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The Best Game Ever: Giants vs. Colts, 1958, and the Birth of the Modern NFL
written by Mark Bowden
Studio : Atlantic Monthly Press
by Atlantic Monthly Press
Publisher : Atlantic Monthly Press
Released : 2008-05-05
Availability : Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Number of Items : 1
Avg. Customer Rating: (based on 21 reviews)
List Price : $23.00
Our Price : $17.51
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Product Description |
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On December 28, 1958, the New York Giants and Baltimore Colts met under the lights of Yankee Stadium for the NFL Championship game. Played in front of sixty-four thousand fans and millions of television viewers around the country, the game would be remembered as the greatest in football history. On the field and roaming the sidelines were seventeen future Hall of Famers, including Colts stars Johnny Unitas, Raymond Berry, and Gino Marchetti, and Giants greats Frank Gifford, Sam Huff, and assistant coaches Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry. An estimated forty-five million viewers—at that time the largest crowd to have ever watched a football game—tuned in to see what would become the first sudden-death contest in NFL history. It was a battle of the league's best offense—the Colts—versus its best defense—the Giants. And it was a contest between the blue-collar Baltimore team versus the glamour boys of the Giants squad. The Best Game Ever is a brilliant portrait of how a single game changed the history of American sport. Published to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the championship, it is destined to be a sports classic. |
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Unitas to Berry, First Down Colts |
Bowden is a tremendous non-fiction writer, and I enjoyed this book tremendously, but it is a quick, light treatment of a subject loaded with nuance and historical context. The subtitle is Giants vs. Colts, 1958 and the Birth of the Modern NFL, but other than an epilog chapter, it does not really cover much ground after 1958.
This is the work of a terrific author churning out a quick book between his more serious efforts. There are strong portraits of several players, particularly Unitas (one of my boyhood idols) the Giant linebacker Sam Huff, and the methodical Raymond Berry, whose meticulous preparation altered the future of the wide receiver position, as well as the outcome of this championship game.
In light of a recent story about Donovan McNab, the Eagles quarterback being unfamiliar with the rules of overtime football during a regular season game, it was amusing to note how many of these now iconic NFL players actually thought the 1958 championship game could have ended in a tie. Sam Huff was walking off the field and mentally figuring out how the playoff shares would be divided when he first learned about the concept of sudden death.
The book misses many opportunities. The Giants had Tom Landry and Vince Lombardi on the same coaching staff, which strikes me worth a story line or two, but is not developed here. And Bowden makes some really odd choices I felt, perhaps reaching for a new angle on a frequently covered subject. For example, at the moment of the clinching touchdown the focus suddenly shifts to the amateur photographer who caught the moment Alan Ameche broke into the end zone.
Bowden acknowledges he spent some time reviewing the game film with Eagles coach Andy Reid, and while the background information gained there was probably helpful, I feel that experience could have been brought into the book more. What does a current NFL coach think of the level of play in the 50s? How did a mistake filled first half change into a beautifully played second half and overtime, as field conditions worsened?
If you are a football fan, you will not doubt enjoy the book, but it is certainly not in the same league with the author's own remarkable Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War |
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It' was like yesterday |
My husband Norman was at the game 50 years ago. It was brought to life by the author. I can still remember Raymond Berry making catch after catch to set up Alan ameche with the winning score.
Thanks for the memories. |
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All NFL Roads Lead to this game |
The 1958 NFL Championship Game is and always will be the starting point for any discussion about the birth of modern pro football. While some consider it the greatest game ever played, I think an argument can be made against that. Bowden recalls a list of the sloppy play that were part of this game. However, what is undoubtedly true is that this was the most important game in NFL history. Pro football was not the dominant sport and money making machine of today. Baseball still ruled the roost of professional sport. Bowden nicely weaves the elements that converged to give this game its importance -- growth of television in post-WWII America, a game that ran into prime time viewing hours so millions more than die-hard fans were tuning in to catch the end of the game, the first sudden death championship game in the NFL and the backdrop of the most important American city and the pantheon of sports, Yankee Stadium.
Bowden does a solid job, especially as he zeroes in on Raymond Berry and Johnny Unitas, the most unlikely of stars to emerge. However, I couldn't help feel that something was missing. I was left wanting more -- more detail, more context, more perspective. I felt like Bowden delivered the facts but a game of this magnitude and importance deserved more.
This is a solid book, certainly a quick read and well worth the investment. It certainly does match the magnitude of the game which it is covering, but is a great starting point for any fan of the NFL. |
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Plenty of meat for most and a quick enjoyable read |
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I really never knew much about pre-Super Bowl era football except for what I've read on the Vince Lombardi coached the Packers (and his bio is fantastic BTW). This account really gives a nice history of the NFL leading up to this game and sketches brief but accurate bios of many of the games key participants. In particualr Raymond Berry gets a LOT of coverage, so does Johhny Unitas, to lesser extent so do Gifford, Ameche, Donovan, Big Daddy Lipscomb, Conerly, and Moore. He does an excellent job summarizing the game including excerpting radio broadcasts in key spots (the TV record is gone, much the way Larsen's '56 perfect game is gone, what were these execs thinking destroying this stuff?!). I don't have a complaint because this was a lot of new info to me, the reason I give it 4 stars is because those who are Giant's fans may find it Colts heavy. Those expecting a lot about the birth of the NFL will find it really ends with this game save a quick, Joe Namath signed for a lot, and soon everyone made money (except those like Bert Bell who dies shortly afterwards)which is really just a few pages at the end. Overall if you are interested in this and don't know the story yet, it's a great read. If you are wel versed in this story already it may not be for you. |
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Lukewarm retelling of often tall story |
Mark Bowden has written some amazing and riveting works of non-fiction and would certainly rate in the top five of anyone today but this work really does not do his prior great writing justice. Basically he takes a lot of other people's work and pardon the pun he treads on well worn turf. Bowden does not reveal any new or insightful offerings into the game, already one of the most well known and well written about games in history. (It precedes my time on this earth so I can't say how it ranks but I will go by the accounts and say it was one of the greatest of all time.)
As a fan of football I would suggest reading it because Bowden is still a great writer and this is a great subject. Still he writes as a fan and as such this is very fluffy and doesn't have much in the way of focus or the hard edge Black Hawk Down and Guests of the Ayatollah had. But still go ahead and read it as it's very enjoyable regardless. |
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