In a time of non-stop 24/7 sports coverage it’s hard to imagine this has not always been the case. I have to go back to my childhood to recall this, before getting cable TV and that little cable channel created by a former local sportscaster from my area called the Entertainment Sports Programming network, or ESPN for short. Prior to the late 70’s you literally had to be there to see the finer details of a game beyond the radio broadcasts and occasional local TV coverage.

This is why books like The Most Memorable Games in Patriots History are not only important but highly nostalgic. The core of the book is literally play-by-play of 10 games over the history of the New England Patriots football team. The narrative is by the authors Jim Baker and Bernie Corbett, heavily complimented with interviews and short pieces from many of the players and people at these games. It is a very detailed story of a sports team that almost wasn’t, and one nobody thought would be the global sports dynasty it is today.

As this Patriots fan read the jam-packed pages of this book, these are some of the many takeaways I had.

Unknown Facts – As the team began playing before I was born, I was expecting to learn a few minor details about the early days. A major one was that the Boston Patriots (as they were then known) and Boston Red Sox baseball team could have built and moved into a retractable roof stadium in 1964. In order for that to happen, the Massachusetts legislature wanted long-term commitments from all of the major sports teams to stay in the capital city. However the deal never happened as the Boston Bruins hockey team wanted more of the Boston Celtics concessions money. What could have been!

It Started in Foxboro – The concept of selling the naming rights to sports stadiums is commonplace today, and the first-ever corporate named stadium was the first permanent home of the Patriots. The team was building a new stadium in the town of Foxboro, Massachusetts, about a half-hour south of Boston, and they were short on funds. Rather than outright ask for more money, founding owner Billy Sullivan offered to sell to Schaefer Beer the naming rights to the eventual Schaefer Stadium. Thus a trend was started in sports which many people are less than keen on. And before I hear from Chicago Cubs fans, the Wrigley Gum family owned the Cubs.

Early, Gritty Days – The big-money that swirls around professional sports today was hardly the case in the early days of football and most other sports as well. The Patriots almost weren’t a team due to financing and played home games in various stadiums around the Boston area – even in the state of Alabama – before opening their own low-budget home field over a decade later after their American Football League merged into the National Football League, or NFL, and required them to. Player salaries were nothing like they are today, and most players had jobs outside of the sport in order to live. These stories are woven throughout tales of early games.

Despite my allegiance to the team, I came into this book with an open mind – it wasn’t going to be awesome simply because it was about the Pats. Fortunately I wasn’t disappointed. The stories of the specific games were extremely detailed and told as play-by-play announcers would on a broadcast. The quotes from past players, ownership and sportswriters added greatly to the feeling for those games. In between each game story were “appendices,” full chapters in themselves, detailing stats and other detailed information related to the Patriots and all of the NFL.

The Most Memorable Games in Patriots History was published in 2012, and has not been updated. I got the book sent to me by a book publisher back then as I got a lot of books because I was blogging about a lot of books I read. Yes, I held onto this for almost a decade, and after finishing it I wish I had read it earlier. I recommend this book to Patriots fans of all types and interest levels, as well as anyone who follows football and has an appreciation for such detail. As for my copy of the book, I am sending it to a friend who has an appreciation for the nuance and details of the teams and their games, as well as their stadiums.

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This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

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