THE CORNERBACK: A Novel of Professional Football

Another popular playback by the pro football editor of Sports Illustrated. Sandy Crichten, twenty-nine, has been with the Los Angeles Rams for eight years, his roommate Dick Jones for seven. Both are apprehensive of the younger players' potential to replace them and resentful of the innovative new defensive coach--when prodded by a friendly neighbor, they talk too much. They find out in time that the neighbor is a gambler, and trap him 007-style (with police help), but Sandy gets a flesh wound that loses the game, the championship, the chance at prize money. In the good-sports-hate-all-evil-tradition Sandy is enthusiastically saluted by his teammates for bravery while he stands by in incredibly naive astonishment. Still, it's straight entertainment for the older sports reader, packed with playing details and professionalism.