The Senior: My Amazing Year as a 59-Year-Old College Football Linebacker [Hardcover]

Mike Flynt (Author), LeBron James (Foreword), Don Yaeger (Contributor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 7, 2008

It's Never Too Late to Tackle Your Dreams!

Mike Flynt was swapping stories with some old football buddies when he brought up the biggest regret of his life: getting kicked off the college team before his senior year. So, one of his pals said, "Why not do something about it?" Most 59-year-olds would have laughed. Flynt's only concern was his eligibility. He not only returned to college football, but actually made the team at his alma mater - Sul Ross State, an NCAA division III school.

His remarkable story begins with a tough upbringing by a violent father who trained him to fight at every opportunity. His fighting habit took him in and out of jail several times, until a faith conversion turned his life around on the very day he was contemplating suicide.

Mike Flynt has much to offer others, not only through his story, but through his belief that it's never too late for God to heal your heart and fulfill your dreams.

Foreword by NBA Superstar LeBron James.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Some readers might be familiar with the story of Flynt, a 59-year-old owner of a sports-equipment company who decided, more than 35 years after being tossed off his college football team, to return to his alma mater, try out for the team, and play out his fourth year of eligibility. As recounted in the press, he made the team, taking the field as a linebacker. But the story reported in the newspapers only touched on the author’s deeply troubled past (family violence, fights, jail time) and the religious awakening that turned his life around. The full story reveals the author to be not merely a man who wanted to finish what he started but also a man who saw his return to the gridiron as a means of revisiting, and to some extent exorcising, the demons of his past. Unlike Stefan Fatsis’ recent A Few Seconds of Panic, which took a journalistic (and frequently humorous) approach to the subject of a grown man joining a football team, this memoir is introspective, thoughtful, and may even prompt some readers to reexamine their own lives. --David Pitt

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Thomas Nelson; Complete Numbers Starting with 1, 1st Ed edition (October 7, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0849920639
• ISBN-13: 978-0849920639
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #853,279 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars RICK "SHAQ" GOLDSTEIN SAYS: "THE HEART OF THIS STORY IS IN THE *JOURNEY*!, November 29, 2008

By 

Rick Shaq Goldstein "*SHAQ*" (Danville, Ca, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

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This review is from: The Senior: My Amazing Year as a 59-Year-Old College Football Linebacker (Hardcover)

The author, Mike Flynt is a fifty-nine-year-old former high school and college football player whose senior college season was cut short when he was kicked off the team and out of school... after a fight... that may or may not have been his fault... but this fight... when added to the already accrued total of fights and arrests on his record... tipped the scales to the point... that the college, Sul Ross State... didn't care... they just wanted him gone from the University. For thirty-six years after the ending of his college career, this one incident festered like an open wound in his soul... and Mike always felt it was the biggest mistake in his life... he felt he let his teammates down.

The author leads you through his life starting with his Father a grizzled World War II veteran who taught his son to box at an early age... and to always be "MENTALLY-READY" for life on the "streets". His Dad had **THREE-RULES**: "IF I EVER HEAR OF YOU STARTING A FIGHT, YOU'RE GOING TO GET A WHIPPIN' WHEN YOU GET HOME. IF I EVER HEAR OF SOMEONE STARTING A FIGHT WITH YOU AND YOU DON'T FIGHT BACK, YOU'RE GETTING A WHIPPIN' WHEN YOU GET HOME. IF I HEAR OF YOU FIGHTING AND YOU DON'T WIN, YOU'RE GETTING A WHIPPIN' WHEN YOU GET HOME." Mike definitely followed his Dad's rules, and probably fought a lot of times even if it didn't have anything to do with his Dad's rules. Mike went to high school at Odessa, Texas Permian High School... the school that was the inspiration for the book, movie, and TV series, "FRIDAY-NIGHT-LIGHTS". In fact Mike was a member of the 1965 Class 4A Football State Champions... the first championship team at that now famous school.

In 2007 he was coerced by his former Sul Ross University teammates to attend a class reunion. When he attended the Reunion, and while having a few beers and celebrating the "Glory-Days"... the conversation led to the fact that Mike still had a year of college athletic eligibility left. Though fifty-nine-years old, Mike was in tremendous physical shape... and one thing led to another... and Mike was eventually approved to try out for the current Sul Ross team... even though he was older than the coach... and had children older than the players. Being that sports was the center of my existence during my school years and after... and the fact that I got kicked off my team in my junior year for the same offense as the author... I related very well with Mike's plight. But since it was my junior year... I got to make amends in my senior year. Mike saw a fleeting shot... albeit thirty-six-years later... to put a permanent bandage on an old wound. Obviously at fifty-nine-years old Mike was not going to be a major player... if he made the team... but to me making the team is the "sizzle"... not the "steak"... in Mike's life. The "steak"... and heart and soul of this story... is Mike's journey... from brawler... multiple arrests and nights in jail... to successful man... successful Father/husband/Grandfather... and a man who found G-d.

This book is about a tremendous journey... the destination is simply what got the story told!

P.S. I've been called a lot of things in my life... but the two best were SON and FATHER... and because of that the most touching words in this entire book, was the dedication that Mike made in the beginning of the book:

**TO MY DAD**
"FOR ALL THE THINGS HE TAUGHT ME, RIGHT OR WRONG, NO FATHER EVER LOVED A SON MORE THAN MY DAD LOVED ME."

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pure Inspiration!, February 28, 2009

By 

CPTScott - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Senior: My Amazing Year as a 59-Year-Old College Football Linebacker (Hardcover)

I actually just finished reading this book over the past 2 days and it was inspiring on so many levels!

It's an incredible true story of a man haunted by regrets of the past and the chance of redemption. It tells of one man's spiritual awakening and transformation. And it's a lesson to all people that life is a process, that you can keep moving forward regardless of chronological age.

I was actually fortunate enough to have the honor of meeting Mike Flynt about a year and a half ago. I didn't really know much about him at the time, I was actually in the process of studying to become a certified personal trainer at 48 years old (my own second chance in life, one also interrupted by my own adversity, as I was losing the use of my left arm in middle of this process due to old injuries from a car wreck. That led to cervical spine surgery a month before I took my certification exam!).

I was already in the process of purchasing equipment to use in my future second profession, such as stability balls, medicine balls, all sorts of other equipment. I found out about the Powerbase unit because my son's middle school used them sometimes in P.E. class and it seemed like a great tool for me to use to train folks at their homes.

Anyway, I had emailed the company and Mike Flynt got back to me personally. I live in the same town (Franklin, TN) and he went out of his way to meet with me when I bought the unit. Not only that, after I mentioned that my son was a dedicated football player he spent about 30 minutes giving me ideas to share with my son on training in general and ideas of the powerbase as well. I was stunned that this man, who had never met me before, was willing to take so much of his free time with a complete stranger. This was after his year at Sul Ross and things were already quite hectic for him with the book upcoming and other related projects. I'm just mentioning this to show the kind of person he is, a true gentleman with a big heart.

I had no idea of Mike Flynt's past, I would never have believed the gentle man I had met could have been such a hot tempered, quick fisted youth. I had no idea that he had been through so much adversity in his past.

The story the book tells of the lessons he learned from his loving father, who was concerned that his small son would be an easy target so he taught him to fight to protect himself was extremely intense. Mike certainly took those lessons too far as a young man and it cost him his Senior Year of college football (at least for many years).

However, Mike was still able to find a way to move forward and become an athletic trainer. Even though at that point he probably never thought he'd get on a football field again, he still was able to dust himself off and keep moving forward to pursue a career that was involved with athletics.

This story is also about the transformative power of love on many levels. First the love he found with his wife and children and the profound effect it had on him. Then through the gentle guidance of his wife, the tremendous impact of finding a relationship with God and how that transformed him in every way. It's also about the relationships he formed with not only his teammates of the past but his teammates of his "senior" year at Sul Ross. How he inspired those young men who in turn had an powerful impact on him!

On another level, this book was just an incredibly entertaining read, a wonderful story, one that I hope will be made into a movie because I think it will be another venue for people to be exposed to this incredible journey filled with life lessons that anyone can be inspired by.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Whatta Comeback!, October 10, 2008

By 

Big Daddy (Raleigh, NC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Senior: My Amazing Year as a 59-Year-Old College Football Linebacker (Hardcover)

I couldn't put this book down. Read it at one sitting. Althought many people won't understand Flynt's mindset about fist fighting it is one shared by many of us that were raised in West Texas. The book was excellent and I invite everyone to read this. Quite inspirational.