Daddy’s Watching Football by Clay Beyersdorfer
“Daddy’s Watching Football” is a children’s book that captures how dads go a little insane while watching football. The best part of football Sunday is time with Mommy! Kids will love the illustrations and the story, while mothers will relate to their husbands acting like a crazy person. It hilariously captures the all-too-familiar tradition that seems to happen every weekend in the fall when the TV is on. Light-hearted and painfully honest, this fun, beautifully illustrated book is best read on Thursday nights, Saturday, and Sunday afternoons (no way Dad makes it through the night games!), or right before nap time.
The Undrafted by Timothy Felton
Timothy Felton is passionate about youth and sports, which is reflected in his productive career. Timothy has a unique, humorous style of approach that relates to all youth no matter what environment they are from. Timothy provides hands-on, down-to-earth teachings that meet youth on their level. From low ACT scores to graduating from college, Timothy Felton inspires and motivates youth of all ages, academically, athletically, and personally. Born and raised in the inner city of St. Louis, Missouri, Timothy played high school football at Charles Sumner High School, the first predominantly Black high school west of Mississippi.
A former student-athlete, Timothy spent most of his career as a juvenile officer and now spends his time as a GED case manager, high school football, and track coach. He provides consultation to parents concerning high school eligibility and gives advice on the recruiting process for student-athletes. His new book, “The Undrafted,” is his journey through athletics and life after. Timothy escaped the deadly St. Louis streets and personal struggles and ultimately graduated from Southeast Missouri State University with a B.S. in Criminal Justice, participated in Pro-Day workouts with NFL teams, and is currently a graduate student and future PhD student. In “The Undrafted,” Timothy highlights some of the major characteristics that shape his life: respect, keeping a cool temper, accountability, being coachable, and being teachable.
Walk-On U by Tim Lavin
“Walk-On U” illustrates the incredible phenomenon of the “College Walk-On.” Depicting the ugly, the bad, and the good, this book is about survival, education, mental toughness, and character building of student athletes who, without athletic scholarships and true to their talents, walk on the team in search of a dream. The seldom discussed realities of the true Walk-On experience will cover everything from the heart, determination, patience, and sheer will of these hope-to-be student athletes as they attempt to conquer massive amounts of adversity and abuse while they willfully pay to practice. This book is about achieving a humbling internal victory, both on and off the field, providing building blocks for future success in life after sport.
This education and enlightening book is for any of the 8 million high school students who are considering walking on for a college sports team should their dreams of earning an athletic scholarship not come true. After reading these stories, some will conclude that this is not an experience they wish to bear. Others will see an incredible opportunity and grasp the chance. Being armed with the information in this book will help these athletes in making sound adjustments, which can ultimately affect the choice of school, career path, and life direction. This Walk-On journey becomes a life-changing transformation; these under-the-radar, high-flying overachievers are awarded coveted membership into Walk-On University. No matter the college or university across the country, there is bound to be a satellite campus secretly called “Walk-On U.”
“Walk-On U” is the brand that will feature and focus on the underdog players in college sports, primarily football. Through an ongoing series of books, websites, TV documentaries, annual awards banquets, and screenplays, the “Walk-On” will be exposed, showcased, publicized, and celebrated.
Fantasy Football Tao by Michael J. Timko
This book is a must read for anyone who wants to become a great fantasy football player. “Fantasy Football Tao” chronicles the author’s four-year quest to become not just a good player but a great one. The book is in the form of a journal, detailing the author’s day-to-day, week-by-week, month-by-month, and year-to-year research and testing. The author listened to hundreds of hours of podcasts, scoured the internet, read every fantasy football strategy book on the market, and even paid for expert advice. Becoming a great fantasy football player is a year-round job. This book is unlike any other fantasy football book available. It is not a “just do what I say” guide to greatness. It is a thinking man’s teaching guide offering learnings that will raise your game.
This book also is a tale of addiction. What began as fun turned into a compulsion, then an all-consuming addiction. During that addiction, the author also learned about the dark underbelly of the NFL and the topsy-turvy, chaotic, maddening, fascinating, and all-consuming world of fantasy football. His search for a winning strategy led to an exploration of fantasy football’s “expert” analysts, the linkage between the NFL and the gaming industry, and the unavoidable risk of injury and death to the world’s greatest athletes. Somewhere between forty and sixty million people play fantasy football, and this book stands apart from all others. There is no shortcut to greatness. If you want to become a great fantasy football player or simply learn more about America’s game, this is a must-read.
The Perfect Pro Football Coach by Robert DeLuca
A “successful” coach in the National Football League is one who simply wins and gets his team in the playoffs. It would seem that NFL franchises would have refined the critical process of finding a new head coach, yet they haven’t. Is it any wonder that so many new coaches are flopping right out of the box? Grounded in a strictly objective historical perspective, “The Perfect Pro Football Coach” provides an in-depth look at head coaching in the NFL. Using only hard quantitative parameters, we have developed the Coaching Assessment Scoring Hierarchy (CASH) system to rank all of the 300 head coaches since the 1960s. We closely scrutinize the careers of these the best and the worst and then blend them together to produce the “perfect coach.” We also apply CASH rankings to the selection of new coaches through a “Success Predictably Indicator,” which compares a new coach to those who have successfully gone before him. We ran “Success Prediction Indicators” for nine new head coaches in 2009 and were right in about two-thirds of the cases. Our rankings will stimulate discussion among fans.
Chasing My Rookie Year by Michael Clayton
Called by ESPN Analyst Bill Curry and former collegiate head coach as a “great, great football player who can walk on the field and change the game. He’s that good.” Michael Clayton’s purpose and passion in life was always football. Then came a moment when Michael realized he needed to chase something else besides perfection on the field. Each of us has ideals, and after eight years in the league, Clayton started to chase and strive for his compassion, solemnity, uprightness, and charity. Clayton never gave up the chase for perfection on the field; he just started working harder toward perfection off of it. “Chasing My Rookie Year” is not a quest for glory; it is a quest for life’s purpose.
From the Copper Pit to the Super Bowl by Roxanne Willis
Born in 1938 in Bingham Canyon, Utah, Tom Lovat’s storied childhood shaped his rise to one of the most influential offensive line coaches of his era. Hand-picked by legendary head coach Mike Holmgren, Lovat was one of the unsung coaching heroes who led the Green Bay Packers to their first championship victory since the Vince Lombardi era. Lovat started his coaching career at the high school level, rising in the ranks to coach in college, the Canadian Football League, NFL Europe, and four NFL franchises. His story intersects with some of the most notable names in football: Bill Walsh, John Elway, Bart Starr, Jim Hanifan, Dan Dierdorf, Reggie White, Andy Reid, Brett Favre, Frank Winters, and Walter Jones, just to name a few. Each part of his life story will instruct football fans on the history of their favorite sport. In particular, Green Bay Packers fans will enjoy reliving the glory days of the 1990s, from the Cheesehead to the Lambeau Leap. Experts in the game will appreciate an in-depth analysis of the offensive line, an often-overlooked part of any winning football team. Lovat’s story helps to bring a human dimension to the people who coach and play the game. Under the leadership of General Manager Ron Wolf and head coach Mike Holmgren, the 1990s Green Bay Packers team rose from the dustbin of the NFL to become one of its most successful franchises. While relatively unknown to outsiders during that era, Lovat’s contribution to that success story cannot be overstated. His personal character and dedication to his craft will leave readers inspired in more ways than one.
The Game That Almost Broke Me by Tavarski “Taz” Wallace
He had it all, but it meant nothing because it almost killed him.
An up-close portrait of one of the most prolific defensive players in NCAA history and a life almost unraveled by football—a memoir of true inspiration. “The Game That Almost Broke Me” is the inspirational story of Tavarski Wallace, an ambitious player in the game of achieving a spot in the NFL and a resilient player in the turbulent, challenging, and sometimes unfair game of life. The intriguing evolution of “Taz” Wallace is remarkable in this long journey, which is marked by milestones of overcoming adversity—from resolving struggles academically and supporting his hard-working single mother to ultimately managing the unforgiving politics of professional football, Taz Wallace’s story is uplifting and inspiring. From modest beginnings in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Taz documents a series of key relationships that shaped him as an individual and helped fuel his dreams of becoming a linebacker in the NFL. With unrelenting persistence every step of the way, the experiences, failures, and surprising successes of Taz in “The Game That Almost Broke Me” prove how the American Dream can dramatically transform with time and may even become something entirely different in the end.