I just finished it up yesterday on audio. Overall really good. I could have done without the pop culture quotes at the start of every chapter but overall he does a great job of covering the history of the team. I was 8 and became a fan of the team in 76 so there were a lot of thing from the early team history I was loosely aware of but when put in context by a lot of other facts I wasn't it was amazing how this franchise even when they were succeeding found a way to F it up.
Even the more public events like Zeke Mowatt I had forgotten so many of the details about that. Or the drafting of Glenn and how McDonough knew because of that Parcells was already talking to the Jets.
For the younger fans I think you'll be amazed at the history and for the older fans there will be tons of OMG I forgot that even happened. A few of you might want to skip the uniform changing chapters for fear of stroking out.
I read through it when it came out and hated it.
Too many drunken, inaccurate takes on events, their relevance and influence. But, undoubtedly shared by narrow-minded locals who instantly believe any headline, and who frankly perpetuate the "Patriots Suck" propaganda that's been trumpeted by media, opponents and the league since the 1970 merger.
Every team in the NFL had more players using recreational drugs than the Patriots in 1986...but it was the Pats who are blown up in another fake "scandal". It was, what, five players? Total. And none used as much as Lawrence Taylor or Dexter Manley.
In '9o, a young, inexperienced, granted vulnerable but clearly disturbed woman entered the team locker room pretending first to be a journalist, and then a victim.
In '91 NFL Commissioner Paul "The Patriots Damaged The League" Tagliabue [
see R. Goodell] ordered an investigation under the aegis of former Watergate scandal prosecutor Philip Heymann [
see T. Wells] and in addition to ignoring the facts and covering their asses, three young African-American players were fined, after being accused of ("mind-") rape.
To put this in perspective, let's say I head out to Phoenix, sneak past security and worm my way onto a local paper's staff, and pretending to be a reporter walk into the U.S Women's Olympic Soccer team's locker room after a match. I could be entirely honorable or even gay; but if I'm sitting there transfixed and staring at scantily clad young women, one or more of them might complain to management; and if nothing happens after that the athletes just might express some kind of disapproval of my behavior and subsequent presence.
Only now I turn into poor, attacked, innocent victim and the athlete's behavior and language is all directed maliciously at me; I know this because I miraculously am able to monitor all of it as I am still performing all my journalistic duties. I am a pioneer for male reporters entering female locker rooms and hailed and praised for decades afterward.
Meanwhile, members of the team are fined by the USOC after I accused them of ("quasi-") rape.
Gayle Gardner (nee Granik) covered the Pats in 1976 and never complained about anything.
