American Football Books

I ordered this for my 8yr. old son for his book review project for school. He read it himself and not only understood everything, he learned alot about Donovan McNabb. The book is in large print and perfect for kids.

The book came earlier than expected and in great condition. I am very excited to read it!

By John Gearan, an excerpt from Holy Cross Magazine, Spring 2007, Vol 41, Number 2

Buster Carroll, a denizen of an Irish enclave in Queens, loved his heritage, his family, his country passionately.

Buster was a die-hard Notre Dame fan, a loyal member of its famed football fraternity known as the "subway alumni." He knew everything about the Fighting Irish and the oft-exaggerated exploits of legends such as Knute Rockne, The Gipper and The Four Horsemen.

In the early '60s, his son Kevin, a member of Holy Cross' last all-male class of 1972, remembers he and his dad watching the Crusaders playing on TV -- when the camera panned to a sideline shot of the coach.

"That's Eddie Anderson,'' Buster told his son. "The guy is a college head coach and a practicing doctor.

"Imagine that," his father wondered aloud. "How can anyone do that?"

Buster knew about the good doctor because Anderson had been a Notre Dame captain and All-American end under Rockne.

Kevin, a fine football safety and baseball outfielder at Holy Cross High in Flushing, N.Y., entered the College of the Holy Cross in 1968. As a walk-on, he played freshman football but was cut trying to make the varsity as a junior.

But his interest in Anderson was piqued again. "I learned a lot more about Doc while being taped up by our trainer, Jackie Scott," says Carroll.

With the passing of each autumn, Carroll's curiosity about Anderson intensified.

How, he wondered, did Anderson do it all -- coach Holy Cross and Iowa in the Big Ten and practice medicine and help raise four kids? Buster Carroll died in 1983, bequeathing his son this intriguing question that needed to be explored by someone who loved history and sports.

"It was a perfect task for me," comments Kevin.

In 1999, Carroll undertook the quest to tell Anderson's story. Spending four years researching archives, he sifted through newspaper clippings and interviewed players and colleagues from Anderson's 39 seasons at four colleges. Carroll also talked at length with Anderson's four children: Nick, a retired businessman living in Florida; Jerry, an oral surgeon residing in Massachusetts; Jim, a 1962 Holy Cross graduate and retired businessman living in Connecticut; and Judy Anderson Moore, a bank attorney and resident of Pittsburgh.

Doc Anderson's rich life is worthy of such an examination. And, without question, Doc Anderson resides near the peak of the Mount Olympus reserved for scholar-athletes.

Mull this over: Edward N. Anderson, while attending Rush Medical College in Chicago, also served as head football and basketball coach at DePaul University -- and was captain of the Chicago Cardinals, the 1925 National Football League champions.

"He had a clause in his pro-football contract that stated he didn't have to practice," says Carroll. "There were days when he would attend medical school, coach, study and, late at night, take a run for miles along the shores of Lake Michigan, reviewing in his head the details from his Cardinals' playbook and medical texts."

Carroll scrutinizes Anderson's four seasons as a first-string, two-way end at Notre Dame. Amusing vignettes provide a rare insight into the hurly-burly birth of big-time football as Carroll pinpricks much of its mythology. A 5-foot-10-inch, 165-pound scrapper from Mason City High in Iowa, Anderson blocked for the immortal George Gipp, tackled with bone-shivering authority and set a school record with three TD receptions against Northwestern -- the last thrown by The Gipper himself. In Anderson's last three seasons, Notre Dame lost only once, to his home state of Iowa. As a senior, Captain Anderson was a consensus first-team All-American.

Carroll does not shy away from controversy. He probes a scandal that tarnished the Golden Dome when Anderson and seven Notre Dame teammates got caught playing in a semipro game just a few days after the 1921 football season ended. He details how Anderson was banned from playing senior-year basketball and baseball when the story broke nationally.

Anderson's accomplishments are astounding. In his first year at Iowa, 1939, he was voted National Coach of the Year; his star, Nile Kinnick, won the Heisman Trophy. As Maj. Anderson in World War II, Doc labored to heal soldiers in England and in field hospitals in France and Germany. After the war, he treated veterans and disabled children. Anderson won 201 games from 1922 to 1964, including 129 at Holy Cross, where he retired as the "Dean of College Football Coaches."

The book is replete with anecdotes that shed light upon Anderson's character. Carroll paints a portrait of a taciturn taskmaster of rock-ribbed toughness, a nattily attired gentleman pacing the sidelines in a tailored suit and crisp-brimmed fedora.

Cast in the Rockne mold, he would drive the team hard in practice. Yet Anderson respected his players. Behind the scenes, he would go to bat for them when they ran into trouble. He emphasized education as the path to success. He never uttered a profanity, never cursed, never denigrated players in public. Only matters such as showing disrespect for the game or loafing or displaying a lack of sportsmanship could bring him to a boil.

Anderson could appear unemotional and aloof while coaching but be kind-hearted and sensitive away from the field of combat. He could at once convince his players to ignore pain, yet attend with a tender touch to his ailing patients.

Perhaps Vince Promuto '60 -- a Crusader Hall of Famer, a former Washington Redskins All-Pro guard and a lawyer -- sums it up best in Carroll's book: "Someone or something has to touch an emotion within you -- anger, pride, whatever -- to make you play beyond your own limits. In my career, only two coaches had the ability to reach that emotion. One was Vince Lombardi; the other was Dr. Anderson.''

Lombardi and Anderson, two men of stern principle, well worth reading about in this age when shallow celebrity so often trumps true character and earned respect.

One of the very best of the wise cracking, tough guy characters ever is W.L. Ripley's Wyatt Storme. Ripley has created a "Midwestern Travis McGee" with some extremely interesting side kicks and an outlandish, but somehow believable, cast of characters. This is a great introduction to Storme with a huge promise of even better things to follow and the promise is fulfulled in the sequels - Storme Front and Electric Country Roulette. Not since James Lee Burke has an author captured the "True Testosterone Essence" with such humor, excitement and humanity. Read all three and then you too can wait with anticipation for Ripley's next Storme mystery

This book is an excellent source for the true sports historian. Please note this book is of serious academic nature - there are no lionized descriptions of teams, coaches, or players, but instead a thoughtful and thorough analysis of the early origins of football, soccer, and rugby in the United States and Canada. Smith has broken down football into the components which he considers essential (carrying the ball and the system of downs) and explains how convention has held us from correctly identifying early field games as soccer/rugby/football. I myself have researched college football for nearly 20 years and I have long thought considering 1869 as the 'first' season was never fully correct since more than one sport can be traced to that game (and even before). Smith has done an excellent job of allowing me to see the picture more clearly. Very much looking forward to his follow up on football after 1883!

This is a great book that displays Emmitt Smith's life and football career and his pursuit of Walter Payton's rushing record. The pictures in this book are very good since they are contributed by an official Cowboys photographer. The book also shows another side of Emmitt, his family life, that you probably wouldn't know even if you have been a fan of his for many years. By reading this book you really get the sense that Emmitt is a good man as well as being an extraordinary running back. I would recommend this book to all Cowboys fans and Emmitt fans.

The Encyclopedia of American Soccer History is a long-overdue addition to the neglected story of soccer in the United States. While it may surprise many, American soccer history begins long before Pele. This book fills in many of the details of this largely forgotten history. The book is arranged as an encyclopedia, with hundreds of alphabetically arranged entries on different topics, including teams, players, cups, leagues, etc. The authors, Roger Allaway, Colin Jose and David Litterer are the triumvirate of North American soccer historians -- clearly the right men for the job of compiling this history.

This book is a lot of fun and has a great variety of information to get you ready for another season of Horns football. Can't wait for next year's edition!

If you love Football, and like looking the business when going to the Football and ever wondered where all the terrace fashions came from, then you will love this book.

A really interesting read with some classic pictures.

I highly recommend this book and LSU grad Chris Warner's "A Tailgater's Guide to SEC Football"

Both are must-haves for the die-hard LSU fan.