Against Football: One Fan's Reluctant Manifesto

by Steve Almond

A New York Times Best Seller

“Powerful...an important read." —Publishers Weekly

New York Times bestselling author Steve Almond takes on America’s biggest sacred cow: football

In Against Football, Steve Almond details why, after forty years as a fan, he can no longer watch the game he still loves. Using a synthesis of memoir, reportage, and cultural critique, Almond asks a series of provocative questions:

• Does our addiction to football foster a tolerance for violence, greed, racism, and homophobia?
• What does it mean that our society has transmuted the intuitive physical joys of childhood—run, leap, throw, tackle—into a billion-dollar industry?
• How did a sport that causes brain damage become such an important emblem for our institutions of higher learning?

There has never been a book that exposes the dark underside of America’s favorite game with such searing candor.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sports, Football, Essays, Politics, History, Social Issues

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2014

About the author

Steve Almond is the author of two story collections, My Life in Heavy Metal and The Evil B.B. Chow, the non-fiction book Candyfreak, and the novel Which Brings Me to You, co-written with Julianna Baggott. He lives outside Boston with his wife and baby daughter Josephine.

Reviews

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Steve Almond is a wonderful writer and a mensch. While this feels more like a long article than an actual book and its ending isn't so strong, I hugely enjoyed Against Football and hope all this week's NFL brouhaha translates into higher sales for Almond's book, which is both a pleasurable and important read.

I'm not the ideal audience for this book since I don't like, watch, or understand football. When I say I don't understand it, I mean I don't understand its basic rules -- they've been explained to me many, many times, but somehow it never sticks. This isn't because I'm not interested in sports -- I love baseball -- but football just does nothing for me, to the point that I've never been able to pay attention long enough to understand how the game even works.

Still, a funny thing happened recently, which is that somehow after a lifetime of various heterosexual entanglements, I finally got my first ever boyfriend who was really into sports. I mean into sports, in that comic-character, stand-up-routine-about-men type of way, where the season never ends because there's always another sport's season starting up, and the TV's never off because another game is always coming on, and something is always happening with his team, because there are like six of them...

Reader, I married him. And this guy, he is the target audience for Almond's book: thoughtful, highly educated, with progressive politics and strong moral beliefs that are completely at odds with his obsessive love of, well, to start, NCAA athletics and the sport of football. My better half lives with the same cognitive dissonance that prompted Almond to write this book, and because I occupy a house with him, I've become familiar with the arguments against football that Almond makes.

So there's not much new here for anyone who follows football or who, like me, doesn't care about football but has become inexplicably addicted to reading Deadspin since marrying a sports fanatic. Every American should know at this point that football causes serious brain damage. As a boxing fan, I'm not exactly blameless on the moral question of whether humans have been permanently disabled while providing me with entertainment. This moral question was Almond's main focus, and the one that had the most force for me. He begins the book reflecting on a clipped article about a disoriented player who's been concussed, then towards the end writes movingly about seeing his mother lost to dementia. He argues convincingly that our brains are what make us who we are, and that it's morally reprehensible for fans to indulge their lust for football at the expense of the personhood of the players whose brains are being damaged to delight lazy Dorito-munching America and further fill the bloated coffers of the NFL.

Almond has many other arguments against football, all important and valid, as well as explanations of what the sport's allure is and what America's devotion to it says about us as a people. What it says isn't good: we're greedy, violent, repressed, apathetic, racist, warmongering, misogynistic, and in a profound state of homosexual panic.

Toward the end, though, a lot of this made me feel that football was more an expression of what's wrong with us than it is a problem that can be solved on its own. The brain injury argument is compelling independently, but many of his other charges -- about football's relationship with the military, about the status of black men in our society, about the true value we assign to education -- made football seem more a manifestation of American pathology than a significant driver of it. The revolting greed of the NFL and the theft they get away with is shocking, but it seems more an example of corporate America being disgusting than a dragon that can be slain.

As Almond himself anticipates, I found his concrete suggestions a bit anticlimactic, and the idea that Obama should come out forcefully against football laughable. Seriously, dude? Obama can't even come out forcefully against climate change, and he can't get the usual Fox-watching hawks on board when he tries to start wars! What do you honestly think would change if he went up against Merka's most manly game? It would frankly just make the sport that much more popular.

I also think Almond could have leaned a bit harder than he did on college athletics, which I personally find more appalling than the NFL because those kids aren't even getting paid. He did definitely talk about this, and talked about it well, but to me this is one of the more shocking and also theoretically preventable crimes of the sport and it could've been a bigger part of his little list-of-things-to-change at the end.

All that said, it's a pretty great book. It didn't leave me feeling particularly optimistic that football fans everywhere would rise up and do the right thing (and start watching... swimming? tennis?) after reading it, but it did do two things extremely well: one, it examined America's obsession with football and explained the reasons for and serious problems with it; and two, in a much more general way, it served as a call for moral reflection. At the risk of sounding like a real dull no-fun-at-all old granny, these days there are not nearly enough meaningful exhortations to thoughtful, moral consideration. Almond does some real thinking here about right and wrong, and he arrives on the side of the light after serious study and obvious internal turmoil. It's unusual to see a strong opinion that isn't a one-sided polemic, but there's one here.

Also, Almond is funny and lovable and really knows how to write. And even if, like me, you could give a shit about football, if you live in this country -- or don't, but want to understand it -- you should read this, because this stuff affects you.

[Peter Derk · Rating 5 out of 5]

The NFL is a tax-exempt organization.

Let's just begin there before we get any deeper into this. Whether or not you would walk into this review as a huge football fan, if you can't agree that there is a problem when the money-making juggernaut that is the NFL is TAX EXEMPT, then I think you should stop reading right here.

In Against Football, Steve Almond lays out in clear, concise language, the problems with American football, of which there are many.

I didn't pick up this book because I saw something that was anti-football and thought it would align with how I feel. It's true, I don't really enjoy watching football. I've always thought it was kind of crazy the amount of devotion people showed to geographically-based teams composed of men who don't play for their home state and often don't even live there full time. But honestly, I really enjoy books and movies about sports. I lack the patience or the quietness of the soul or the stockpile of Doritos or whatever it is that might let me sit in front of the TV for 4+ hours on a Sunday watching what is, statistically, likely to be an unremarkable match with a few highlights. But I like a great sports story, and I'm always up for a highlight reel.

That said, after reading this book, I'm firmly in the anti-football camp. Especially when it comes to anyone under 16 playing tackle football.

This book, it's an important read for everyone because we're all taxpayers and consumers of entertainment. It's REQUIRED reading if you're thinking about whether or not it's a good idea to let your child play football. I try not to make judgments about how other people conduct their lives, but I'm telling you right now, if you have a boy who is considering football, set aside the hour it takes to read this book. If you skip this book, you are not upholding some sort of morality or ideology. You are denying yourself the opportunity to even ASK THE QUESTIONS about what football might mean for the longevity, emotional stability, and cognitive ability of your child. I'm not judging a parent who lets a child play football...okay, yes I am. Now, anyway. But there's a lot of misinformation and crap swirling out there, so what I'm really judging is the parent who, made aware of the existence of this information, does not avail him or herself of it.

I'm not normally in the habit of summarizing books in a review because it sort of spoils the reading experience. However, I think that there are some key points in here that are really important, whether you are a sports fan or not, and with apologies to Mr. Almond, I'd like to talk about a few of them.

+Retired football players are NINETEEN times more likely to suffer from brain-related illness than non-players, and retired players die 20 years earlier on average.

20 years. Think about that. Not in the abstract. Think about what your life would be like if your parent died 20 years earlier. How different the world would be if the average male life expectancy was in the 50's.

What's really fucked up, the NFL did its own "study" and found players live longer than the average person. How did they find the exact opposite of the first study? What they did is compare ALL human men as opposed to college-educated males. So in their study, you've got people with chronic diseases. You've got people who died before their 10th birthday. The stats are fucked, whereas in the first, correct version, NFL players were compared to college-educated males, which most of them are.

+Taxpayers funded 70 percent of the construction costs of the stadiums in which the NFL plays.

The old saw here is that pro sports bring a lot of business to town. Maybe, sure. However, let's put this in simple financial terms. For what business would you put up 70% of the capital and expect absolutely nothing as a return on your investment? Why would it be wrong to then have the taxpayers reap 70% of the benefits from that stadium? The NFL is set to earn $10 BILLION this year. That would mean $7 BILLION would go back into the nation's budget. In one year, only because we asked for the return on our investment.

According to the book here, even if the cities asked for only the return of the cost of building and maintaining the stadiums, we'd still be talking hundreds of millions of dollars returned to the local economy.

More to the point and close to my own heart, how the fuck is it that these tax-funded stadiums don't require a vote?

The current state, as put by Almond: "Think about how insane our cultural priorities are that we're allowing so much money to be siphoned from the public till and funneled directly into the private koi ponds of the nation's wealthiest families. That arrangement isn't even capitalist. It's feudal."

+The NFL is tax-exempt.

Note that the NBA and MLB are not. Football is the only one. 501(c)6, baby.

+I'm just going to quote the book directly on this one, Almond's summary of the NFL questions surrounding the draft of Michael Sam, the first openly-gay player in NFL history, and the tenor of so many news reports and articles asking if the NFL was "ready" for an openly-gay player:

"A workplace exists, Circa 2014, in Which the Prospect of Accommodating a Single Openly Gay Employee Is Enough to Induce Panic."

+The book and the movie The Blind Side ask the question of whether an impovershed African-American would have been adopted by a well-to-do white family if it weren't for his football skills.

They both ask the question, and they fail to answer it. One has to wonder if the answer is not forthcoming because that answer is No.

+High School players receive more blows to the head than college players, and because their brains are still developing, these blows do more damage.

+Researchers at Purdue University studied the effects of concussions on high school players. They set up a study using non-concussed players as a control group, however they found that even those who did not suffer concussions showed plummeting levels of cognitive ability as the football season continued.

Almond, again:
"What would happen if some invisible gas leak in the school cafeteria caused diminished brain activity in students? Can we safely assume district officials would evacuate the school until further notice? That parents would be up in arms? That media and lawyers would descend in droves to collect statements from the innocent victims? Can we assume that the community would not gather together en masse on Friday nights to eat hot dogs and watch the gas leak?

+Buzz Bissinger, who wrote Friday Night Lights, believes football should be banned in high school and college.

+45% of Division I football players never graduate college.

+Football players are disposable, abused athletes.

If it helps you sleep at night, feel free to say that they know what they're doing and they get paid proportionally to their risk. If it helps you sleep at night, don't look into what Jim McMahon has to say. Or Brett Favre coming to tears when he says he doesn't remember his daughter playing soccer. Don't look into the facts behind Junior Seau's suicide.

That's just a little bit of what's in here.

I suspect, based on some emails shared in the book, that Almond is going to get a lot of flack for this book, especially of the "don't be such an artsy pussy" variety. As a self-proclaimed artsy pussy, I can say it's not that bad. Because really, I'd ask you this back: Is the coward the person who addresses questions not by answering, but by questioning the character of who asked them, or is the coward the person who asks some very unpopular questions while being fully aware of the consequences?

Almond, yet again:

"I'm going to get hammered for asking these questions. Fine. Hammer away But don't pretend that's the same as answering."

As a final note, what can you do if you think any of the stuff above is wrong. Stop football. For yourself. Stop watching, stop participating.

Almond relates the story of Howard Cosell, well-known sports announcer, who announced a boxing match and then declared the sport brutal, saying he'd never announce another boxing match again.

Almond, one last time:

"Did Cosell's boycott end boxing as we know it? No. That's not the point. You take a stand because it's the right thing to do, not because it's effective."

[Clif Hostetler · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book exposes the dark underbelly of America’s favorite game. Any American (or Canadian) who is morally aware and intellectually honest will have to acknowledge that there are things about American style football that are troubling on many levels. This book is written by a former fan who's experienced a conversion to become a leading critic of the game. And he makes a convincing case.

The book's narrative is a combination memoir, documentary, and cultural critique. Through it all he asks poignant questions:

• What does it mean that our society has transmuted the intuitive physical joys of childhood—run, leap, throw, tackle—into a corporatized form of simulated combat?
• Why do schools and institutions of higher learning support a sport that causes brain damage?
• Does our addiction to football foster a tolerance for violence, greed, racism, and homophobia?
• How can we enjoy watching a game that features giant muscled men, mostly African-American, engaged in a sport that causes many of them to suffer brain damage?

If you're resistant to the suggestion that football causes brain damage, the evidence is damning. And additional evidence is continuing to be compiled. The scary part is the delayed appearance of dementia years after participation in the game has ceased.

We're talking about a billion dollar business here. There is a lot of moneyed interests in keeping the game popular.

This, of course, is the big dance of capitalism: how to keep morality from gumming up the gears of profit, how to convince people to make bad decisions without seeing them as bad.

Then there's the social aspect to a game through which alumni identify with their alma mater and municipal citizens feel pride in their city's team. It's not going to be easy to bring an end to a sport that brings people together; gives strangers on the street something in common to talk about.

Here's a book about College football:
“Billion-Dollar Ball: A Journey Through the Big-Money Culture of College Football” by Gilbert M. Gaul (249 pages; Viking; $27.95)

Here’s a review of the book, "Billion Dollar Ball" from the Kansas City Star Newpaper.
http://www.kansascity.com/entertainme...

[Robert Wechsler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Besides the fact that it is intelligently written and, relative to most such books, responsibly argued, what makes this book is the way Almond aggregated what otherwise are considered unrelated observations and arguments to show how interrelated, in many ways, football’s problems (and our problems with football) are. As a moderate fan who had just decided to stop watching the sport, I found it valuable not only to find confirmation for my concerns, but also to learn about issues I hadn’t thought of.

There is only one problem with this otherwise excellent extended essay: its left-wing politics. The problem doesn’t involve whether the politics is right or wrong, but whether the political views add enough to Almond’s revelations and arguments to merit putting off more conservative readers and giving conservative writers and bloggers an excuse to attack the book for otherwise irrelevant reasons.

Football might seem too trivial to call this book important, but, as Almond shows, football is, for a huge percentage of Americans, the most important thing beyond immediate family and work. It is, in fact, what holds many relationships and communities together. It is scary how important it is. In fact, deciding whom to discuss the book with, and how, is an ethical quandary for me. The issues Almond raises are more sensitive to some than issues involving politics and religion.

[Chris Lytle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Steve Almond writes about why he is still a football fan, but no longer a fan who watches football. I decided much the same thing after reading "League of Denial" last fall. "Against Football" has strengthened my resolve. I read it in the time it takes to watch a football game, which I no longer feel compelled to do. Like Toto revealing the real Wizard of Oz, Almond pulls back the curtain and reveals the ugly truth about the Football Industrial Complex. No thinking fan will view the game or the shills for the game in the same way.

[Ellis · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've been trying to come up with a clever review for this for about a week, something about all the football-ish stuff I've done as a fan over the years, like most egregiously, the time I deliberately enmeshed myself in a traffic jam after the Broncos won the Super Bowl in 1998 just so I could honk my horn on Speer Blvd for two hours with 5000 other fools, or perhaps about how drunk I had to get to watch my perpetual underdog favorites the Cardinals play Amber's Steelers in the 2008 Super Bowl because they came so close to winning (sorry I never got the cardinal tattoo like I promised, Amber). How about how excited I was when we got Peyton Manning, or how awesome I feel when I'm at the bar & I can talk about inside hand-offs and nickel defenses & all the dudes are shocked because they all think that the gridiron is too tough for lady brains? I love this game. Other than a total four-month-long media blackout my family imposed on ourselves after that egregious, excruciating Super Bowl last year, I listen to sports radio all the time, I follow to draft (ohh, Tim Tebow, what the heck was that about?), I watch games all weekend long, and I have been a fan of this sport for the past fifteen years of my life.

I no longer watch football. I made that decision before I read this book, but this was just icing on the cake of being sad & disgusted at the sport. If I talk about football now, I can't just tell you how awesome I think Emmanuel Sanders is or how I love that dumb In-Com-Plete chant we do at Mile High. I have to talk about beautiful blue-eyed Wes Welker, who I was so excited to watch once we got him in 2013 & how I've now watched him get concussed going on four or five times & I just can't take it anymore. I have to talk about chronic traumatic encephalopathy and Ray Rice and tax exemptions and Jameis Winston and how Brett Favre may have been a great QB and made a lot of money and all that, but now he can’t remember pieces of his life, and all the other gross crap that Almond brings up in his book.

This book is not perfect. There's a chapter about Michael Sam that starts out as a conversation between Almond & a one-time girlfriend that's nothing but cringe-worthy tee-hees about how the QB takes the snap from between the center's legs. It is remarkable and terrible that, as Almond says, “A workplace exists, Circa 2014, in Which the Prospect of Accommodating a Single Openly Gay Employee Is Enough to Induce Panic" and giggling about how a woman the author once dated thinks the words “tight end” sound vaguely gay just diminishes that point. Almond also extols the virtues of sport, how it brings people together to root for a common cause & feel united for a few hours, etc., etc. sports clichés, then mentions several times how he's amazed that women like the sport because of how dismissive the NFL is of them, as though camaraderie is a feeling exclusive to men (let me tell you, as a woman, I have a lot to shake my fist at the NFL about, but please don't presume to tell me I’m immune to rooting for the home team because I don’t have a penis, Steve Almond). But minor, slightly sexist flaws aside, this book is a devastating indictment on the NFL. Take it from me: even though he knows that I’m the type of person who will switch pasta brands because one takes a homophobic stance on advertising, my husband still thought I was silly to stop watching a sport that so devalues the rights of women that it only makes domestic violence an offense worse than pot smoking after a sustained, national outcry, since no one on Denver’s team really gets busted for the former as often as they get busted for the latter. Then he read this and all of a sudden the Broncos are going to be making it to Super XLIX without anyone from my house and Gray is going to grow up to be a professional golfer despite a proud K family tradition of Pee Wee.

[Justin Tapp · Rating 2 out of 5]

In 532 A.D., nearly half the city of Constantinople was destroyed, and thousands were killed, by a riot brought on by a fight between factions of different sporting teams, the Blues and Greens. Sports had become intertwined with politics and ones loyalty to his faction/team trumped his loyalty to religion. This event occurred long before football, modern capitalism, marketing, or television -- which itself cuts into Almond's thesis. Almond does not mention this event or other historical events, and this ignorance really hurts some of his arguments-- that the modern passion of violent sports is primarily an American male response to his social surroundings and stimulated by American-style capitalism, marketing, and television.

I really wanted to like this book because I agree with his basic premise: we need to question the ethics of football, and if it's unethical then we need to stop watching. I stopped watching major league baseball in the 90s because of its perceived lack of ethics and I have, like the author, tried to give up watching football after spending time as a university instructor and seeing exploitation of student athletes as well as traumatic injuries. I have written several blog posts on the corruption of the NCAA and my support of the Ed O'Bannon class action suit. So, I'm with Almond in terms of his argument. But his philosophical arguments are so poorly thought out, his ignorance of history so blatant, and his attempts at armchair psychology so disgusting that I can't recommend it.

Almond points out the physical and social ills of the NFL monopoly and calls on thought leaders to challenge it. From my Christian point of view, he makes some good points:
"I thought about the amount of time Americans, men in particular but also women, spend thinking about football during a given week, as opposed to thinking about God and the state of our souls and whether we are leading a noble life, and I realized that I probably spent about ten minutes max on these issues, whereas my recap of the Patriots game had already run fifteen or more. I thought about the tens of millions of fans—the tailgaters, the face painters—whose sacred wishes and fears and prayers are reserved for a vicious and earthly game."

"Can you recall a single public figure who has ever condemned football? A major politician? A religious leader? A celebrity of any kind?" (besides Malcolm Gladwell)

Almond attempts to look at psychology of sports fans without looking at any academic research or even basic anthropology. There have been die-hard fans of sports since before anything modern. Almond blames capitalism and its marketing for making us all feel like "losers," thus pushing us to seek tribal camaraderie and something to cheer for in our sports teams. This ignores the fact that people all throughout the history of the world, in every political and economic order have found comeraderie and enjoyment in watching sports, often more bloody and cruel than modern American football. Almond actually contradicts himself on this because his own history of football shows that the game became popular and drew large crowds first, the marketing and exploitation came later. Couldn't one make the argument that reality TV shows such as Jackass are equally deplorable and harmful for society? Yet we call them protected under the First Amendment.

Almond's attempts at sociology include comparing football fan's behavior to the "camaraderie of drink," drawing on an alcoholic's memoir that somehow serves as a relevant source. Point out the African American athletes that become millionaires helps absolve white America of the guilt they feel over historical racial barriers. Rooting for them is supposed to counter the deep-seeded racism that whites actually feel. He even hypothesizes that love of football is evidence of possible latent homoerotic behavior. "I'm 23 percent gay," he writes. His logic is that since ancient Greeks were into homosexuality and pedophilia, it's natural that men professing to be heterosexual really enjoy watching men "grind" each other in a brutal fashion. He is a newspaper reporter by profession and should keep his day job. His own admission of long-time guilt, including still watching football and seeing his love of college football grow even as his moral qualms with the game grew, make the book somewhat hard to read. He admits to his own hypocrisy, yet also criticizes everyone else.

The author also fails to recognize that every sport has corruption and ethical issues. See the high salaries and cheating scandals rampant in soccer as an example. See the brutality and also cheating scandals in international martial arts competitions. Every sport, from MLB to NASCAR, and every stadium get government subsidies. All of them also


Almond imagines a "Marxist NFL," in which salaries are no longer "grossly inflated by our blessed free market." He prefers the NCAA basketball tournament as a more "purer form of meritocracy," momentarily turning a blind eye to the exploitation revealed by the O'Bannon lawsuit and other investigative reporting on college athletics, although he later returns to it and holds it up as another example of corruption in yet another contradiction of himself.

The strengths of the book are that Almond fleshes out the irony of the brain researcher who still watches and enjoys the game, despite knowing the dangers. He
rightly points out the 70 cents on the dollar subsidies that NFL stadiums get, but doesn't realize that each of these stadium projects produce economic impact analyses promising positive return to the taxpayer and the surrounding area. That lack of understanding weakens his argument; he doesn't know as much about all the processes involved as he thinks. He calls out the Bill Simmons of the world who make a living criticizing the sports they write about, making themselves out to be morally superior to the rest of us unquestioning fans; if Simmons really wanted to make an impact he'd announce he was boycotting the game. He rightly criticizes President Obama for stating he has moral problems with the game on the one hand, yet still justifies the game on the other.

"Couldn't the guy at least admit that it's wrong to watch a sport so dangerous he wouldn't let his own son play it?"

So, what to do? Most people, like Almond and myself, still find ourselves watching the game sometimes or discussing it with our friends without opining on its evident immorality.
"I’ve talked to dozens of fans who offer some version of the same concession. Okay, okay, the game is totally corrupt. Can we move on?"

Almond lays out a few ideas. Banning tackle football before college, including college GPA in the (BCS) national ranking formulas, requiring high GPAs for college players, ending tax subsidies for stadiums to name a few. He ignores possible unintended consequences-- by itself, requiring high GPAs for college athletes will cause colleges to discriminate proportionally more against the minorities Almond wants to help.

Two stars out of five. I would say there have been better articles in The Atlantic and documentaries on PBS (which Almond cites) making similar points but in a much better fashion. This book would be better as a long-form article, but no editor would tolerate his faux psychoanalysis.

Two stars out of five.

[Karin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was pretty good--it's about the many reasons why we as a culture should abandon football, or at least make some serious changes to the game and how it's funded. He covers how football uses taxpayer funds as subsidy, brain injury, violence, exploitation of Black players, and rape culture and how the Athletic Industrial Complex works to cover it all up in the name of capitalism.

#readharder book about sports.

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is not nearly as one-sided as the title would imply. I almost wish it had a different title so that I could gift it to friends and family who are fans. As it stands, it would immediately raise their hackles.
Steve Almond is an ardent football fan but he is more self aware than most. In this slim volume (short audio) he examines his love of the sport and what brought him to this point while fully examining the perils and pitfalls and most importantly, offering concrete suggestions for how the structure of the sport can be improved (not eliminated).
Chris Borland's resignation from the San Francisco 49'ers this week, concurrent with my reading of this book, could not have come at a better time to drive home Almond's points. I urge you to pick this up with an open mind....it's an important topic for our collective conscience.

[jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

let me be clear about this: i believe our insatiable appetite for football is symptomatic of our imperial decadence, of our quiet desperation for shared dramas in an age of social and psychic atomization, for animal physicality in an era of digital abstraction, for binary thought in an age of moral fragmentation.

but i also believe that watching football indoctrinates americans, that it actually causes us to be more bellicose, tolerant of cruelty, less empathic, less willing and able to engage with the struggles of an examined life.

steve almond's new book, against football, aptly subtitled one fan's reluctant manifesto, may well be the talk of the forthcoming football season. after some four decades as a devoted follower of gridiron action, almond found himself questioning the morality and ethics of continuing on in his fandom. polemical, acute, and compellingly argued (and likely to be debated endlessly on sports programs throughout the nation), against football will challenge even the most ardent admirer of pigskin play.

mostly, this book is a personal attempt to connect the two disparate synapses that fire in my brain when i hear the word "football," the one that calls out, who's playing? what channel? and the one that murmurs, shame on you. my hope is to honor the ethical complexities and the allure of the game. i'm trying to see football for what it truly is.

what does it mean that the most popular and unifying form of entertainment in america circa 2014 features giant muscled men, mostly african-american, engaged in a sport that causes many of them to suffer brain damage? what does it mean that our society has transmuted the intuitive physical joys of childhood - run, leap, throw, tackle - into a corporatized form of simulated combat? that a collision sport has become the leading signifier of our institutions of higher learning, and the undisputed champ of our colossal athletic industrial complex?

against football, at the least, ought to generate considerable discussion (and vitriolic criticism), but is also an opportunity to begin a dialogue about the larger (long ignored) questions almond highlights in the book. his judgments and moral objections about the game are many, and though couched in wit, humor, and personal asides, almond's concerns are legitimate and sincere. in lucid examination, almond considers many different aspects and outcomes of the sport: concussions (and the ensuing dementia and brain damage that plagues so many now-retired players), corporate corruption (and the nfl's non-profit status), engendering of racism and homophobia, normalization and celebration of violence, its co-opting of educational institutions, and its psychological effects on society and the individual (as "consumers," rather than "fans").

maybe the modern sacrificial impulse is a natural response to the stark darwinist pressures of capitalism, the arena in which all of us, like it or not, must now compete. maybe football represents the illusion of order imposed upon or chaotic aggression. maybe watching games isn't just an evasion but a way of managing our panic about resource depletion, climate change, plague, the looming prospect that the serpent within our souls will doom the human experiment.

whether casual fan or fervent follower, against football may well make for both a discomfiting and discomforting read. as it happened to almond, it may well happen to you: the slow encroach of too many questions and not enough answers, the duality of enjoying the game but feeling shamed by it, and, perhaps finally, the forlorn feelings of knowing you must leave a once-great love behind. rather than abandon the game altogether, however, almond offers a list of practical and reasonable steps that could easily (from a non-ownership perspective) be implemented to make football safer, less corrupt, and maybe even more ethical. against football, regardless of how you feel about the sport, is a timely and entertaining read. with conversations about concussions, locker-room homophobia, and public financing of stadia ongoing, almond's new book may well be the one that allows true (and much-needed) reform the attention it so sorely deserves.

all the proud fathers are ashamed to go home.
their women cluck like starved pullets,
dying for love.
therefore,
their sons grow suicidally beautiful
at the beginning of october,
and gallop terribly against each other's bodies.

"autumn begins in martins ferry, ohio" by james wright (as excerpted in against football)

[TJL · Rating 2 out of 5]

You know, it's not often that I get so pissed off that I can't finish a book that's just short of 200 pages.

Let me clarify my position:

I am a woman. I am not a football fan. Not now, not never. I am at best tolerant of the game, and at worst I deeply resent the annoying, die-hard fans and the NFL's glossing over of the concussion issue. If I ever have a son, it will be a cold day in hell before I sign a permission slip for him to play football whilst still a minor, knowing what I do about how injuries are handled in football culture.

Not a fan.

So this book- I should love this, right?

For a bit I did: When the author was talking about the facts, about the medical realities of CTE and the men that are suffering from depression, memory lapses, paralysis, and all sorts of things related to the injuries they received while playing football, that was all great. The money bit threw me for a bit of a loop because math isn't my strong point, but I got the gist of it: The NFL is obscenely rich.

It was when we started getting to the issue of homophobia and women that I started to take issue.

First, the remark that was made about women and football: Namely that football is still firmly in the "pre-Suffrage" era and that women are either cheerleaders or football wives. In football, we're either "sex objects" or passively cheering on "our men".

Well excuse you, but that's bullshit. The author spends the whole first half of the fucking book railing about the evils of the NFL, concussions and major injuries that leave players paralyzed, but then suggests that it's "sexism" that women aren't... IDK, on the field with the male players getting the shit knocked out of them?? He also, interestingly, neglected to mention that adult female football teams and leagues exist in their own capacity, outside of the NFL.

Second, the author does way, W A Y too much projection and assumption when it comes to homophobia. In addition to being a woman, I'm also bisexual and I am repelled by the notion that homophobes are all just secretly closeted gays that need to come to term with their feelings, struggling with their own homoerotic confusion. I don't doubt that some are, but it's a gross simplification of an attitude that could have a lot of different roots: Some people grow up in religions that teach them that gay people are evil; some people have been molested by adults of the same sex as children, and haven't dealt with the trauma.

Homophobia is wrong regardless of motive, but reducing it all to "lawl you've just thought about fucking men and you don't want to admit it" is idiotic.

It's the author projecting his understanding, his view onto a wider and nuanced subject, and consequently oversimplifying it to the point of making a mockery of it. It's especially idiotic when speaking in reference to a man that the author does not know (Richie Incognito) and suggesting that he's participating in pig-tail pulling: He suggests that Incognito is harassing this other player because he secretly has feelings for him. Don't even fucking ask me to start on the stupidity of the "he's only picking on you because he likes you" argument; we don't have time for that here and I will get 100% more heated than I already am.

(BTW, If someone was sitting next to me and trying to point out how homoerotic football is- like the author's old girlfriend at the beginning of this chapter- I would be just as irritated and tell them to stop viewing everything through sex-tinted glasses. I get doing it as a joke, but there are people who see sex Literally Everywhere and will demand that you see it too.)

I had to stop around the part the author started talking about rape, because I'm already getting that Feeling that I get when I read books and the author is handling sociopolitical topics with all the delicacy of a fucking sledgehammer. If he couldn't talk about homophobia (and sexism, from that bit I mentioned above) without obnoxiously and obliviously projecting his own biases onto it, I am terrified of how he's gonna talk about rape and racism.

I'm out. If the author had stuck to reporting the facts- accounts from football players who have faced homophobia, the support and backlash they've faced in coming out, how it's affected their careers- I would have a totally different view of this, because it would be first-hand accounts from the people themselves.

But instead he decided to start lapsing into tired, biased, outdated understandings of what homophobia is and why people feel it, and as a result I have just got zero faith in his ability to discuss the other topics remaining in this book with even a semblance of grace.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I desperately wanted to hate this book. I hoped that it would be trite, simplistic, and altogether too snarky. Sadly, except for the snarky part, I was disappointed. It was intelligent, complex, and replete with the moral ambiguities inherent in the sport itself. It didn't moralize or judge, but presented a strong case along with historical and social context against football. I like football (as does the author, though a Raiders fan??) and I feel that tinge of ugliness when I see a savage hit and think about the damage that will do to their brain. (I know, best not to think about it). What Steve Almond does is force one to think about it and that's good.

I also appreciated his reference to other great sports writers (Simmons, Fainaru, etc.) and other great writers in general (DeLillo, Klosterman) to both support and refute his points. This made the book seem more like a discussion of varying points of view and less like a lecture.

Will I stop watching football because of this? I honestly don't know, but before reading it I wouldn't have given much thought at all, now it will get the consideration it deserves and for that I am most appreciative. If only more writers could address more issues in this manner - maybe we'd move away from didactic debates and towards reasoned conversations and conclusions.

[Dree · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an important book. Yes, there's been a documentary (League of Denial), which he discusses. Yes, there is an "official repository of NFL player brains". But the simple fact is that this shockingly greedy set of 1% owners is using tax breaks and public funds to destroy the lives of a subset of men--largely poor men from very rural or very urban dead-end places.

Because it's not just the NFL players who suffer brain injuries. It's the college players, and it's the high school players. It's guys who never make a cent playing football, and have regular lives.

The NFL is a nonprofit--tax exempt! No other sports league is (not NBA, NHL, MLB). Yet still taxpayers foot the bill for stadiums that owners/NFL use to blackmail cities into getting/keeping a team.

I have given up on football. I used to love it, 20 years ago. Everything has changed--more games, college playoff system, Rose Bowl has been ruined, players are ever bigger, and it is just no fun to watch any more. It's all about money--for a select few.

[Jason Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lifelong Oakland Raiders fan, Steve Almond makes several compelling arguments as to why football or, as he puts it, the "Athletic Industrial Complex" oftentimes does more harm than good. He considers various angles from which to approach and evaluate the sport--health, economics, race, etc.--and in the end addresses the ways in which the game and its policies could be improved from a more ethical, moral standpoint. As a casual fan, who watches some of the games on TV but doesn't attend them nor buy any merch, I can't say Against Football convicts me enough to forgo doing that. I suppose, in other words, that I'm willing to overlook the game's problems in favor of my own gratification. Still, this is a thought-provoking, enjoyable read. For more information, I suggest watching this interview with Almond about the book and sport.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Are we really so spoiled as a nation, in 2014, that we can't curb our appetite for an unnecessarily violent game that degrades our educational system, injures its practitioners, and fattens a pack of gluttonous corporations?"

I was certainly leaning in his direction before reading the book, but Almond pushed me over the edge. I draw the curtain on football--at least in its current configurations in the pro, college and high school ranks. I cannot in good conscience participate. The future will tell if I have the courage of my convictions.

[Brendan Shea · Rating 2 out of 5]

I feel like this is one of those books that is designed to give people who already sort of believe something (watching football is immoral) a set of plausible-sounding reasons that they use to “argue” for this belief, and to help them feel certain they are “right”. There’s nothing wrong with this, I guess, but I wonder whether it has prevented people from being as critical of the science in this book as they otherwise might. In any case, here are some significant claims made by the book that are misleading or false. (Toward the end, when the book discusses high school and college football, I am much more sympathetic. I also like the fact it cites A Fan’s Notes, which is an awesome book.)

1. The claims about life expectancy. The big “statistic” in the first third of the book is the one concerning life-expectancy: he cites a study saying CFL and NFL players have a life expectancy of 55. I played around in PubMed and Google Scholar for a while and discovered the source: it was NOT based on a medical study, but based on an (informal) conversation between a doctor and an “insurance professional.” The worries about life expectancy arising from this belief (which was frequently cited by players’ unions) convinced OSHA to do an actual statistical analysis, which found that pro football players tend to live *longer* than average. There are more recent studies that say basically the same thing. This author’s critique of the OSHA study is, frankly, stupid: he basically argues that if we control for *every possible benefit that football gives* (physical fitness, non-smoking, increased wealth) but DON’T control for brain injury (or weight gain), than it turns out playing football is harmful! By this methodology (Ignore the benefits! Only pay attention to the harms!), every occupation is harmful. I’m happy to agree that, when compared to people like pro tennis players, NFL players no doubt suffer greatly because of both brain injuries and heart disease (and I think this is a legitimate worry, and one the players’ unions are right to push Goodell on). However, if the headline was “NFL players die younger than pro tennis players do,” this book wouldn’t be nearly as exciting, right?

2. The claims about informed consent. So, suppose (contrary to our best evidence) that the life expectancy of NFL players is 55. Are the players kept in the dark about this, and thus unable to give informed consent? The author suggests they are, by a vast conspiracy of league-paid scientists, or something of the sort. However, this ignores the (obvious!) fact that the players’ unions are the ones who brought up the concern in the first place! I find it hard to believe that this isn’t the sort of thing that union stewards wouldn’t make players aware of (I’m a union member, BTW, and I think this is what union stewards ought to do).

3. The claims about NFL teams being “parasites” on local economies. I agree with the (run-on-the-mill) criticisms about the cartel-like structure of the pro sports leagues, both in the US and abroad, and specifically the way they “blackmail” cities and states to pay for stadiums. It makes me angry, and I agree that this is something federal regulators should do something about. However, this doesn’t entail that cities don’t see *some* sort of net benefit. In fact, almost every economic analysis has found that cities do see some sort of benefit (though not as large of a benefit as they would if the cartel were broken up). In any case, NFL teams are not parasites, and cities are not “better off without them.” Finally, while I agree it would be more effective for cities to spend the money on social services, this could be said of *lots* of government spending (so I’m not sure why NFL stadiums should be of special concern).

4.The accounts of homophobia and racism. I’ll be the first to grant that homophobia and racism are a big problem in pro sports. However, the explanations here (“repressed homosexual desires channeled into rage!” “Draft day is like a slave auction!”) aren’t good ones. Violent sports (and violence in general) were plenty popular in Ancient Greece (which had different sexual mores), and the NFL’s popularity seems to be growing even as the US becomes (a bit) less homophobic. The comparison with slavery seems a bit behind the pale, at least to me, since it basically minimizes all the concrete evils of slavery (the fact that slaves don’t consent, that they were tortured, had their families taken from them, etc.) and instead focuses ONLY on some sort abstract power relation between masters and slaves (“slaves were valued for their physical skills”). This felt to me like a writing assignment in sophomore-level critical theory class: use Freud’s theory to argue that our love for the NFL is a result of our repressed desires. Since this general technique can use repressed desires to explain basically anything (our love for reality shows, that new car you bought, the fact you like grilled cheese sandwiches), the fact it "works" here is basically meaningless. The worst thing is that author seems to think that because these parts will annoy people, his analysis is therefore revealing. Well, I was annoyed. I wish this author had, I don’t know, talked to a sociologist who studied racism/homophobia in pro sports (such people do exist), instead of just journaling his feelings for 30 pages.

5. The Blind Side. This part basically consists of an ad hominem attack on the family described in the Blind Side, just based on the author’s intuitions (there’s no new research or anything). Whatever.

6. The fact that everyone the author talks to agree with him, even though they all watch football. There are about six conversations during the book where the author recounts some conversation with some super smart person who likes football. The author assures us these people are basically convinced by his argument, but just can’t pull themselves away. I understand the feeling—it’s hard to defend one’s “guilty pleasure,” and these people probably do worry about it. However, there are plenty of (very smart) people who can and have defended their love for pro sports. I’m baffled that the author couldn’t find any of these people to talk to. Also, the author quotes Malcom Gladwell (i.e., the world’s worst science writer, and the most famous contemporary critic of football) approvingly. All things being equal, this doesn’t bode well.

7. The comparison between the NFL encouraging hard hits on defenseless receivers and the justice system allowing rapists to walk. And between Pat Tillman’s being killed by friendly fire and of an NFL player dying in their 50s. And between NFL players and human sacrifices. At this point, I probably should have stopped reading. The moral analogies in the book are, almost without exception, terrible ones. Things like slavery, rape, human sacrifice, and the military cover-up of Tillman’s death are very serious moral wrongs. These sorts of comparisons trivialize them.

8.The claim that watching football makes one more violent. I guess this is conceivable, but given the difficulties researchers have had linking even ultra-violent video games and movies to violence, it seems pretty doubtful. The only studies linking football and violence have involved fan’s reaction to upset losses (which increases domestic violence). However, this sort of phenomena doesn’t seem to be tied to the nature of the game, but to the disappointment experienced. If people were super into chess, you’d probably find the same thing after they lost to an inferior opponent.

9.The modesty of the solutions. After comparing football players to slaves, human sacrifices, and rape victims, the author’s conclusions are pretty weak—no tackle football until 16 (and maybe no tackle football in high school), get rid of the NFL’s tax exempt status, weight limits on NFL teams, better tracking of sub-concussion impacts, federal regulations about stadium funding. I agree with all of these things (as do lots and lots of sports fans and writers), but I hardly think that any of these come to the level of “we need to stop watching pro football until they happen.” Instead, these seem like the sort of everyday regulatory issues that get debated in all sorts of industries all of time. Given all the lead up, I was hoping for something a bit more creative: How can we breakup the owner’s cartel? How can we make the NFL liable for the health issues of past players? How in the world is the federal government going to regulate high school sports? How should college players in “money” sports be treated (the current system is certainly unfair to them)?

10. The fact this book ignores all the relevant research that has been done about these things. There are a ton of smart people working in the sociology, psychology, economics, and philosophy of sports. I'm not sure this book made meaningful contributions to any of the debates that are going on in any of these discpines.

[Bryan Winchell · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a football fan for most of my 41 years, this is probably the most important book I've read this year. And for me to be reading it during the week the horrid Ray Rice spousal abuse video was released and the photos of Adrian Peterson's 4-year-old son's battered body, who he hit with tree branches to "teach him some discipine," seems like a cosmic coincidence that I shouldn't ignore.

I admit it, I did do my usual thing of getting up before dawn here in Japan to watch college and pro games this weekend, but while the games were on, I found myself doing other things, such as reading this book and not paying close attention to the action on the field (a good thing, too, as both my teams, my alma mater, USC and my hometown Seattle Seahawks lost!).

I wonder if I can give up the sport after reading this book. It certainly caused a lot of soul-searching for me, and one thing I realized is that, as an ex-pat living in Japan for a decade who has had most of my best friends move back to America in the past few years, one of the main reasons I follow the sport is because it keeps me connected with old friends, helps me feel a sense of community. And for me, that's a very valuable thing as I often feel rather isolated here since I am not Japanese and since I didn't come over because I was in love with culture (in fact, as a high schooler, I told my friend I would never even visit Japan, let alone raise a family here, because of how conformist and boring it seemed!). Fortunately, I've learned to accept things about the culture here, but that doesn't change that I often feel isolated from the people around me and football is one of the last places I have where I feel a sense of something bigger than myself.

All that said, though, is just a justification as I am sure there are other communities I could get involved with, other ways to re-connect with past friends. Anyway, this book is a real eye-opener and writing in a very honest way. And before you think that it's written by a guy with a lifelong hatred football, the exact opposite is true---he is a lifelong fan, thus this book has a lot bigger impact than if he were against football from the beginning.

Ultimately, Almond argues that it's time we fans take back our power and take some action to at least try to change the game and change our relationship with it. Perhaps we need to ask ourselves, for example, why do we get so excited by big hits, why don't we feel compassion for the guy on the receiving end of it? He also details the corrupt business practices of the NFL, and asks that we revoke its tax-exempt status and stop letting owners blackmail our citizens into paying most of the tab for new stadiums every two decades while they alone reap the rewards. If you are a football fan, you ought to seriously consider reading this book to see how it settles with you. Because for me, it's made me wonder a lot about this game I love (but never really played) and just how much longer I can stick with it.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I miss football.

For a few years, I’ve had a harder and harder time justifying my enjoyment of football. In addition to the big media stories, too many of my favorite players have sustained serious injuries. More and more, I’ve felt like a Roman in the Coliseum. Watching football made me feel like a hypocrite.

But it’s football. Football! Do you know how much fun it is to watch football? To spend a fourth quarter standing on your couch because the stress of a close game is just too much to take while sitting?

And the commercials! Oh, the commercials …

To vanquish my guilt, I found excuses: they choose to play. What difference does one person make regarding the NFL juggernaut. I’ll just watch until players x and y retire. If anything, I became a bigger fan to hide my concerns, much like unhappily married people post the most nauseating “I LUV MY POOKIE” photos and posts on Facebook.

Much like those married folk, my attempts at overcompensating weren’t working. My stupid, anti-football conscience just kept getting louder. Late last season, I decided that it would be my last year. Then I put on my jersey and hugged it (no, not really, but close).

Something horrible happened in the interim: My team choked in the playoffs. Not just choked but performed in a way that will make that squad the understandable butt of jokes for years to come. It was so bad that, as a fan, I wasn’t even disappointed. I discovered it’s possible for your team to play so badly that you lose the capacity to care. I hadn’t realized that was possible.

Unfortunately, it was so bad that I felt like a traitor for turning on them. So I went back to my excuses.

But that stupid voice in my head didn’t shut up. So, finally, one day, I told a friend: Please hold me accountable for what I’m about to say: I’m going to stop watching football.

And I have.

And it’s been difficult. Want to know a good way to stop a conversation dead in its tracks? Tell people you’ve stopped watching football.

This is all to say: Steve Almond, thank you. Thank you for writing a book that made me feel less alone. That helped me remember why I decided to give up football. For putting into words – with much research and eloquence – why I arrived at the decision I did. For making it easier for me to avoid the TV on Sundays. And Thursdays. And Mondays.

Events since Against Football’s publication have only highlighted Mr. Almond’s many points. Even for those who plan to continue to watch football, as fans, they should read this book. Recommended.

[Laurie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very thought-provoking treatise on the damaging effects that playing football has on the bodies of athletes at all levels. It is tough to read this when one is a fan of football whether it is watching Pop Warner league, high school, college, professional or any combination thereof.

Football is inherently violent if it is tackle football which all organized football is in the US. We are all now aware of how damaging concussions are which are sustained by boys and men at each level of play. Steve Almond pointed out something I didn't know however, which is that most states and the NCAA have no official protocol to deal with concussions at the middle school, high school or college level. Most schools will suspend the athlete for the remainder of the practice or game, but that may be the extent of the protection that a player receives. Meaning that an athlete can get a concussion, minor or major, and go right back out and practice or play the next day. This can lead to long-term brain damage even if a player never goes beyond playing at the high school level. And many of us gleefully and wholeheartedly cheer on football teams each weekend, little caring how damaging this could ultimately be.

This is something that many readers will dismiss as alarmist and unnecessarily dramatic. I don't. I think Steve Almond is simply bringing to our attention how hypocritical most of us are who know the dangers of football on the brains of athletes, yet we watch anyway. He admits that he is one those fans and I do too. I cheer on my university alma mater's team and my husband's every Saturday and then watch NFL games on other days. And I shouldn't because it won't ever change unless fans demand an end to watching men get hurt for entertainment. Watching football is a pastime that would be hard to give up for many of us. But we wouldn't think it was okay to watch gladiators today just because they were paid well and we are entertained. Football may not be a fight to the death, but it is damaging all the same.

Okay, I've ranted enough now. Read this book and see if his arguments seem valid to you.

[Sean Owen · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a terrible and misleading title for such a brilliant and complex book. From the title one would expect a simple and straight forward argument against the nation's favorite and highly problematic sport. That sort of argument is awfully easy to make if you were never a fan and never understood the appeal in the first place. That kind of book wouldn't be much of an argument at all. Almond actually talks about that sort of thing in "Against Football" as "pandering to our moral sensibilities." Thankfully Almond has given us something far more complex. Almond is a true fan, he charts significant experiences in his own life along the timeline of major events in football. He roots for a team that is a hopeless basketcase. He knows the sport is crooked and violent and yet he still watches it.

What Almond is doing in "Against Football" is an exercise that seems to be less and less common in our culture. He's thinking critically and questioning his own assumptions. It's very easy to view things for us to unconsciously compartmentalize and ignore uncomfortable facts. Almond is asking the hard questions and trying to understand why he can take so much enjoyment from something that causes so much harm. There are many sad stories of the human wreckage that football has created. Almond's brand of sarcastic humor does a good job of balancing this out, but without taking away any of the emotional power. He manages to keep the reader from feeling fatigue as the wrongs done in the name of sport pile on. Almond stumbles a bit towards the end when he gets a bit too sweeping in comparing football to the military. Yes the NFL bangs the patriotism drum and the current conflicts are difficult to understand, but it's just such a grand claim that it oversimplifies. The best moments of "Against Football" are when Almond avoids the easy solutions and shows just how complex our ability to compartmentalize can be.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Steve Almond covers all the reasons that fans should question their devotion to the game of football. First and foremost is the debilitating effects that the repeated crushing blows have on these athletes, especially head injuries. It's not just the frequent concussions that football players suffer, but the accumulated effects of hundreds of small hits every game and practice session. Fans are watching players seriously injure themselves for their entertainment.

Almond wrote this book before the most recent football scandals, including the spousal abuse charge against Ray Rice. Football has a long history of sexism, and hyper-masculinity. Almond even covers the bullying scandal of a few years back (Miami Dolphins' Jonathan Martin,) and the expected media hoopla over the first openly gay NFL player (Michael Sam.)

One of the issues covered that particularly interests me is the way public taxes are used to build these extravagant arenas, only to have the team owners benefit, often moving the team to another city when it suits their financial fancy. I guess they figure it works like the trickle down theory of economics. In other words, it's just another way for the rich to stay rich and get richer.

This is a well-thought out diatribe, with humor, insight and empathy. I recommend this piece of social criticism for fans and non-fans alike.

[Thom · Rating 4 out of 5]

This short book details, chapter by chapter, the several problems with football as a sport and as a business. Most are well argued, and though the author doesn't provide a solution, he is quite clear on that in the conclusion. He sees his role as provoking discussion.

Like a previous work, the autobiographical parts don't add much for me, and in many cases detract. No actual studies are cited, and there probably are several mentioned in the concussion chapter alone. It would be interesting to count the number of times "I believe" is used in the text.

I found the chapter on military connections most surprising, and the chapter on concussions most depressing. As a late-comer to the game and fandom, it is probably easier for me to step back - but I feel driven to make a bigger difference. This book only makes the arguments. Perhaps the associated website and forum have more suggestions for change.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Here's what I wrote in the forum on the book's website.

"I am almost ready to leave behind my enthusiasm for football. I do not know if your book exactly convinced me of much — indeed, much of its argument seems tailored to someone with a more refined sense of morality than I could ever boast of — but it has perhaps help me sort out my increasingly conflicted feelings about the sport. I don’t think I would have picked up the book if I weren’t ready to be swayed.

But like St. Augustine with chastity, I need a little time to make the change. At the close of a long tenure as an Oregon Ducks fan, I specifically need — depending on what happens at the Rose Bowl — until either tomorrow or until January 12th. Even when you are just letting young athletes fulfill your need for cathartic emotional experience, there’s something to be said for quitting while you’re ahead. Right?"

[Adam Ross · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a great little book. It explores, with profound simplicity, each of the serious problems with American football as a sport. He speaks about the economic drag of the teams on their towns, as well as the high costs of footing the bill for their stadiums on public funds, while giant corporations make all the profits from it. He points out that football manufactures the fragile masculinity that harms boys and society by promoting sexism, racism, and homophobia. He discusses the proven psychological reality that football, as a violent sport, actually increases aggression and violence in those who play and in those who watch and admire from the TV. Many profound insights can be found on every page.

[elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

I give this book all of the stars and thumbs up possible.

Almond is a delight to read no matter the subject, but he really hits it out of the park (oh, the sports!) here. Anyone concerned about the recent HS football deaths, concussion headlines, and the NFL, a giant behemoth corporation, being a tax exempt organization will find more fuel for the fire here. Almond expertly handles the complexity of of throttling America's favorite THING while still acknowledging a love of the game by many, including himself.

Fans of League of Denial and NFL fans in general should read.

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's more fun to read Steve Almond write about his love of football (some of the best parts of the book) and his subsequent moral problems about it than it is to feel guilt-tripped by him for liking the sport. And that's my only complaint really--that Steve can sound a bit histrionic at times. Still, it's a fantastic ("fan"-tastic) book that presents the beauty and the beast of the NFL. I like that he offers some solutions to the game's problems at the end too. Really interesting and well-done, but I'm still going to watch football (and I bet Steve does too--at least the highlights).

[Kyle Nicholas · Rating 5 out of 5]

My only regret about this book is that I can't give it a rating of fifteen stars on Goodreads. This book says everything I've been burning and aching to say about the barbaric "sport" of football but could not because nobody would take me seriously. Steve Almond can say it because he's an actual fan. I've loathed football all my life. This is definitely one of those profound works that everyone must read... and I'd even say write a paper on. (You will be graded.)

[John Lamb · Rating 4 out of 5]

I came to this book skeptical and was shocked how convinced I was by the end. It is hard to disagree with Almond's claims and I can't promise I will change my ways but now I understand why I hate and love football at the same time.

[Fawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a decent football fan for quite some time, starting with a misguided attempt to be a "guy's girl" and then moving on to actually being interested in the game. A couple of years ago though I started wondering why I was spending time on something so pointless. Then after the ridiculous backlash against Colin Kaepernick taking a knee in protest of our fellow humans literally being killed in the streets, I decided I was done with football.
I've been meaning to read this book for while as I'm a big Steve Almond fan primarily due to his podcast with Cheryl Strayed (thanks for the rec, Lisa). He's mentioned this book and his thoughts on a football a couple times on the podcast and he made some excellent points which sparked my interest in this book. In Against Football he does a great job of intelligently synthesizing several societal issues and folding in how they all touch football in some way. Economics, racism, homophobia, violence, war, religion, etc. A few examples:

The NFL is a tax exempt behemoth. Tax exempt. This is astounding.

Almond details Michael Sam, the first openly gay player and the various homophobic situations he was exposed to. Sam came out in 2014, ultimately played very little in the NFL and when you go on to do some cursory research you'll find that still, since 2014, the NFL has never fielded an openly gay player. While Sam is just one snapshot, for anyone interested in equality to deny the fact that it's 2017 and the NFL remains a fully homophobic organization is utter and complete denial of something staring you in the face.

A great deal of this book discusses violence. Player-on-player and player-on-civilian (so to speak). Almond touches on the condoning of the beating, raping and sometimes killing that NFL players participate it and that it's brushed aside for the most part (god forbid you take a knee though).

Almond's real sticking point though is the mental and physical anguish that repeated brain traumas place on a person. He details the effects on high school players up through the NFL and it is truly awful to read. Just a couple of quotes of many:

"Retired football players are nineteen times more likely to suffer from brain-related illness than non-players, and retired players die 20 years earlier on average."

"Researchers at Purdue University studied the effects of concussions on high school players. They set up a study using non-concussed players as a control group, however they found that even those who did not suffer concussions showed plummeting levels of cognitive ability as the football season continued.

I found this quote to be particularly meaningful:

"What would happen if some invisible gas leak in the school cafeteria caused diminished brain activity in students? Can we safely assume district officials would evacuate the school until further notice? That parents would be up in arms? That media and lawyers would descend in droves to collect statements from the innocent victims? Can we assume that the community would not gather together en masse on Friday nights to eat hot dogs and watch the gas leak?"

And yet, football lives on and we repeatedly, willingly allow our sons to experience brain damage in the name of the game.

This book is worth reading. It's a hard read. I don't agree with everything but it forces the reader to engage critically in thinking about a societal institution that is just taken for granted. I do wish Almond has cited the studies he used more thoroughly but aside from that I wish every football fan would read this.

[Julia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though it pained him, lifelong, self-admitted football superfan Steve Almond reluctantly came to acknowledge how destructive and damaging (in more ways than one) his favorite sport is. Though he focuses in this slim volume primarily on the quite shocking permanent physical, psychological and mental damage players experience over years playing the game, he also calls out the ways in which the NFL organization (which has an astoundingly non-profit tax status) takes advantage of its host cities and, especially, their taxpayers. It isn't entirely doom and gloom, though -- he provides in the final chapter some suggestions which, if adopted, would provide some measure of improvement to both the game itself and the NFL without abandoning the sport completely. It wasn't difficult for Almond to sway me, as I'm an apathetic football fan at best. However, I would challenge real fans to read through this book and then ask themselves if their conscience still allows them to watch other human beings damage themselves and each other for our entertainment, while the team owners laugh themselves all the way to the bank.