INTRODUCTION: FOOTBALL, IN SPITE OF ITSELF
“America can survive”: “Football’s True Believers Circle the Wagons and Insist the Sport Is Just Fine,” New York Times, January 30, 2018, p. B8.
“In twenty-five years”: Chuck Klosterman, But What if We’re Wrong?: Thinking About the Present as if It Were the Past (New York: Blue Rider Press, 2016).
By Friday, the warring: “30 Surprising Facts About the Mall of America,” BuzzFeed, July 8, 2014.
“I will always live”: Steve Rushin, “Show and Nice,” Sports Illustrated, January 29, 2018.
“Much of its popularity”: Michael MacCambridge, America’s Game: The Epic Story of How Pro Football Captured a Nation (New York: Random House, 2004).
PROLOGUE: RESPITE
“I can’t think of another”: Leigh Steinberg, The Agent: My 40-Year Career Making Deals and Changing the Game (New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2014), pp. 209, 210.
CHAPTER 1: THE SUPER BOWL WITHOUT JOCK STRAPS
“Hey, even the worst bartender”: Eric Winston interview with CSNNE, January 30, 2015.
the next month’s draft: Source of credentialed media numbers: NFL media relations department.
“He’s made the NFL relevant”: Pat McManamon, “Joe Thomas Rips Deflategate Probe, Roger Goodell’s ‘Ridiculous Witch Hunts,’” ABC News, August 23, 2015.
CHAPTER 2: THE MONKEY’S ASS
truck-stop operator: Tony Dejak, “Haslam-Owned Truck Stop Chain to Pay $92 Million Fine over Rebate Scam,” AP, February 11, 2014.
$84.5 million in compensatory damages: Ben Horowitz, “Judge Announces Damages of $84.5 Million Against Wilfs in Long-Running Lawsuit,” NJ.com, September 24, 2013.
“organized crime–type activities”: Ben Horowitz, “Real Estate Mogul and Family on Losing End of Epic Lawsuit Filed by Business Partners,” NJ.com, April 5, 2013.
an antigay initiative: Katherine Driessen, “Texans Owner Bob McNair Donates $10,000 to Anti-hero Effort,” Houston Chronicle, October 15, 2015.
to a Walmart heiress: “Ann Walton Kroenke Profile,” Forbes, March 6, 2018.
Johnson was hopeful that: Peter King, Monday Morning Quarterback, SI.com, January 23, 2017.
CHAPTER 3: NUGGETS
on Secretary’s Day: Greg Bishop, “Blocking for the Patriots Coach so He Can Do His Job,” New York Times, February 3, 2012, p. D1.
Goodell is apparently required: Monday Morning Quarterback, SI.com, August 8, 2016.
“sex scandal with his wife!”: Nicholas Dawidoff, Collision Low Crossers: A Year Inside the Turbulent World of NFL Football (New York: Little, Brown, 2013).
CHAPTER 5: “BEWARE THE PISSED OFF PRETTY BOY”
Al Davis used to wear padded suits: David Harris, The League: Inside the NFL (New York: Bantam Books, 1987), p. 58.
CHAPTER 6: GARISH FIST ORNAMENTS
“guilty of retiring early”: Brett Favre to Greta Van Susteren, On the Record, Fox News, July 14, 2008.
“God only knows”: Brett Favre, interview with WSPZ-AM, Washington, D.C., October 24, 2013.
“We get brainwashed to believe”: Tom Brady interview, WEEI, October 12, 2015.
“scheduled car crash”: Tom Brady, The TB12 Method: How to Attain a Lifetime of Peak Performance (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2017), p. 19.
CHAPTER 9: NO ONE BUYS TICKETS TO WATCH A MORALITY PLAY
“my candy store”: Frank Deford, “Welcome Commissioner Pete Rozelle and Wife Carrie,” Sports Illustrated, January 21, 1980.
“We can’t hopscotch franchises”: John F. Steadman, From Colts to Ravens: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Baltimore Professional Football (Centreville, MD: Tidewater Publishers, 1997).
“It was the worst feeling”: MacCambridge, America’s Game, p. 398.
CHAPTER 11: WHUPPINGS
It spent a fortune: Alan Schwarz, Walt Bogdanich, and Jacqueline Williams, “NFL’s Flawed Concussion Research and Ties to the Tobacco Industry,” New York Times, March 24, 2016, p. 1.
“You have no choice”: Pete Rozelle interview (unbylined), “Backtalk: From a Retired Pete Rozelle, Some Points After,” New York Times, September 18, 1994.
CHAPTER 12: “WE PAY HIM DAMN WELL TO BE NEUTRAL”
Even the head of the nation’s: Ken Belson, “Goodell’s Pay of $44.2 Million in 2012 Puts Him in the Big Leagues,” New York Times, February 14, 2014, p. D1.
He was known as cerebral: Bryan Curtis, “Mr. Goodell Goes to Washington,” Grantland, February 4, 2013.
“I no longer wanted”: Suzanne Pollak interview with Roger Goodell, “Remembering Mom,” AOL Build, May 8, 2015.
“The job is like attending 10 weddings”: Sam Farmer, “No Consensus Yet on a Replacement,” Los Angeles Times, March 21, 2006, p. 2.
“I inherited a strong constitution”: Deford, “Welcome Commissioner Pete Rozelle and Wife Carrie.”
“Dammit, don’t be telling us”: MacCambridge, America’s Game, p. 317.
“He’s the face of the owners”: The MMQB, SI.com, July 19, 2016.
CHAPTER 14: ROGER AND ME
complaining in open settings: Gabriel Sherman, “The Season from Hell,” GQ, January 19, 2015.
He infamously patronized Peyton Manning: Jay Feely interview, The Michael Kay Show, ESPN Radio, February 14, 2014.
He also wondered: Ibid.
CHAPTER 15: THE BIG SPLAT
“The game lets you know”: Jermichael Finley, “They Basically Reset My Brain,” The Players’ Tribune, May 23, 2017.
“bullet in his chest”: Ibid.
CHAPTER 16: IMMORTALITY GETS OLD
Baker referred to the Hall: Daniel Kaplan, “Canton Puts Up Some Hall of Fame Numbers,” SportsBusiness Journal, July 28, 2014.
CHAPTER 17: “START BLOW-DRYING TEDDY KOPPEL’S HAIR ’CAUSE THIS ONE’S DONE”
“you played some, man”: Ben Smith, “Travels with Joe,” Politico, September 18, 2008.
CHAPTER 18: AMERICAN CARNAGE
More than 83 percent: http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2014/05/30/nfllast-sports-bastion-of-white-male-conservatives/.
Nearly 70 percent of the players: http://nebula.wsimg.com/1a7f83c14af6a516176740244d8afc46?AccessKeyId=DAC3A56D8FB782449D2A&disposition=0&alloworigin=1.
“This makes football akin”: Klosterman, But What if We’re Wrong: Thinking About the Present as if It Were the Past (New York: Blue Rider Press, 2016), p. 187.
“They just saw him as this scumbag”: Tim Marcin, “Trump’s NFL Fight Dates Back to His Failed USFL Experiment in the ’80s,” Newsweek, September 25, 2017.
CHAPTER 19: PATRIOTISM
“face to face with my gangsters”: William C. Rhoden, “Connections That Go Far Beyond Wins,” New York Times, January 29, 2008.
CHAPTER 20: CHEESEHEAD ELEGY
“We don’t talk about Fight Club”: Michael Eisen, “The McAdoo Report,” Giants.com, January 6, 2007.
CHAPTER 22: “I’M DRUNK, I’M STUPID, I’M A PATS FAN,” THE MAN TOLD POLICE
“I hope to Christ I never again”: Hunter S. Thompson, “Fear and Loathing at the Super Bowl,” Rolling Stone, February 28, 1974.
CHAPTER 23: THE TV REPORTER IN THE BILL BELICHICK UNDERWEAR
They went as far as scrubbing: Benjamin Hoffman and Ken Belson, “No Trump or Goodell at Super Bowl, at Least According to NFL Transcripts,” New York Times, January 31, 2017.
“lower your own IQ”: Buck Harvey, “If Watt Is Earl: How Some Stories Last,” San Antonio Express-News, October 1, 2016.
“The hardest-hitting running back”: Frank Luska, “Campbell Leaves His Legend,” Los Angeles Times, August 20, 1986, p. 32.
CHAPTER 24: CLOCKS AND SITCOMS
“taking a great Chagall”: Mornings with Maria, Fox Business Channel, February 13, 2017.
CHAPTER 26: THIS MAN’S LIVER BELONGS IN CANTON
“surprises people if he can roll out of bed”: Seth Wickersham and Don Van Natta Jr., “Sin City or Bust,” ESPN The Magazine, April 24, 2017.
CHAPTER 27: “FAITH, FAMILY, AND FOOTBALL . . . PROBABLY NOT IN THAT ORDER”
“When pro football owners”: David Shribman, “Dan Rooney: Pittsburgh and N.F.L. Royalty, and an Ordinary Guy,” New York Times, April 14, 2017, sports section, p. 8.