Sports Illustrated Monday Morning Quarterback: A Fully Caffeinated Guide to Everything You Need to Know about the NFL

My dad was so pleased to receive this present for his birthday. The next day he told me that one of the stories, about the death of the author's dog, had made him cry(!). He enjoyed telling me some of the stories and it was a nice bonding experience for us. Impress your dad with this!

SPORTS ILLUSTRATED: MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK A Fully Caffeinated Guide to Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About the NFL Peter King Sports Illustrated Books $25.95 - Hardback 256 pages ISBN: 9978-1-60320-080-6 Reviewer: Annie Slessman After twenty years with Sports Illustrated, Peter King is thought of as one of the experts in reporting the game of football. In his book, MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK, he touches on a variety of subject matter other than football. He is a real fan of girl's softball games and has a good friend in the armed services that heads an Improvised Explosive Devices platoon. At age 34, this man hopes to make it out of Iraq alive and bring his men home safely. So, King's Monday Morning Quarterback column isn't all football. It has been said that he adds too much of his personal life in his reporting, but his followers would beg to differ with that opinion. Any football fan would surely love this book as it takes a reader though the paces of the game, the players and the coaches that lead these teams in their efforts. It is an informal look at the game of football with a touch of statistical information as well. If you are looking for a gift for that man or woman who can't get through a weekend without football...this book is a good buy!

This book is tons of fun for avid football fans. Peter King definitely knows about what he writes and he writes very well. Each week nearly two million readers click onto his "Monday Morning Quarterback" Internet Column. Ironically, in the fall of 1997, when King was offered a chance to write a column for that newfangled media known as the Internet, he almost didn't accept. Big newspapers and magazines were going great guns and he was spending most of his time writing for them. But he was assured that he would have almost complete freedom to write the column anyway he wanted. He could put some personal and/or strong opinions in the column or if he felt like sharing some conversation from the dinner the night before, he was free to do it. Like most people he had absolutely no idea what a monster media the Internet was going to grow into. But reluctantly he became one of the pioneers of that form of sports communication. This is a collection of Peter's favorite columns as well as some new and updated rankings including his "Top 100 Players of All Time," the "Top 100 Active Pro Players," and several of his favorite "10 Things" that cover a variety of subjects including "10 Biggest Hall of Fame Snubs,""10 Best NFL Traditions" and of course that most important "5 Best Watering Holes in the NFL." The book is riddled with King's dry humor that keeps the reading light. It's 30 chapters plus the Introduction and Acknowledgements. His observations on the game and game strategies is interspersed with interesting interviews with players, sports casters, team owners, coaches, etc., etc. He also shares some of his personal stories about his family and pets. For those people already familiar with his sports writing, much of this will be a welcome revisit to some of his most enduring stories. For those who may not have much experience with his work, this will be a very pleasant tour of the in's and out's of pro football. It will also serve to remind most of us amateur "Monday Morning Quarterbacks" how little we really know about the behind the scenes part of the NFL--especially the mysteries of multi-player trades. The book includes a section of color reproductions of famous "Sports Illustrated" covers and pictures. Peter and his family reside in Boston so as a long-time Boston and then New England Patriots fan, this reviewer found lots of material about his favorite team and it's star players and colorful coaches. Example: "Bill Belichick, asked by David Letterman on Feb. 4, 2004, if he had any knowledge of the Janet Jackson's `wardrobe malfunction' during the half-time of Super Bowl? The coaches reply, "We were in the locker room, so we missed that. Nobody kept us abreast of that." There are lots of asides such as a list of the author's 10 favorite movies and television shows, his five favorite airports as well as his opinion of the worst five airports. The knowledgeable fan will quickly find players on the various lists that he doesn't agree should be the

A confession: I know and admire Peter King. Another confession: I'm a professional writer, and when I want to read for pleasure, I either crack open another Elmore Leonard or, Mondays, at lunch, treat myself to Peter's MMQB. No one knows football like Peter King, and it's a treat to have some of his best columns collected in a book. If you haven't read him, I envy you the pleasure of encountering his voice for the first time -- expert yet unaffected, knowing yet curious, and funny, always funny, often laughing at himself with as much gusto as he pokes fun at some of the athletes in these pages. Reading some of these columns a second time gave me as much pleasure as reading them on line. Better in fact, because they seem more resonant on the printed page. Some of his most poignant work is here too. "Family Matters," his column on the death of James Dungy, Tony Dungy's son, still gives me pause, makes me reflect. Peter, of course, is writing about a lot more than football. He's a chronicler of American culture. Sometimes his lens is the game, sometimes the life of a player. Here too are riffs on coffee and airplane rides and -- how can I put this delicately -- even his colonic caper. He is us and we are him and the voice is both original and familiar. That's his great writer's secret. He writes as if he knows everyone who reads him. Hats off too to Sports Illustrated for producing a good looking and clever text with entertaining asides and catchy icons. And I really enjoyed the photo insert in the middle, especially the last page which shows my Giants and Michael Strahan swarming poor Tom Brady to create the famous 18-1. I know what I'm getting my sons, Ben and Josh -- Giants fanatics like their father -- for Christmas.

I'm a huge fan of MMQB so I really enjoyed this book, but honestly even if you're just a fan of the game you will love it. A smart, entertaining, opinionated mix of classic columns and new material. Like his online column, this book is a must-read for football fans. Peter King really knows football, and this is as close to the game as you can get without putting on the pads!