendent quarterback in a journey that mirrors and accentuates the rebirth of the once swingin’ cow town of Kansas City, Missouri.

Often recruited before they've worn long trousers, today's footballers become superstars who earn huge amounts without ever learning much about the world beyond the training ground. But what do these Peter Pans, whose careers end just as most people's are getting going, do with the rest of their lives? Crouch speaks from his own experience and discusses with fellow former professionals too—just how do you safely release a near seven-foot striker back into the wild?

Captain, father, leader, a fearless ambassador for the causes he believes in and a world-class midfielder, Jordan Henderson is all of these things—and it is why he is one of the most widely respected players of his generation. His story will go down in legend but his story also carries an inspirational message for anyone, showing hurdles and barriers won't stop you reaching your goals. In this, his first autobiography, Jordan reveals how an early love for the game as a kid became an all-consuming passion.

Dave Meggyesy had been an outside linebacker with the St. Louis Cardinals for seven years when he quit at the height of his career to tell about the dehumanizing side of the game - about the fraud and the payoffs, the racism, drug abuse, and incredible violence. The original publication of Out of Their League shocked readers and provoked the outraged response that rocked the sports world in the 1970s.

Der Superbowl, das Finale der US-amerikanischen Football-Meisterschaft, ist eines der größten Sportevents der Welt. Allein in Deutschland verfolgen über zwei Millionen Zuschauer nicht nur dieses unglaubliche Spektakel, sondern inzwischen auch die gesamt NFL-Saison - und das jedes Mal mitten in der Nacht! Für diese Fans ist Patrick Esume ein Star. Der TV-Experte und Moderator hat sich in den letzten Jahren als DAS deutsche Gesicht dieser Sportart etabliert. In seinem ersten Hörbuch erklärt uns der "Coach", wie er liebevoll genannt wird, alle Facetten dieser verrückten, exotischen und ungemein spannenden Sportart.