Jill saw me reading First and Long yesterday morning, and suggested that it was time for a bookstore trip. Of course, I am not normally a football-book reader.
But this is not an ordinary football book, and I’ve been meaning to read it since the last time we were in Milwaukee, when I bought it. (Actually, I bought it in Shorewood, roughly 3 blocks from where most of the action takes place.)
The fundamental story is that of the first-ever football partnership between a private and public school, one urban and the other suburban, one overwhelmingly black and the other overwhelmingly white, in a football program, in the United States.
That would make me pick it up in a bookstore, but it probably wouldn’t make me buy it unless it was one of those library sales where the books are a dollar each. BUT, these two schools are both in the Milwaukee area, and indeed, when I went to high school, my bus passed both of these schools. They’re located maybe a mile apart, on the major Milwaukee thoroughfare of Capitol Drive. Furthermore, if and when Jill and I ever relocate to the Milwaukee area, we think we will probably wind up living in Shorewood — the liberal, inner-ring suburb where the story largely takes place.
So, the story is a great story, as well as being personally interesting to me because of the hundreds of times I’ve passed both Shorewood High and Messmer High.
In the late 1990s, Shorewood High School football had dwindled to a barely sustainable level. In fact, in the mid-1990s, they made ESPN for breaking their losing streak, then the longest in high school sports history in the US. In an entirely predictable demographic moment, much of the blame is laid at the feet of Boys Soccer. Shorewood is a soccer school. That was already true in the 1980s, although apparently Shorewood football didn’t begin to completely suck until 1988.
At the same time, Messmer has recovered and begun to flourish after briefly closing down in the late 1980s. (I actually remember Messmer closing, and wondering what was going to be done with the building, which is beautiful in that mid-century, midwestern, cream brick way.) Unfortunately, the school didn’t have the capital to begin a football program, and no one within the school was especially passionate to carry that flag. They’d explored the possibility of joining with another local Catholic high school, Dominican, which is also suburban. But the alumni squelched that idea in a heartbeat — Dominican had been Messmer’s arch-rival back in the day.
Shorewood’s football coach was driving past Messmer one day, when on impulse, he stopped and asked a group of kids whether or not the school had a football team. The idea took off quickly with both the Shorewood and Messmer administration.
That August, the Shorewood-Messmer team kicked off.
Unfortunately, they had a legacy of either no experience, or sucking. Which would be hard enough to motivate teenagers through, but they also had kids from unbelievably different backgrounds, getting to know each other for the first time.
And the white suburban coaches had never had to deal with players whose parents weren’t stable, middle-to-upper class providers. Some kids on the team had to deal with family violence, death in the family, or the demand for another paycheck in the household.
What you WANT to happen in this book is for the plucky team to finally win a game. The kids get better, mostly; they work hard, mostly; some of them quit, some of them bond, some of them play their hearts out.
Remember, this team has a legacy of sucking. And the new members have never played high school football before.
They do not win a game their first season. They get crushed. Every single game. Eventually they start to score points, and once or twice, they actually get ahead. But in their first season, the Shorewood-Messmer football team gets destroyed in every game.
One of the most annoying things about the book is that it includes pictures, with spoiler captions. I’ve already spoiled this for you, but I promise, if you didn’t know the outcome already, you’d hate the layout for this reason.
You’ll be reading all the buildup about the Dominican game, and 3 pages before the end of the game, there’ll be a picture, with the score of the defeat in the caption. BAD layout people! BAD! If you ever do a second edition of this book PLEASE just bundle all the pictures together in the middle of the book. Or at least move the pictures so that the reader already knows that the team has lost BEFORE they get to the picture with the devastating loss in the caption.
The author does manage to end things on a good note. The partnership was extended after the first season, and in the second season, the team’s first win is against hated Messmer rivals Dominican. And they even manage to get the final moments of the game onto local news. The kids are elated, of course. AND the boys on the team go on to college, some even to play football there.
And everyone lives happily ever after. (Except the coach from the first season, who either quits or gets fired, and gets replaced by someone new. The kids seem fine, but the original coach is bitter.)
Still, a good read, and a nice feel-good story.
