The 1972 Green Bay Packers were not expected to challenge for a playoff spot, or even to top their four victories from the season before. But the players were an eclectic group of over-achievers, 20 of whom were brand new to the team. Despite disheartening decisions by a questionable head coach, they gelled almost immediately and by season's end became the only Packers team throughout the 1970s to earn a division title. This book details how they succeeded beyond all expectations and tells one of the great stories in pro football history.
The 1972 Green Bay Packers were not expected to challenge for a playoff spot, or even to top their four victories from the season before. But the players were an eclectic group of over-achievers, 20 of whom were brand new to the team. Despite disheartening decisions by a questionable head coach, they gelled almost immediately and by season's end became the only Packers team throughout the 1970s to earn a division title. This book details how they succeeded beyond all expectations and tells one of the great stories in pro football history.
In 1967, when Jerry Kramer was a thirty-one-year-old Green Bay Packers offensive lineman, in his tenth year with the team, he decided to keep a diary of the season. “Perhaps, by setting down my daily thoughts and observations,” he wrote, “I’ll be able to understand precisely what it is that draws me back to professional football.” Working with the renowned journalist Dick Schaap, Kramer recorded his day-to-day experiences as a player with perception, honesty, humor, and startling sensitivity. Little did Kramer know that the 1967 season would be one of the most remarkable in the history of pro football, culminating with the legendary championship game against Dallas now known as the “Ice Bowl,” in which Kramer would play a central role. Nor could he have anticipated that his diary would evolve into a book titled Instant Replay, first published in 1968, that would become a multimillion-copy bestseller and be celebrated by reviewers everywhere, including the Washington Post’s Jonathan Yardley, who calls it “to this day, the best inside account of pro football, indeed the best book ever written about that sport and that league.” This groundbreaking look inside the world of professional football is one of the first books ever to take readers into the locker room and reveal the inner workings of a professional sports franchise. From training camp, through the historic Ice Bowl, then into the locker room of Super Bowl II, Kramer provides a captivating player’s perspective on pro football when the game was all blood, grit, and tears. He also offers a rare and insightful view of the team’s storied leader, Coach Vince Lombardi. Bringing the book back into print for the first time in more than a decade, this new edition of Instant Replay retains the classic look of the original and includes a foreword by Jonathan Yardley and additional rarely seen photos from the celebrated “Lombardi era.” As vivid and engaging as it was when it was first published, Instant Replay is an irreplaceable reminder of the glory days of pro football.
DIVSince its establishment in 1919, the Green Bay Packers football organization has stood proudly as the United States’ only community-owned professional sports team. Its fans are renowned for their unrivaled die-hard dedication, with Lambeau Field season tickets sold out since 1960 and a waiting list stretching decades into the future—tickets so coveted, they are often bequeathed in family wills. These are not quiet fans. Fortunately, The Packers Experience is not a quiet book./divDIV/divDIVThe ultimate guide to the Green Bay Packers, The Packers Experience takes readers year by year through every single season of the franchise’s storied history. Award-winning sportswriter Lew Freedman describes each season’s key moments, and his stories are accompanied by detailed stats and glorious images. Additional feature articles highlight the legendary players and coaches who have made the Packers one of the most successful organizations in the NFL: Curley Lambeau, Don Hutson, Paul Hornung, Bart Starr, Ray Nitschke, Vince Lombardi, Willie Davis, Herb Adderley, James Lofton, LeRoy Butler, Reggie White, Brett Favre, Donald Driver, Aaron Rodgers, Clay Matthews, and many others./divDIV/divPhotos from the team’s history are accompanied by rare memorabilia and mementos. This premier-quality book is the perfect keepsake for Packers fans of all generations—an essential addition to the Packers library and as timeless as that indomitable Packer pride.
Formed in 1967, the NFL's Central Division — the Chicago Bears, Green Bay Packers, Detroit Lions, and Minnesota Vikings — quickly earned the nickname “Black and Blue Division” due to the teams' fierce, physical play. This behind-the-scenes history recalls 40 years of great plays, gritty players, memorable seasons, and crucial games through first-rate photographs and first-hand interviews with players, coaches, and officials. Berghaus’s All-Time Black and Blue team, where nastiness is just as important as greatness, provides plenty of fodder for discussion.
One of the most storied franchises in all of professional sports, the Green Bay Packers have featured some of footballs greatest players, from Bart Starr and Ray Nitschke, to Reggie White and Brett Favre. Even the Super Bowl trophy--which theyve won three times--has taken its name from their legendary coach, Vince Lombardi. Green Bay Packers: The Complete Illustrated History is an intensely illustrated treatment of this iconic sports team. It includes more than 200 photographs, along with numerous drawings showing stadium plans and maps and chalkboard illustrations of key moments and plays from the teams history. With detailed profiles and stats, the volume explores the players and teams that have defined the Packer legacy over more than eight decades. It is a book that no Packer fan will want to be without.
Are you searching for a book about American Football that has it all? R. D. Griffith will take you on a comprehensive drive through the history and highlights of American Football, its salient details, from its inception at the turn of the century to its centralized embodiment now in the modern era, the NFL. He will share with you the challenges the game faced through the Great Depression and two World Wars, including the spicy anecdotes of the people comprising the great game of American Football throughout the years.
For more than 90 years, the Green Bay Packers have been the model of excellence across the National Football League. Now, LeRoy Butler—a 12-year veteran and one of the most popular Packers ever to don the uniform—teams up with Rob Reischel to tell the stories of the Packers’ most memorable players and coaches, including Bart Starr, Paul Hornung, Forrest Gregg, Jim Taylor, Herb Adderly, Willie Wood, James Lofton, Sterling Sharpe, Brett Favre, Aaron Rodgers, and Donald Driver to name but a few. Packers Pride looks at the favorite games, favorite moments, and behind-the-scenes stories of the men who played and coached for the team with 13 World Championships, more than any other team in football.
