Fourth and Long; The Fight for the Soul of College Football

New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. vii, [1], 343, [1] pages. Fourth and Long reveals intimate scenes behind closed doors, from a team's angry face--off with their athletic director to a defensive lineman acing his master's exams in theoretical math. It captures the private moment when coach Urban Meyer earned the devotion of Ohio State's Buckeyes on their way to a perfect season. It shows Michigan's athletic department endangering the very traditions that distinguish the college game from all others; and it recreates the euphoria of the Northwestern Wildcats winning their first bowl game in decades, even as they do honor to the student-athlete ideal. This is the work of a writer in love with an old game--a game he sees at the precipice. Bacon's deep knowledge of sports history and his sensitivity to the tribal subcultures of the college game power this elegy to a beloved and endangered American institution. None of Bacon's discoveries is more poignant than this--the last, true defenders of the student-athlete ideal are the players themselves, who, even as money changes everything around them, are left to carry the future of the league, the game, and more half a century of tradition on their backs every fall Ssturday. Most unforgettably, Fourth and Long finds what the national media missed in the ugly aftermath of Penn State's tragic scandal: the unheralded story of players who joined forces with Coach Bill O'Brien to save the university's treasured program--and with it, a piece of the game's soul. John U. Bacon is an American journalist and author of books on sports and business as well as a sports commentator on TV and radio. Bacon earned a bachelor's degree in History and a master's degree in Education from the University of Michigan. His first journalism job was as a lifestyle report for The Ann Arbor News in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In 1995, Bacon became a sports feature writer for The Detroit News. During this period, he wrote articles on baseball player Jackie Robinson, the sport of bullfighting, and high school basketball at a Potawatomi Native American reservation in Michigan. Bacon left The Detroit News to become a freelance writer. He has written articles for The New York Times, Time, and ESPN The Magazine. In 2000, Bacon started his radio career with a sports show on WAAM in Ann Arbor. In 2002, he started a radio show, Off the Field, on WTKA in Ann Arbor. In 2007, Bacon began providing weekly sports commentary on Michigan public television stations. In 2005, Bacon was awarded a Knight-Wallace Fellowship for journalism from the University of Michigan. The New York Times bestseller about the state of college football: Why we love the game, what is at risk, and the fight to save it. A fascinating saga (Booklist). In search of the sport's old ideals amid the roaring flood of hypocrisy and greed, bestselling author John U. Bacon embedded himself in four college football programs, Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan, and Northwestern, and captured the oldest, biggest, most storied league, the Big Ten, at its tipping point. He sat in as coaches dissected game film, he ate dinner at training tables, and he listened in locker rooms. He talked with tailgating fans and college presidents, and he spent months in the company of the gifted young athletes who play the game. Derived from a Kirkus review: A true believer in the traditions (even sanctity) of the college game gnashes his teeth about the corrosive, corrupting influence of money. Bacon, who has taught at the University of Michigan (and maintains his devotion to the Wolverines) and has written a half dozen previous works, mostly about athletics, returns with a paean to the college gridiron. Repeatedly, we hear about the assiduous "college kids" who play for Michigan, Penn State and elsewhere, as well as how the fans of college football are more noble and pure-hearted than pro fans. Bacon's framework is the 2012 college season—the Big Ten, in particular—and he deals with the fallout of the Penn State disgrace, the smaller scandal that ended in the ouster of Ohio State head coach Jim Tressel and the attempt of Northwestern to rise from the ashes of mediocrity. Game summaries appear in most chapters. His villains are the "suits," the MBAs and the greedy and the profit-driven guys who are despoiling Eden with seat licenses, advertising and other Mad Men cupidity.