The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game | 
 enlarge | Author: Michael Lewis
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
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Rating:  150 reviews
Sales Rank: 4252
Media: Paperback
Pages: 320
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.3 x 0.9
ISBN: 0393330478
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.332092
EAN: 9780393330472
Publication Date: September 4, 2007
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Product Description
"Lewis has such a gift for storytelling...he writes as lucidly for sports fans as for those who read him for other reasons."—Janet Maslin, New York Times
One day Michael Oher will be among the most highly paid athletes in the National Football League. When we first meet him, he is one of thirteen children by a mother addicted to crack; he does not know his real name, his father, his birthday, or how to read or write. He takes up football, and school, after a rich, white, evangelical family plucks him from the streets. Then two great forces alter Oher: the family's love and the evolution of professional football itself into a game in which the quarterback must be protected at any cost. Our protagonist becomes the priceless package of size, speed, and agility necessary to guard the quarterback's greatest vulnerability: his blind side. This paperback edition contains a brand-new 2007 afterword.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 145 more reviews...
 Multiple Stories, All Good September 26, 2006
R. Spell (Memphis, TN USA)
121 out of 135 found this review helpful
An incredible human interest story detailed further below but first.........the author of Liar's Poker and Moneyball is at it again with an offbeat interesting subject, or multiple subjects which are intertwined. This is an analysis of the evolution of the left side tackle designed to protect the quarterback's blind side, particularly from the evolution of speed rushers in the Lawrence Taylor mode. Lewis starts with an in depth analysis of Joe Theisman's famous leg break with some interesting facts even Joe didn't remember including who may really have been responsible. Separate stories are then presented of the new prototype Left Tackles like Jonathan Ogden whose investment banker father showed him that his value at Left Tackle would out way any interest in playing college basketball for his 6'9" son. This part of the book is intertwined with a historical perspective of how the passing game developed mainly through the Bill Walsh West Coast offense which downplays the significance of the quarterback. This section of the book is intertwined around the personal story to be described and while extremely interesting to football fans will have virtually NO appeal the typical female fan or other casual fans.
But what will be of greater human interest is the overlay of the story of Michael Oher, the "man/child" currently playing football at Ole Miss. Oher shows up at a predominantly white Christian school in the 9th grade with virtually no school history and horrible family background. An incredibly shy 350 pound kid struggles but ingratiates himself to faculty and staff and manages to stick around. Finally one Thanksgiving Day a volunteer assistant coach and his wife see him at a bus stop in his usual shorts and recognize that in addition to no money for food, he is traveling to the gym to watch practice just to be in a heated room. Through incredible acts of kindness and caring this young man is taken in by this wealthy Christian family who attempt to socialize and educate him for the future.
But little did they realize that at 6' 6" with an incredible frame and quick feet, football coaches would see their answer to possibly the most important position on the football field and they would relentlessly come calling. This presents many problems as Oher has virtually no chance of attending college with his past educational background. Thus begins the odyssey of the recruiting wars for this individual who by the end of high school has been called the best pro prospect even though he has played in only 15 football games.
This portion of the book dominates approximately 70% of the book. It is incredibly touching and I certainly applaud the sympathetic, caring approach by Leigh Ann and Sean Tuohy. This book is not just for football fans as the issues here are much greater. How does a child get to the 9th grade with virtually no retention of knowledge or ability to function in a social setting? What can a change in culture and caring do for this young man? And other questions will also appear such as is their potential ulterior motives for selecting this student out of so many and wasn't the final steps to eligibility really inappropriate? As to my opinion I choose to believe that the Tuohy's were interested in helping another human being, and in the process, it enriched the lives of their family, this young man and the possibilities that a loving, caring environment can create.
I strongly recommend this book for football fans, sociologists, and people with interest in politics, religion, or Southern Culture as there are many issues intertwined. Once again, the weakness to this book may be that he narrowed its focus by making it a "sports book". It's not. Its main message concerns underprivileged kids and how a change in environment can produce incredible results.
As a matter of disclosure, I live in Memphis, have leased Tuohy's his plane in the past and have many mutual friends. He and his wife have exceptional reputations and I applaud their involvement in helping this man.
Inspirational Story September 25, 2006
Jevon Jaconi (Luxemburg, WI USA)
38 out of 45 found this review helpful
Like in Moneyball and Liar's Poker, Michael Lewis examines a culture, e.g., baseball, stock market, and now football, while interspersing a biography illuminating the underlying culture.
In this case, Mr. Lewis shows how the left tackle position has rose from obscurity in the 1960s into one of the highest-paid positions in the current game. The initial focus is in how specialized a person must be to play this position as the highest level (more rare than many other positions). After this description, Mr. Lewis introduces us to Michael Oher, a person who has all of the physical tools and then some but has never played organized sports and has basically been abandoned since early childhood.
The people (parents, coaches, etc.) all want to help Mr. Oher fulfill his potential. However, it doesn't come off as being completely altrusitic as all benefit whom are in his presence, e.g., coach parlays his involvement into a college coaching position. In addition, the recruiting battles for Mr. Oher's services amplify these traits.
His adoptive parents and coaches seem angelic compared to the NCAA in this story. One of the most sobering statitistics quoted in this book is that only one of five players capable of playing in the NFL ever make through the legal and educational morass that is the NCAA.
It's hard not to root for Mr. Oher and I would think we'll see his name at the top of the draft board in 2007-2008. Excellent book and highly recommended.
This is not just a sports book September 3, 2008
Gunner (Bethlehem,Georgia)
56 out of 56 found this review helpful
First to give you full disclosure I'm a University of Georgia (UGA)Ball Fan. In the South "Ball" means just one thing, football. Does your son play ball has only one meaning, unless you are a Tech fan, then it could mean basketball, but those guys still carry slide rules.
I bought this book because I thought it was a "sports story". I was wrong. It is an incredible human interest story, also. One which has caused me to laugh out loud and read some passages to my wife and, others, which made me cry.
This should be required reading for every school board official in the country.
Oprah ought to put it in her book club.
The author starts off explaining why an offensive left tackle is important in football (See Lawrence Taylor (L.T) and Joe (How I got my leg broken on national television) Thiesmann. It tells of the evolution of the passing game in the NFL from a steam-roller running game to a finesse passing game ala Bill Walsh (see west Coast Offense that was really born in Cincinnati).
I particular enjoyed the antidote about his official trip to visit the University of Tennessee.
But what will be of greater human interest is the overlay of the story of Michael Oher, the "man/child" currently playing football at Ole Miss. Oher shows up at a predominantly white Christian school in the 9th grade with virtually no school history and horrible family background. An incredibly shy 350 pound kid struggles but ingratiates himself to faculty and staff and manages to stick around. Finally one Thanksgiving Day a volunteer assistant coach and his wife see him at a bus stop in his usual shorts and recognize that in addition to no money for food, he is traveling to the gym to watch practice just to be in a heated room. Through incredible acts of kindness and caring this young man is taken in by this wealthy Christian family who attempt to socialize and educate him for the future.
But little did they realize that at 6' 6" with an incredible frame and quick feet, football coaches would see their answer to possibly the most important position on the football field and they would relentlessly come calling. This presents many problems as Oher has virtually no chance of attending college with his past educational background. Thus begins the odyssey of the recruiting wars for this individual who by the end of high school has been called the best pro prospect even though he has played in only 15 football games.
This portion of the book dominates approximately 60% of the book. It is incredibly touching and I certainly applaud the sympathetic, caring approach by Leigh Ann and Sean Tuohy. This book is not just for football fans as the issues here are much greater. How does a child get to the 9th grade with virtually no retention of knowledge or ability to function in a social setting? What can a change in culture and caring do for this young man? And other questions will also appear such as is their potential ulterior motives for selecting this student out of so many and wasn't the final steps to eligibility really inappropriate? As to my opinion I choose to believe that the Tuohy's were interested in helping another human being, and in the process, it enriched the lives of their family, this young man and the possibilities that a loving, caring environment can create.
I strongly recommend this book for football fans, sociologists, and people with interest in politics, religion, or Southern Culture as there are many issues intertwined. Once again, the weakness to this book may be that he narrowed its focus by making it a "sports book". It's not. Its main message concerns underprivileged kids and how a change in environment can produce incredible results
I thought it was hilarious that Sean Tuohy read Michael the following and told him that it was about Ole Miss going into the stadium at LSU (THE STADIUM IS KNOWN AS ""Death Valley,":
The Charge of the Light Brigade
by Alfred Lord Tennyson
Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns!" he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismayed?
Not though the soldier knew
Some one had blundered:
Their's not to make reply,
Their's not to reason why,
Their's but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volleyed and thundered;
Stormed at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.
Flashed all their sabres bare,
Flashed as they turned in air
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wondered:
Plunged in the battery-smoke
Right through the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reeled from the sabre-stroke
Shattered and sundered.
Then they rode back, but not,
Not the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volleyed and thundered;
Stormed at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came through the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.
When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honour the charge they made!
Honour the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred!
Oh, I'm an ex-artillery officer as well.
Highly recommended for educational professionals and members of Boards of education. It wouldn't hurt if you are a fan of college football ,either.
Gunner August, 2008
Another Great book by Michael Lewis, this time about Football January 18, 2007
Michael S. Briggs (Virginia)
9 out of 10 found this review helpful
Book: A nonfiction book without graphs, charts, or pictures that is a combination biography of Michael Oher and an examination of the NFL from the late 1970s to today.
Review: The author of Moneyball, Michael Lewis, returns with another sports book, this time focused on football (the USA version of the word). Lewis tracks the changing nature of the NFL, and the changing importance of certain positions. As time advanced the manner in which the game is played evolved, lead by the strategists (as opposed to the brute force school), mainly Bill Walsh. The strategists pushed an offensive system that used a more organized systematic method of offensive production (a more "chess board" approach) that increased the average yards per pass, increased the total number of passes, relative to total and to percentage of plays vs. run plays, and, oddly enough also increased the completion rate at the same time. This new method, which has been called by some the "West Coast Offense", coupled with a new player/management system that allowed free agency, drove one particular position to the forefront.
In the past everyone that played on the offensive line believed himself (as indicated in the book) to be playing a position that was non-individualistic (more team-focused), and interchangeable (play Center, Guard, Tackle, left-right did not matter). Adding in the lack of measurable production numbers, the pay for players on the offensive line reflected this "throw any body in there" mentality. Then things began to change, both with an offensive system that advanced the use of the pass to the point where it became much more feasible to stress the pass over the run and win games, and with advent of the counter to this system. The advanced pass system opened up a new realm of offensive production, but also opened up the quarterback to danger. Why? Because the blockers who would normally be back for the run, are forward as potential targets for a pass (not specifically the same players). This allowed players like Lawrence Taylor to run forward and clobber the QB (though, he likely would have been able to do so anyway, there were just fewer people between him and the quarterback after the change in offensive systems). The position pushed to the forefront by the changes in the game? Left tackle. Why left tackle as opposed to any other position on the field, like say right tackle? Because the left tackle guarded the quarterback's blind side (right-handed quarterback, and most are right-handed). While the system was in transition, most salaries remained the same for offensive linemen, while an increasing number of quarterbacks became injured, sometimes with career injuries. Then free agency came about, and everyone awaited the avalanche of money to fall on quarterbacks, running backs and wide receivers. Oddly enough, a good portion of this free agent money, though, went to left tackles. GM's realized that they needed a great left tackle to protect their quarterback, and without one, even the best quarterback will have lower production.
This realization flowed down to the college level, and somewhat down to the high school level. Especially down to one particular kid by the name of Michael Oher. Oher was a gigantic black kid from the poorest area of Memphis when he joined a private high school and began his rise up the social-economic ladder.
Lewis' book examines this change in the NFL system, while spending the majority of his time following the career of Michael Oher up to the present (2006) as a sophomore in college. The sections with information about the changes in the football world are intermixed with sections on the life of Michael Oher (includes: life in a very poor section of Memphis, introduction to a private high school and figurative, then literal adoption by two rich white people, the transformation of a young man from having an IQ of 80 to roughly having an IQ of 110, and advancement from high school to college football).
I enjoy sports, including football, but am most familiar with the inner-workings of baseball. I tended to follow the same fan path as noted in Lewis' book in which most football fans follow the ball, and pay less attention to the other action on the field that is sometimes more important in moving the ball (like the offensive line-defense battle). This particular book provided me with a great deal of insight into an area of the football field that I had never really considered, and never really understood.
Great interweaving of human interest and football's free market. November 27, 2006
M. Strong (Milwaukee, WI USA)
12 out of 13 found this review helpful
What we have here is a really unique book. Michael Lewis has taken a little of what made his "Moneyball" so spectacular, applied it to football and married it up to a truly unbelieveable story of a real person struggling against all odds to make something of his life. The result is both entertaining and educational.
Lewis lays the foundation for the book by telling a basic story of the free-market at work in the game/business of professional football. He explains how Lawrence Taylor and free agency inadvertently conspired to make the offensive left tackle the second highest paid player in NFL football after the quarterback.
Taylor threw off quarterbacks by attacking them from behind, their "blind side." He was so effective that college and high school football programs sought to find or build others like him and soon the NFL filled with players in the LT mold. The player who defended the quarterback against the LT type was the offensive left tackle. To play the position well, a person needed the rarest combination of physical attributes; 6'6" to 6'9", 325 to 350 pounds, long arms, huge hands, a low center of gravity all coupled with an ability to move -- fast. Bring it all together and some NFL team will write you a check for about $7 million each year.
Thus begins the unlikely story of Michael Oher, a 15 year-old Memphis near-orphan with little to no education who starts attending an upper-middle class Christian high school through a twist of fate. Michael, as it happens is about 6'6", 345 pounds, with speed, long arms, big hands... you get the idea.
His story is truly fascinating and the book will engage you on a number of levels. This one is absolutely worth reading.
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