The Last Coach: A Life of Paul "Bear" Bryant (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. This meticulous, fascinating look at the life of the legendary "Bear" Bryant (1913–1983), longtime head football coach of the University of Alabama's fearsome "Crimson Tide," will further enhance the reputation of Barra (Clearing the Bases) as one of America's finest sportswriters. It begins with a powerful and unsentimental view of Bryant's difficult childhood in Moro Bottom, Ark., an area Barra describes as "the reality of which Al Capp's Dogpatch, the home of L'il Abner, was the hideous caricature." It ends with a moving description of Bryant's death, just 27 days after his final game and retirement, and the three-mile-long funeral procession viewed by an estimated quarter of a million people. In between, Barra covers Bryant's rise as a cultural and sports icon whose influence helped transform college football "from a game with a large cult following into the most lucrative spectator sport in the world." Among the many incidents Barra deftly explores are Bryant's hesitancy—followed by his thoroughness—in integrating the Alabama team (in 1971), and his visionary use of televised games in the early 1960s—which he accomplished with ABC sports broadcasting superstar Roone Arledge, then a 29-year-old rookie—to establish himself and his team (including flamboyant players such as Joe Namath) in the minds of a national sports audience. Throughout, Barra illuminates the complexities of what he sees as Bryant's legacies: "his intensity and will to win and his unshakable belief that these qualities, when applied to a higher purpose, can make you a better person." Photos.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Bear Bryant, who won more games as a college football coach than anyone except Joe Paterno, died in 1983, but he was recently catapulted back into national prominence via Jim Dent's best-selling Junction Boys (1999), an account of Bryant's first year at Texas A&M, and by the well-received HBO adaptation of Dent's book. Bryant was born in 1913 in a tiny Arkansas hamlet called Moro's Bottom. He was educated in nearby Fordyce, where he wrestled the vaudeville animal that earned him his nickname. Football got him into college, and he graduated to coaching, making stops at Kentucky and Texas A&M before moving to Alabama, where he earned his legendary status. Barra, a regular contributor to the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, meticulously researched Bryant's life, but his subject somewhat eludes him, perhaps because Bryant kept everything other than his public persona so well hidden. Still, anyone interested in the history of college football will want to read at least some of this book. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 608 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company (September 17, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 039332897X
• ISBN-13: 978-0393328974
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (37 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #107,576 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Life of Paul "Bear" Bryant told in a Humanistic Manner, August 24, 2005

By	George McAdams (Alabama, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

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This review is from: The Last Coach: A Life of Paul "Bear" Bryant (Hardcover)

For those how have lived in the State of Alabama during the last half of the 20th Century, there is no escaping the presence of Coach Paul W. "Bear" Bryant. As a fan of the University of Alabama's sports programs, a graduate of the University, a football season ticket holder, friend of the author, and a person who assisted the author in obtaining a minor amount of the information that went into this ambitious undertaking, I am somewhat hesitant to publicly write anything about it. However, it is also with that particular knowledge, that I know what I say may mean more to others.

I have always had an interest in biographies. Whether they be of Eddie Rickenbacker, George F. Kaufmann or, even, Harpo Marx, biographies held my facination from an early age. With Coach Bryant, the books purporting to give one the "insight" into his persona could fill-up several shelves in ones bookcase. Some retell the story John Underwood undertook in the 1970's with Coach Bryant in BEAR. Others talk of specific instances and moments the author and Coach Bryant shared. Still, others discuss his humor, his quotations, his ______ (you fill-in the blank). With THE LAST FOOTBALL COACH, Allen Barra has taken a very complex man, who had values that he adhered to throughout his life, and has written as thorough a book on Coach Bryant as will ever be written.

As a biography, it is not a book that dwells on the Coach's life as one who is infallible, yet it does not shy away from those infamous qualities Coach Bryant's detractors were quick to bring-up: his brutal practices, his drinking, his mistakes.

Allen Barra, whom I have known since his days as the Entertainment Editor of the UAB KALEIDOSCOPE in the early 1970's, is a gifted writer, but I have to tell you, most of his stuff is complicated as heck. The comparison of this baseball player from this era with another player from another era. I mean, I understand him, but if I am going to be using that much energy understanding what I read, I might as well be picking-out stocks that will produce a 200% profit in two years. HOWEVER, and this is a big, in more ways than one, "however," with THE LAST FOOTBALL COACH, Allen Barra has crossed the threshold to being an author who will make a difference in other's lives: those young men and women who read this book, whether they be football players or not, will understand just a little bit better, what went into being the "Last Football Coach," a man not too big to climb down from his tower to show a guard or an end how to "do it right."

I would recommend this book to anyone who loves the college football game and would like to have a lot of insight into what made Coach Bryant click. As a bonus, well to me it's a bonus, you get to read how Coach Bryant gave one ten-year-old, me, a "try out," as I imagine he gave a thousand other boys try outs, with an intensity and focus that made one ten-year-old boy want to "do it just a little bit better for the coach."

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Portrait of a True Leader, October 7, 2005

By	Allen St John (New York City) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Last Coach: A Life of Paul "Bear" Bryant (Hardcover)

In the spirit of Dave Maranaiss' When Pride Mattered, The Last Coach isn't so much a football book as a portrait of a true American original. Barra presents a nuanced portrayal of a man who was loved and feared in equal parts, and who could have been Governor of Alabama-if he got tired of being King.

While there's plenty of artfully described gridiron action in these pages, at its core this is a book about leadership as it is practiced in the real world, not in those 13-Steps-to-Excellence books that weigh down the shelf at your local bookseller.

The Last Coach is not only a great book, it's an important one, as well.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Greatest Book On The Greatest Coach, September 25, 2005

By	Gene Black (Vestavia, Alabama) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Last Coach: A Life of Paul "Bear" Bryant (Hardcover)

I've was never entirely convinced that Bear Bryant was the greatest football coach of all time until I read this book. The author's analysis is clear and penetrating, and he never overstates the case but lets Bryant's record speak for itself. But I needed no convincing that this is a great book. From the start it kept me reading, beginning with the story of Bryant's rise from abject poverty in Arkansaas to the way the entire country munrned him at his death. The book reminded me a lot of Davide Maraniss' biography of Vince Lombardi, When Pride Still Mattered, which is one of the best things I could say for it.