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On December 28, 1958, the New York Giants and Baltimore Colts met under the lights of Yankee Stadium for that season’s NFL Championship game. Football, growing in popularity amid America’s post-war economic boom, was still greatly over-shadowed by the country’s favored pastime – baseball – but the 1958 championship proved to be the turning point for pro football. On the field and roaming the sidelines were seventeen future Hall of Famers, including Colts stars Johnny Unitas, Raymond Berry, and Gino Marchetti, and Giants greats Frank Gifford, Sam Huff, and assistant coaches Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry. Played on a freezing Sunday evening in front of 64,000 fans and an estimated forty-five million television viewers around the country - at that time the largest crowd to have ever watched a football game - the championship would become the first sudden-death contest in NFL history. With two minutes left in regulation, Baltimore had possession deep in its own territory, and the ball in the hands of the still unproven quarterback Johnny Unitas. The Best Game Ever is a brilliant portrait of how a single game changed the history of American sports. Published to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the championship, it is destined to be a sports classic.
- Sales Rank: #125400 in Audible
- Published on: 2008-05-24
- Format: Unabridged
- Original language: English
- Running time: 364 minutes
From Publishers Weekly
Bowden (Black Hawk Down; Guests of the Ayatollah) tells the story of the 1958 National Football League championship game between the Baltimore Colts and the New York Giants, a legendary game that proved to be a harbinger of the enormous popularity of pro football over the next 50 years. Bowden writes that the game featured the greatest assemblage of talent ever on one field, including 17 future Hall of Fame inductees. He frames the picture with a wide lens, but then focuses on the roles and lives of a few key players, particularly the Colts' obsessive and methodical wide receiver Raymond Berry and the iconic quarterback Johnny Unitas, as well as the Giants' powerful linebacker Sam Huff. The game, played in frigid Yankee Stadium three days after Christmas, stretched into the evening, garnering the largest television audience in the history of the sport to that time. Bowden begins his entertaining and informative narration in the third quarter, and then delves into backstory on the league, players and the buildup, before returning to the gridiron to conclude with a detailed account of the final plays and an epilogue. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
It’s hard to believe, in this era of Super Bowl overkill, but once upon a time, professional football was considered a minor sport. But one game changed all that. It was the 1958 NFL championship between the New York Giants and the Baltimore Colts, which began three days after Christmas on a gloomy afternoon and ended early in the evening under the lights at Yankee Stadium. Bowden, author of Black Hawk Down (1999), provides context for the game, along with a perceptive overview of the socioeconomic forces at work in America at the time, but he tells the story of what happened on the field primarily through the testimony of key players: Raymond Berry, Gino Marchetti, and Art Donovan of the Colts and Sam Huff and Frank Gifford of the Giants. His skill in transferring these interviews to the page, capturing the dynamic personalities of his subjects, provides an immediacy and electricity missing from so many sports histories. These were tough, intelligent men who loved competing, cared for their teammates and coaches, and who recall their roles in the birth of pro football proudly. No tapes of the original broadcast exist, but in many ways, Bowden’s book is better than any tape could be. --Wes Lukowsky
Review
“Entertaining and informative narration . . . [Bowden] frames the picture with a wide lens, but then focuses on the roles and lives of a few key players.” —Publishers Weekly
“A sharp look at the 1958 National Football League championship game . . . [Bowden] wisely focuses on a few individuals—Johnny Unitas, Raymond Berry, Weeb Ewbank, Art Donovan of the Colts; Frank Gifford, Sam Huff, Vince Lombardi, and Tom Landry of the Giants—to explain the game's singular link to the NFL's past and future. The author deftly examines the larger historical context shaping this coming-of-age moment, which propelled professional football to its current position as America's favorite sport. . . . A delight for anyone interested in the history of the NFL.” —Kirkus Reviews
“Bowden, a skilled journalist . . . has written The Best Game Ever as a labor of love . . . His explanations of shifts in the teams’ offensive and defensive strategies are lucid, and he knows enough about the extreme physical and mental demands the game exacts to convey a strong sense of the players’ exhaustion and determination as the contest ground toward its conclusion . . . The Best Game Ever is sure to become an instant Sacred Text.”
—Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post
“In his scrupulously researched account of the 1958 NFL championship game between the Baltimore Colts and the New York Giants, Mark Bowden makes a compelling case for both his title, 'The Best Game Ever,' and subtitle: 'The Birth of the Modern NFL.' . . . Mr. Bowden succeeds in making a contest from a half-century ago seem fresh, in part because he has a keen sense for the anecdotal . . . [his] best trick, though, is that he gets out of the way of a great story and a great game.” —Steve Wulf, Wall Street Journal
“Tight and tidy . . . As we become more familiar with the participants in this drama, there is a shock of recognition on seemingly every page. It is remarkable learning what these men who all played in one game went on to do with their lives, both on and off the football field . . . Reading through Mr. Bowden’s reconstruction of the game, one does get the sense that this game was, if not the best ever, at least one of the most intriguing.”
—Peter Hausler, Wall Street Journal
“With the same precision he used to dissect a firefight in Mogadishu, Bowden anatomizes the 1958 NFL Championship between the Baltimore Colts and the New York Giants, which featured a death-defying comeback by the Colts and was also one of America’s first ‘truly communal live national events.’” —Time
“Bowden dives into the trenches of the 1958 NFL Championship game, where New York and Baltimore waged an overtime battle that wowed TV audiences and ensured the future of pro football . . . He astutely contrasts Frank Gifford’s glamorous Giants with the blue-collar Colts of Johnny Unitas.” —Entertainment Weekly
“Befitting a skilled reporter, Bowden uncovers new material to enliven his retelling. His interviews with several of the Colts and Giants players, as well as with Colts’ then-assistant coach Charley Winner, yield new insights. In particular, receive Raymond Berry’s detailed game notes from the day itself are invaluable, as are excerpts from the transcript of the NBC radio broadcast by Joe Boland . . . this book is a fine account of one of the most significant games in sports history.” —Library Journal
“Bowden handles [the story] deftly, using a spare writing style to illuminate the historic tussle.” —Newsday
Most helpful customer reviews
21 of 22 people found the following review helpful.
What a magnificent book!
By John Kendall
Mark Bowden has a proven record as an exciting writer of history. The Best Game Ever is his best book ever. He makes the 1958 NFL title game come alive. I have memories as a high school senior of watching this game on television. The game's black-and-white starkness is imbedded in my memory. Mr. Bowden makes this memory come alive in all its vivid character. His lively style is more that of an analytical journalist than an academic historian, and he offers insights that I have not read elsewhere. The photos of this cold-weather game offered in the book made me want to bundle up in spite of the fact that it is 90 degrees in San Antonio (my home) today. Every football fan should be grateful for this book.
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful.
Lightweight treatment of a great game
By Barry Sparks
December 28, 1958 marks one of the most classic moments in NFL history. That's the date the Baltimore Colts defeated the New York Giants in sudden death overtime to win the NFL title as 45 million fans watched on television. It marked the birth of the modern NFL as football began to step out of the shadows of baseball.
The match up featured the greatest concentration of football talent for one game as 17 future Hall of Famers were involved. It pitted a team of self-made men and the league's best offense (Colts) versus a team of glamour boys and the best defense (Giants).
Author Mark Bowden tells the story of the 1958 championship game through a handful of players and coaches such as Raymond Berry, Weeb Ewbank, Sam Huff, Tom Landry (Giants' defensive coordinator) and Vince Lombardi (Giants' offensive coordinator). Bowden's exceptional study of Berry is the cornerstone of the book.
Bowden recounts how Johnny Unitas and Berry teamed up to take the Colts 86 yards in two minutes to tie the game. And, how Unitas engineered the 13-play drive in overtime to secure the thrilling victory. Unitas' greatness and leadership in the game elevated him to the highest echelon of NFL quarterbacks.
Interestingly, many of the players didn't realize that the game would continue into sudden death overtime after it was tied in regulation.
As a writer, Bowden makes the reader feel like he's in the middle of the game. He makes you wish you had been able to witness this great game. You envy those who did. NFL Commissioner Bert Bell called the Colts-Giants sudden death overtime game, "The greatest day in the history of professional football."
While I thoroughly enjoyed the book, it's definitely a lightweight treatment of the subject. The book is 239, easy-to-read pages. When I finished the book, I wanted to read more about the game and its impact. I suspect many other readers will feel the same way.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
Sheer enjoyment of the sport
By John Galluzzo
Bostonians like me are as parochial as sports fans get. In fact, we're sometimes downright myopic. "Who cares about the Giants and Colts? Well," we'd think, "Raymond Berry played in the 1958 championship game, and he later coached the New England Patriots. Maybe I'll read it."
The beauty of Bowden's treatment of the game - of course debatable as to its superlative (American publishing marketing working overtime) - is that it allows the football purist to read all the way through cheering for neither side in particular, but for the game and the sport itself. I wasn't alive when the game was played, and didn't have a rooting interest when I picked up the book. I just wanted a good read on a favored topic, and got just that.
See all 50 customer reviews...
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