Overview

Sid Gillman, unlike so many of his coaching colleagues, never wrote a book about himself. He never published his own ideas about the game and why he thought passing the ball in an age where most quarterbacks handed off to running backs was the key to his success. In more than four decades of coaching, nobody thought it necessary to tell the definitive Sid Gillman story. Until now. Gillman was a true innovator. The kind of football genius that goes overlooked by today's average fan, but who will never be forgotten by the coaches he directly - and indirectly - impacted. The modern-day offenses that emphasize spreading the field with receivers, running backs and tight ends? That was Gillman's idea. The idea that the long pass could stretch a defense? That was Gillman's baby as well. What NFL fans watch today in ever-increasing numbers (and the high-flying offenses those fans love) can be directly traced back to the Midwestern coach who was a forerunner to the West Coast offense. Gillman wasn't a perfect man. He had plenty of warts, and he made plenty of enemies. But he also made a major impact on the game, comparable to how Vince Lombardi, Paul Brown and Woody Hayes left a timeless impression. Josh Katzowitz tells you how Gillman was just as important as any coach who came before him or afterward. This is not simply a biography of an innovator. It details exactly how and why the NFL football you watch today is the image of what Gillman believed was possible. It's why football luminaries like Al Davis, Bill Walsh and Chuck Noll cite Gillman as one of the most important influences on their careers and lives. It's why if you watched the Green Bay Packers beat the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl XLV, you could see the scope of Gillman's reach. In order to truly understand the reason why football offenses are so exciting today, learning about Gillman is absolutely essential. Katzowitz takes you on that journey.

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9781322356495

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A brilliantly reported and written work that will not only teach you things about one of football's greatest innovators, it will tell you things you never knew about one of football's greatest times. This book is as memorable as the man who inspired it. --Mike Freeman, author of Undefeated: Inside the 1972 Miami Dolphins' Perfect Season Gillman's incredible football journey is, for the first time, closely chronicled in Josh Katzowitz's welcome and much-needed biography, Sid Gillman: Father of the Passing Game. These days, it doesn't happen often that a sports author brings to light a truly historical figure whose story has somehow gone untold. Katzowitz, however, has accomplished that. His book not only rolls through more than half a century of football's evolution, but makes it personal. Gillman's obsession with the game is presented, to a large extent, through the loyal eyes of a wife and four children equally steeped in love and tolerance. From sitting at his side as he studied film in the garage every night, decade after decade, Esther Gillman understood more about passing schemes than . . . well, certainly more than most sportswriters. So did the Gillman sons and daughters. The great innovator's unconventional family life is treated in the same thorough fashion as the casual Judaism that sometimes blocked his career path. --Lonnie Wheeler, New York Times Best-selling author whose works include I Had a Hammer: The Hank Aaron Story

Author Information

Josh Katzowitz covers the NFL for CBSSports.com and is a featured contributor for Manofthehouse.com. He's worked most of his career as a sports writer, including positions with the now-defunct Cincinnati Post and the Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle. As a freelance writer, Katzowitz has written for The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, and a variety of other newspapers, magazines, and national websites. In August 2009, he released his first book, Bearcats Rising. He lives with his wife and their twins in Austin, TX.

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