On Halloween 2007 I heard a story of how a football team in a small Kansas town had scored seventy-two points in the first quarter of their game the night before. This broke the record of sixty-six in one quarter, a number that had stood since 1925. 
I was incensed. I was railing on everything about this story. How could a High School coach allow his team to show such terrible, grotesque sportsmanship? I’m sure it didn’t help that this was only a few days after the New England Patriots (who would go 16-0) ran up a score of 52-7 against the Washington Redskins.
My feelings have shifted (for the Redmen, not the Pats) after reading Joe Drape’s “Our Boys: A Perfect Season on the Plains with the Smith Center Redmen”.
In this Friday Night Light’s style documentary, Drape moves his family to Smith Center, Kansas to follow this team during the 2008 season - the year after the blowout. Drape is the New York Times columnist that covered the story on the day before Halloween the year before, so he seemingly had access to everyone. He moved his family from New York to a city of 1,900 people on 1.2 square miles.
You pick this book up looking for a great story about a young football team; the struggles and triumphs, the ups and downs, but you get much more. Drape paints a portrait of the town and its inhabitants. He tells you the story of fathers who played on the team because their fathers had before them. You learn about men and women who went off to college but came back to Smith Center because that is their home. You discover a community that you didn’t know existed. You hear about the community that cares more about each other then they do anything else. You hear stories about a simpler life where men still have breakfast with their parents before they harvest their crops.
Expertly woven in this city’s biopic is the story of the Redmen’s battle for the State Championship behind a Senior Class that was inexperienced and not nearly as talented as the team before them. The Redmen are led by Coach Roger Barta – a man who cares more about the kids then he does about the games. The team had won four straight state championships while outscoring their opponents 704-0 during its fifty-one game win streak, but Roger Barta was more interested in the maturation of these young men.
This is why I changed my tune. Barta wasn’t telling his team to destroy Plainvile on October 30, 2007; he was putting them in position to win in life. Sure, he had installed is offense in the Junior High ranks, so when the kids got to him, he taught them game plans, he trained them on how to get better, but above all else, he had taught them how to be men.
While I was a little disappointed in the lack of “play-by-play” in “Our Boys” (and that there are photos in the middle of the book that tell you how the season progresses), I was not disappointed in the amount of heart. I cared about these kids and remembered what it felt like in High School to see your team win.
I was entranced from the first page and it never let me down. Drape has written a book that any sports fan would like. No, that anyone would like.
I was incensed. I was railing on everything about this story. How could a High School coach allow his team to show such terrible, grotesque sportsmanship? I’m sure it didn’t help that this was only a few days after the New England Patriots (who would go 16-0) ran up a score of 52-7 against the Washington Redskins.
My feelings have shifted (for the Redmen, not the Pats) after reading Joe Drape’s “Our Boys: A Perfect Season on the Plains with the Smith Center Redmen”.
In this Friday Night Light’s style documentary, Drape moves his family to Smith Center, Kansas to follow this team during the 2008 season - the year after the blowout. Drape is the New York Times columnist that covered the story on the day before Halloween the year before, so he seemingly had access to everyone. He moved his family from New York to a city of 1,900 people on 1.2 square miles.
You pick this book up looking for a great story about a young football team; the struggles and triumphs, the ups and downs, but you get much more. Drape paints a portrait of the town and its inhabitants. He tells you the story of fathers who played on the team because their fathers had before them. You learn about men and women who went off to college but came back to Smith Center because that is their home. You discover a community that you didn’t know existed. You hear about the community that cares more about each other then they do anything else. You hear stories about a simpler life where men still have breakfast with their parents before they harvest their crops.
Expertly woven in this city’s biopic is the story of the Redmen’s battle for the State Championship behind a Senior Class that was inexperienced and not nearly as talented as the team before them. The Redmen are led by Coach Roger Barta – a man who cares more about the kids then he does about the games. The team had won four straight state championships while outscoring their opponents 704-0 during its fifty-one game win streak, but Roger Barta was more interested in the maturation of these young men.
This is why I changed my tune. Barta wasn’t telling his team to destroy Plainvile on October 30, 2007; he was putting them in position to win in life. Sure, he had installed is offense in the Junior High ranks, so when the kids got to him, he taught them game plans, he trained them on how to get better, but above all else, he had taught them how to be men.
While I was a little disappointed in the lack of “play-by-play” in “Our Boys” (and that there are photos in the middle of the book that tell you how the season progresses), I was not disappointed in the amount of heart. I cared about these kids and remembered what it felt like in High School to see your team win.
I was entranced from the first page and it never let me down. Drape has written a book that any sports fan would like. No, that anyone would like.
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