Longtime NFL commentator Frank Gifford, a.k.a. the guy who cheated on his wife Kathie Lee Gifford and got caught, has a new book out about his glory days errrrrrrrr i mean about The Glory Game, a game that Frank Gifford refers to as "The Greatest Game Ever Played." He is under the belief that this game, that he happened to be involved in, some how single-handily helped transform the NFL in to what it is today. Frank Gifford couldn't be any more wrong and he would be denying all that the NFL organization as a whole did to transform this game in to a national past-time. However, with that being duly noted "The Glory Game" does contain a lot of first account stories and memorable moments of a game that Frank Gifford is at least to say very passionate about and therefore it is worth a read for anyone who is in any way interested in the sport of Football. You definetly don't need to be a NFL history fanatic to enjoy "The Glory Game."
VIDEO! Watch a video and read an excerpt of Frank Gifford’s new book. Frank Gifford’s new book is “Glory Game”. Kathie Lee Gifford spoke of book Glory Game last week on the extended version of Today. But Monday Frank appeared on Today to promote the book.
The Gifford book is about the 1958 NFL championship game between the Giants and the Colts. You need to buy this book!!
Below is a video and excerpt.
From chapter one of Frank Gifford's "The Glory Game":
We didn’t all live in the Concourse. The only two bachelors on the team — Cliff Livingston, our strongside linebacker, and Harland Svare, our other outside linebacker — lived in the Manhattan Hotel, downtown in Manhattan, across from Downey’s bar and restaurant. They got a good rate. (All of us were always looking for rates back then — on anything and everything.)
“We all envied Harland and Cliff to some degree, but not completely. They’d come to practice after what had been a long, hard night on the town, and we’d look at their bloodshot eyes and eagerly ask them what they’d done the night before. They’d just look at each other and shake their heads. Cliff and Harland always talked about how much better off we were — we had home cooking, wives to go home to, security. But a lot of us fantasized about being in their shoes.
“Rosie Grier, our mammoth right defensive tackle, and Mel Triplett, our tough fullback, were roommates in an apartment over in Jersey: “We caught the bus, over and back,” Grier says now, as if it were yesterday, from Los Angeles, where he’s lived for years. “We couldn’t afford a car.” It wasn’t that the black players weren’t welcome at the Concourse Plaza; it was just that the fifties were simply a different time. Rosie and Mel felt more comfortable living across the river — and preferred the cheaper housing prices.
“But Rosie and Mel did draw the color line, and set a Giant precedent, at an exhibition game in Dallas in 1956. Down there, the hotels were separated by color, and one day Rosie and Mel made a statement for our team: “We were going to go to some hotel for a luncheon, and the black players on the club said they weren’t going to go to the luncheon,” Rosie told me. “We talked about it, and Mel and I decided we wouldn’t go. A couple of the older black players were on the bus. (The Giant roster had four black players in 1958: Mel, Rosie Grier, Rosey Brown, and Emlen Tunnell.) Mel and I wouldn’t get on. We figured, ‘If we can’t stay in the hotel with our teammates, then we’re not going to the luncheon.’ “
Here is the publisher’s description:
“In 1958 Frank Gifford was the golden boy on the glamour team in the most celebrated city in the NFL. When his New York Giants played the Baltimore Colts for the league championship that year, it became the single most memorable contest in the history of professional football. Broadcast to an audience of millions, it was the first title game ever to go into sudden-death overtime. Its drama, excitement, and controversy riveted the nation and helped propel football to the forefront of the American sports landscape.
“Now, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of “The Greatest Game Ever Played,” New York Giants Hall of Famer and longtime television analyst Frank Gifford provides an inside-the-helmet account that will take its place in the annals of sports literature. Drawing on the poignant and humorous memories of every living player from the game—including fellow Hall of Famers Sam Huff, Andy Robustelli, Art Donovan, Lenny Moore, and Raymond Berry—as well as the author’s own experiences and reflections, The Glory Game captures a magnificent moment in American sports history. It is the story of two very different cities and teams, filled with the joy, the disappointment, and the eternal pride of a day that will forever symbolize all that is great about sports.
“Told with gripping immediacy, The Glory Game is an indelible portrait of the NFL’s most transcendent hours—a winter version of The Boys of Summer, told by one of football’s true legends.”
Excerpts from HarperCollins
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