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Earl Campbell: Yards after Contact
Earl Campbell was a force in American football, winning a state championship in high school, rushing his way to a Heisman trophy for the University of Texas, and earning MVP as he took the Houston Oilers to the brink of the Super Bowl. An exhilarating blend of biography and history, Earl Campbell chronicles the challenges and sacrifices one supremely gifted athlete faced in his journey to the Hall of Fame. The story begins in Tyler, Texas, and features his indomitable mother, a crusading judge, and a newly integrated high school, then moves to Austin, home of the University of Texas (infamously, the last all-white national champion in college football), where legendary coach Darrell Royal stakes his legacy on recruiting Campbell. Later, in booming, Luv-Ya-Blue Houston, Campbell reaches his peak with beloved coach Bum Phillips, who celebrates his star runner’s bruising style even as it takes its toll on Campbell’s body. Drawing on new interviews and research, Asher Price reveals how a naturally reticent kid from the country who never sought the spotlight struggled with complex issues of race and health. In an age when concussion revelations and player protest against racial injustice rock the NFL, Campbell’s life is a timely story of hard-earned success—and heart-wrenching sacrifice.
344 pages, Hardcover
Published September 5, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
August 11, 2019
In 'Earl Campbell: Yards after Contact,' journalist Asher Price unpacks the legend of Earl Campbell the football player and pieces together the portrait of man forged by East Texas politics and culture in the post-Civil Rights era. From the rose farms of Tyler to the 40 Acres in Austin and the booming metropolis of Houston, Price digs deep to humanize the bruiser that took defenders by storm most Saturday and Sunday afternoons.
The narrative that gets spun is as much a riveting sports story as it is a deep examination of race relations in the South and the struggle to desegregate the University of Texas.
'Earl Campbell: Yards after Contact' is a well-researched, fast-paced and inexhaustible piece of Lone Star lore.
The narrative that gets spun is as much a riveting sports story as it is a deep examination of race relations in the South and the struggle to desegregate the University of Texas.
'Earl Campbell: Yards after Contact' is a well-researched, fast-paced and inexhaustible piece of Lone Star lore.
September 18, 2019
Heisman Trophy winner. NFL Hall of Famer. Civil rights trailblazer? Asher Price makes a convincing case that Earl Campbell's performance on the field had a more lasting impact off the field in the State of Texas. In his biography 'Yards After Contact," Price recounts Earl Campbell more as social history than sporting history.
Earl Campbell was born a year after Brown v. Board of Education, the effects of which did not filter down to his native Tyler, Texas until he reached high school. Unlike his older siblings, Earl attended formerly all-white (and recently desegregated) John Tyler High School, where he transformed a middling football program into a state champion. Price mordantly observed that the former all-black high school that was shuttered when Tyler high schools integrated sits at the corner of Martin Luther King Boulevard and Confederate Avenue. In a city that had built parks that included obscure back entrances for blacks, Earl was feted as a hero in a city-wide parade.
From Tyler, Earl moved on to another bastion with a fraught racial history, the University of Texas at Austin. It is a credit to the University of Texas Press that it published a book that examines in painful detail UT's efforts to exclude and marginalize blacks' participation at the school and in sports in particular al the way up to the 1970's. UT was the last school to win a national championship in football with an all-white team. UT had only a handful of African-American football players when Earl enrolled in 1974 and had a deserved reputation for being inhospitable to blacks. Price gives a nuanced portrayal of legendary UT football coach Darrell Royal. While Royal was one of the few men in Texas with the political capital to integrate UT athletics, he was reluctant to challenge the prevailing mindset in Texas that football should be segregated. Even though Earl was initially wary of Royal, they bonded over their shared interests and upbringing. Ironically, Earl's career at UT flourished after Royal retired and UT shifted from the wishbone to the I-formation, which suited Earl's bruising style of running.
After graduating from UT, Earl was the overall Number 1 draft pick for the Houston Oilers in 1978. As with John Tyler High School and UT, Earl transformed the Oilers from losers to Super Bowl contenders. Earl's glory years for the Oilers coincided with a brief period of time where Houston enjoyed national glamour, inspired in part by cowboy chic and the movie 'Urban Cowboy". The precipitous drop in oil prices from 1982 to 1986 largely paralleled the unraveling of the Oilers and Earl's career.
Having grown up as a UT fan, "Luv Ya Blue" Oilers fan, and an overall Earl Campbell fan, Price's depictions of early 70's Tyler, 1970's UT, and late 70's Houston resonated with me. For example, in describing Gilley's nightclub, Price says, " More than anything, it had ways of geysering up pent-up energy, of the physical or sexual nature."
Earl Campbell is my all-time favorite football player, and "Yards After Contact" did nothing to diminish my respect for him. Earl Campbell was never a conventional civil rights hero like Martin Luther King or Barbara Jordan, who inspired others with gifted oration. Rather, Earl embodied the dream described by King where one is judged not by the color of his skin, but by the content of his character.
Earl Campbell was born a year after Brown v. Board of Education, the effects of which did not filter down to his native Tyler, Texas until he reached high school. Unlike his older siblings, Earl attended formerly all-white (and recently desegregated) John Tyler High School, where he transformed a middling football program into a state champion. Price mordantly observed that the former all-black high school that was shuttered when Tyler high schools integrated sits at the corner of Martin Luther King Boulevard and Confederate Avenue. In a city that had built parks that included obscure back entrances for blacks, Earl was feted as a hero in a city-wide parade.
From Tyler, Earl moved on to another bastion with a fraught racial history, the University of Texas at Austin. It is a credit to the University of Texas Press that it published a book that examines in painful detail UT's efforts to exclude and marginalize blacks' participation at the school and in sports in particular al the way up to the 1970's. UT was the last school to win a national championship in football with an all-white team. UT had only a handful of African-American football players when Earl enrolled in 1974 and had a deserved reputation for being inhospitable to blacks. Price gives a nuanced portrayal of legendary UT football coach Darrell Royal. While Royal was one of the few men in Texas with the political capital to integrate UT athletics, he was reluctant to challenge the prevailing mindset in Texas that football should be segregated. Even though Earl was initially wary of Royal, they bonded over their shared interests and upbringing. Ironically, Earl's career at UT flourished after Royal retired and UT shifted from the wishbone to the I-formation, which suited Earl's bruising style of running.
After graduating from UT, Earl was the overall Number 1 draft pick for the Houston Oilers in 1978. As with John Tyler High School and UT, Earl transformed the Oilers from losers to Super Bowl contenders. Earl's glory years for the Oilers coincided with a brief period of time where Houston enjoyed national glamour, inspired in part by cowboy chic and the movie 'Urban Cowboy". The precipitous drop in oil prices from 1982 to 1986 largely paralleled the unraveling of the Oilers and Earl's career.
Having grown up as a UT fan, "Luv Ya Blue" Oilers fan, and an overall Earl Campbell fan, Price's depictions of early 70's Tyler, 1970's UT, and late 70's Houston resonated with me. For example, in describing Gilley's nightclub, Price says, " More than anything, it had ways of geysering up pent-up energy, of the physical or sexual nature."
Earl Campbell is my all-time favorite football player, and "Yards After Contact" did nothing to diminish my respect for him. Earl Campbell was never a conventional civil rights hero like Martin Luther King or Barbara Jordan, who inspired others with gifted oration. Rather, Earl embodied the dream described by King where one is judged not by the color of his skin, but by the content of his character.
November 8, 2019
Asher Price takes great care to put Earl Campbell in an important social and racial context that some sports fans prefer to ignore. More detached and ecumenical readers, however, will delight in this treatment of the many forces working for, along with and against (mostly against) Campbell, who came to the University of Texas at a pivotal time and, consequently, represented something greater than himself (or his yards per carry, or his Heisman, or his future NFL career). Price gives us a courageous, bold and sympathetic appraisal of a man and his times. For those very reasons, it's one of the most rewarding sports biographies I've read in years. If you want hagiography and dumb superlatives, move on. There are plenty of superficial sports books out there. This isn't one of them.
December 28, 2019
Excellent book, even if you are not into football (I'm not) as it is more about the people and the times more than the plays and technical details of the game. If you are from Texas, or have lived in Texas, then this book will be of even more interest with interesting stories about Austin, Houston, as well as Tyler (Campbell's home town) during the time span the book covers. The author clearly has empathy for the various characters (players, coaches, their families, etc.) who are insightfully depicted. And I particularly enjoyed the tales about Houston during Campbell's time with the Oilers, that section had me laughing out loud.
February 4, 2020
Loved this book. It is the story of Earl in 3 sections...Tyler, Austin, and Houston. Have always just loved this man and his humility. I was at UT the same years he was there and in Houston the same years he was there. Of course it is the remarkable story of a phenom from a very poor background making it in the NFL without all the ego of so many. The story is also about race and the hurdles young people faced particularly at the University. I think I was under a rock....I just didn't see what they went through and for that I am embarrassed and ashamed. His is a remarkable story, especially if you are a Longhorn fan or an Oiler fan.
March 28, 2020
Usually sports biographies are not my thing, but this was an excellent book not only about Earl Campbell's achievements on the football fields for John Tyler High School, the University of Texas Longhorns, and the Houston Oilers, but a book about race in eastern, central, and southern Texas during the later part of the 20th Century.
Honestly, it's a book about race in Texas: then and now. That was what hooked me. In this way, it was very much like Friday Night Lights.
Honestly, it's a book about race in Texas: then and now. That was what hooked me. In this way, it was very much like Friday Night Lights.
March 13, 2021
The story of Earl Campbell as a sports hero in Tyler (JT), Austin (UT), and Houston (Oilers).
But it's also the story of the boundary between segregation and integration and life as a black man in a world controlled by whites resistant to change.
But it's also the story of the boundary between segregation and integration and life as a black man in a world controlled by whites resistant to change.
July 8, 2020
Great look at not just my favorite runner but the world in which he lived.
Worth it for the UT & Oiler stuff, but also for the history lesson.
Worth it for the UT & Oiler stuff, but also for the history lesson.
December 17, 2022
As much about race relations in Texas as the story of Earl himself.
August 25, 2025
This ended up being much more than a sports biography with great detail about Texas’ shift from a segregated community to integrated. Very refreshing but also evokes emotion.
January 10, 2021
I'm not a huge sports fan, but Asher takes his biography of UT legend Earl Campbell and makes it about so much more. Starting with Earl's impoverished childhood in Tyler, Texas, and then his rise at the University of Texas to his time as a pro football player, Asher shows the complexities of race relations during Earl's career, challenges that obviously continue into our time. Just one example - Earl and two of his siblings were named by the white doctor that delivered them; Earl was named after the doctor himself and the younger sibling's names were chosen by the physician - over the objections of their mother, who had other names in mind. When she sought, after the births, to have their names changed, she was told it would cost $100 per child - money she didn't have. While this is appalling, Earl and the doctor continued to be friends, and he later was at Earl's wedding, showing that relationships from that time and place could be very complex as they crossed racial and class lines.
September 25, 2023
Fascinating look at Earl Campbell's life. When we see him at events, we understand more why he is wheelchair bound. But this book should actually be sub-titled, "The Life and and Times of Earl Campbell", for it tells so much of growing up black in the south
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews