The Opening Kickoff: The Tumultuous Birth of a Football Nation

A New York Times Bestseller and Boston Globe Bestseller!

It€s America€s most popular sport, played by thousands, watched by millions, and generating billions in revenues every year. It€s also America€s most controversial sport, haunted by the specter of life-threatening injuries and plagued by scandal, even among its most venerable personalities and institutions. At the college level, we often tie football€s tales of corruption and greed to its current popularity and revenue potential, and we have vague notions of a halcyon time€"before the new College Football Playoff, power conferences, and huge TV contracts. Perhaps we conjure images of young Ivy Leaguers playing a gentleman€s game, exemplifying the collegial in collegiate. What we don€t imagine is a game described in 1905 as €œa social obsession€"this boy-killing, man-mutilating, education-prostituting, gladiatorial sport.€

In The Opening Kickoff, Dave Revsine tells the riveting story of the formative period of American football between 1890 and 1915. In just a quarter century football spread across the nation, captivating people from coast to coast. It was a time that saw the game€s meteoric rise, fueled by overflow crowds, breathless newspaper coverage, and newfound superstars€"including one of the most thrilling and mysterious the sport has ever seen. But it was also a period racked by controversy in academics, recruiting, and physical brutality that, in combination, threatened football€s very existence. A vivid storyteller, Revsine brings it all to life in this captivating narrative.