Skip to main content

The Extra Yard

By

                                            The Extra Yard - Lupica, Mike


The Extra Yard
by Mike Lupica
Simon & Schuster, 2016.  292 pgs. Fiction

     Teddy Madden is a bit of a schlub until his friend Jack takes him in hand, helps him get into shape, and then finds him a spot as a catcher on his school's baseball team. But Teddy wants to play football. He makes the team on the strength of a one-handed grab in the end zone at tryouts and surrounded by friends Jack, Gus, and Cassie he looks forward to a great football season with the Walton Wildcats. But then his long-absent father shows up. His friends tell him to stop hating on the man, and Teddy makes progress until his Dad (a former quarterback) shows up on the sidelines and starts coaching. Predictably, the starting quarterback (Jack) goes out for the season with a shoulder separation, and Teddy steps in at quarterback, only to discover that his father actually has some good ideas. The team goes undefeated into the championship game, where things turn out a little differently than one might expect, but all's well that ends well, nevertheless.  I am a big Mike Lupica fan - his books, including this one, are filled with likable characters wise beyond their years and excellent descriptions of skills, games, and tactics. "The Extra Yard" is a little unsettling, however, because with our growing understanding of the consequences of playing football, especially for young people, it seems a little off that Lupica revels in the violence of the game, and encourages his readers to follow Teddy's example of not being afraid to "play hurt." Young sports fans and football players will love this book; their parents maybe not so much.  Plus Teddy's dad really is a cluck.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Kareem Between

By
  Kareem Between By Shifa Saltagi Safadi New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2024. Fiction. 324 pages.  Kareem loves football and as he gets ready to start seventh grade he dreams of someday becoming the first Syrian American NFL player. Seventh grade is not off to a great start for Kareem, after football tryouts don't go as he had planned, his best friend moves away, and his mom returns to Syria to help bring his sick grandfather to the US for treatment. So when Austin, the quarterback and coach's son, offers to talk to his dad and get Kareem on the football team in the spring, if he will cheat and do his homework for him, Kareem agrees. Kareem really wants to fit in at school and he is desperate to find a friend, but deep down he knows that doing Austin's homework isn't the right thing to do. And to make things harder, Kareem's mom asks him to be a friend to Fadi, a Syrian Christian refugee. He knows he should stand up for Fadi and help him adjust to the new school,...
Post a Comment
Read more

Review: Sole Survivor

By
  Sole Survivor  Written By Norman Ollestad and Brendan Kiely  New York: Farrar Straus Giroux Books for Young Readers, 2025. 255 pages.  This is a juvenile biography/memoire about the plane crash that Norman Ollestad survived when he was a sixth grader. The book starts off with Norman wining a skiing competition and heading home to play in a hockey game only to head onto an airplane with his dad, his dad’s girlfriend (Sandra), and the pilot so he could go and claim his trophy for the skiing competition. Only, the plane crashed and the pilot and Norman’s dad were killed. Then when Sandra falls and dies as well, Norman is left as the sole survivor from the plane crash in the San Gabriel Mountains during a snowstorm.  Fans of Hatchet or other adventure novels will love reading how Norman survived this ordeal. And they will be even more impressed with the fact that this is a true story and the person who survived and is still alive today. This book goes over all of...
Post a Comment
Read more

Review: Fowl Play

By
  Fowl Play By Kristin O'Donnell Tubb New York: Katherine Tegen Books, 2024. Fiction 277 pages. Still reeling from her beloved uncle's death, Chloe Alvarez is comforted and confused when at his last will and testament reading, Uncle Will gifts her his African Grey parrot, Charlie. Charlie has a robust vocabulary and loves to make Alexa requests for her favorite songs, but when she starts saying things like, "homicide," and "cyanide," Chloe becomes convinced that Uncle Will may have met his demise by murder instead of a genetic disease, as was previously thought. Ultimately, bringing in her brother, Grammy, and Uncle Frank (and of course Charlie,) Chloe's ragtag and adoring family support her search for answers ---going on stakeouts, engaging in fast pursuits, and searching for clues. But as the suspects stack up and the mystery grows, Chole will learn that the process of death and grieving is complicated, and in the end her Uncle Will's words that, ...
Post a Comment
Read more