Product Description

Drawing on rare access to an NFL team’s players, coaches and facilities, the author of The New York Times bestseller Word Freak trains to become a professional-caliber placekicker. As he sharpens his skills, he gains surprising insight into the daunting challenges—physical, psychological, and intellectual—that pro athletes must master

In Word Freak, Stefan Fatsis infiltrated the insular world of competitive Scrabble® players, ultimately achieving “expert” status (comparable to a grandmaster ranking in chess). Now he infiltrates a strikingly different subculture—pro football. After more than a year spent working out with a strength coach and polishing his craft with a gurulike kicking coach, Fatsis molded his fortyish body into one that could stand up—barely—to the rigors of NFL training. And over three months in 2006, he became a Denver Bronco. He trained with the team and lived with the players. He was given a locker and uniforms emblazoned with #9. He was expected to perform all the drills and regimens required of other kickers. He was unlike his teammates in some ways—most notably, his livelihood was not on the line as theirs was. But he became remarkably like them in many ways: He risked crippling injury just as they did, he endured the hazing that befalls all rookies, he gorged on 4,000 daily calories, he slogged through two-a-day practices in blistering heat. Not since George Plimpton’s stint as a Detroit Lion more than forty years ago has a writer tunneled so deeply into the NFL.

At first, the players tolerated Fatsis, or treated him like a mascot, but over time they began to think of him as one of them. And he began to think like one of them. Like the other Broncos—like all elite athletes—he learned to perfect a motion through thousands of repetitions, to play through pain, to silence the crowd’s roar, to banish self-doubt.

While Fatsis honed his mind and drove his body past exhaustion, he communed with every classic athletic type—the affable alpha male, the overpaid brat, the youthful phenom, the savvy veteran—and a welter of bracingly atypical players as well: a fullback who invokes Aristotle, a quarterback who embraces yoga, a tight end who takes creative writing classes in the off-season. Fatsis also witnessed the hidden machinery of a top-flight football franchise, from the God-is-in-the-details strategizing of legendary coach Mike Shanahan to the icy calculation with which the front office makes or breaks careers.

With wry candor and hard-won empathy, A Few Seconds of Panic unveils the mind of the modern pro athlete and the workings of a storied sports franchise as no book ever has before.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8370 in Books
• Published on: 2008-07-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 352 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Fatsis (Word Freak) is dwarfed by any of the NFL athletes who put their bodies on the line each Sunday. But that doesn't stop him from asking to attend the Denver Broncos' training camp in hopes of learning one very specific athletic skill—that is, placekicking—and not to become an NFL-caliber kicker, but to become a credible one. Fatsis is treated like any rookie, from having to sing his alma mater's fight song minutes after stepping into the locker room to carrying the team's duffel bags and bunking in the hotel with all the other rookies. But his vibrant enthusiasm for improving his kicking ability helps his Bronco teammates accept him as one of their own. With that, the reader gets a glimpse of the true NFL, in the tradition of George Plimpton's Paper Lion. We see the crippling injuries that are kept secret for fear of losing playing time; the heartbreak of standing on the sidelines in camp, just aching to prove one's worth; the tears that come when the NFL dream could be over. Fatsis, too, has his own personal highs and lows through camp, enduring the long days, the trainer's visits and the sting of failure in front of coaches and players. It's an incredibly fascinating read for football fans, squashing the notion that the life of an NFL player is always glamorous. (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The Washington Post

Stefan Fatsis, who has covered sports for the Wall Street Journal and National Public Radio, spent the summer of 2006 training as a place kicker with the Denver Broncos. He's allowed to stand on the sidelines for the first pre-season game (but not play), and he melts with childish glee when he sees his locker: "The letters of my last name are stitched individually and perfectly onto the back of an authentic NFL jersey . . . ready to be worn on an authentic NFL playing field and read by thousands of authentic NFL fans." Later that season, the Broncos play the New England Patriots, and Robert Kraft, owner of the Patriots, sees Fatsis (now back in journalist mode) talking to a group of Denver players. "So are you a Broncos fan now?" Kraft jabs. "No," replies the author, "I'm a Bronco."

Well, no. He's not a Bronco, and his own reporting shows why. No matter how often Fatsis practices with the team, no matter how many strained calves, sore hips and aching knees he endures, he still has a life outside of football. He can't be cut; he can't be deprived of his identity and income by a coaching staff that seems inspired by the Soviet gulag. Hey, I sympathize with the author's dreamy self-glorification. Like all washed-up jocks, I have my fantasies (returning to the Little League in Bayonne, N.J., where I hit well under .200, and blasting one -- just one -- home run). But you can't just pull on a player's cleats and become a pro athlete; you have to feel the fear of taking them off.

Still, give the guy credit. When George Plimpton attended an NFL camp in 1963 and wrote his famous account of that experience, Paper Lion, he was more observer than participant. Fatsis worked hard to become a passable place kicker, and because he shared their training camp regimen -- the pain and pressure, brutality and boredom -- he won the confidence of his teammates. That intimacy produces some candid insights, particularly about the marginal players, the walk-ons and spear-carriers in the NFL's "moneymaking machine," as one Bronco calls it. In fact, the author's physical shortcomings endear him to these very large but very human characters. One day, coach Mike Shanahan announces that if Fatsis can make a field goal from 35 yards, practice will end early. When he misses badly -- twice -- he thinks his chance "to validate my presence here" has been lost. But the opposite happens. Pro players believe that sportswriters never understand how hard their job really is, and once Fatsis fails, they think he finally gets it.

The magic number threading through these pages is 53. That's how many roster spots are allotted to each NFL team, and with more than 90 players in camp, and thousands more clamoring at the gates, the chances of any one player making the grade are quite small. That's true in all pro sports, but the stress level in football is higher for two reasons: The risk of injury is much greater, and few contracts are guaranteed. You're off the payroll as soon as an old ligament betrays you, or a new linebacker outruns you.

This means that teammates are forced to root against each other. When Todd Sauerbrun, the incumbent punter, jeers at a youngster trying to replace him, a coach cracks, "Attaway to pump air in his tires, Todd." Sauerbrun spits back, "I'm here to slash his tires." Players hide injuries, knowing that any sign of weakness could mean their demise: "Obviously it's illogical. But players believe they can overcome pain more easily than they can a coach's perception. So they avoid treatment and suck it up." Jason Elam, the team's star kicker, sums up life for even the best NFL players: "You are a replaceable part. It's just that unknown. What are they thinking and how long am I going to be here?" One of the author's closest friends, P.J. Alexander, is cut on the last day of camp. "Before I can say good-bye, P.J. is behind the wheel of his Lincoln Navigator," Fatsis writes. "I knock on the tinted window. He rolls it down and I see him crying."

Fatsis might not be a real Bronco, but he's a real sportswriter, and this book tells you what brings real Broncos to tears.

Steven V. Roberts is a professor

of politics and journalism at

George Washington University and author of "My Fathers' Houses,"

a childhood memoir.

Copyright 2008, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

About the Author
Stefan Fatsis is The New York Times bestselling author of Word Freak. He is a sports reporter for The Wall Street Journal and a regular guest on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered.

Customer Reviews

Great insight into the game
Stefan Fatsis takes us inside the game of football and also takes us into his struggle to be accepted by these Sunday warriors, who battle pain, fear of failure and fear of what success may do to them.

Fatsis reminds us that most football players aren't stars who are set financially for life. Instead, they play a game that is run like a business.

I really got a "kick" out of this book (pun intended)
Even the most dedicated fan of the National Football League (NFL) can't possibly know what goes on "behind the curtain." Most of us know only what we see on Sundays or what we read in Monday's newspaper. Sure, we think we know our favorite players and all their foibles. You can lay all that aside after reading this book.

Stefan Fatsis suceeds in infiltrating the most sacred of grounds: the NFL locker room and the strange world that surrounds it. We get a glimpse of what it is like to know that your very job hinges on the next play in training camp. Players come and go like the tides. Coaches rule like tyrrants and the pecking order among them becomes painfully evident. So does the stress created in this bubbling cauldron they call professional football.

Reading about the personalities of the players--from the lowly undrafted rookie free agent to the highest paid super-star--reminds us that these people are only human. In fact, Fastis' colorful writing creates a word picture that surely is the way these players really are. Some are real characters, some are sad reminders of how cruel life can be. I found myself identifying with one partiular play and this gave me great insight into my own place in life.

It must be terribly frustrating to be a professional football player, where the glamor of game day gives way to utter despair when the "turk" comes to visit.

The only downside I see with this book is that it is so captivating that I let my usual workload pile up while I sat glue to the book. Oh, well.

Stefan Fatsis provides a ticket to a game seldom of us see--the game withing the game. Though he stands only 5 feet 8 inches, this work is gigantic. May all of his kicks in life sail thorugh the uprights.

okay book but nothing exciting
I have been a huge Broncos fan for many years, and when I saw this book was being printed I ordered a copy right away. I think I was looking for a book that would give some real insight into what a player goes through to play in the NFL, and I was anxious to read about interesting things involving the Broncos. This book provides only small amounts of both.

First off, I must give the author credit for having the guts and determination to train and participate in the Broncos' training camps. He does give some glimpses into what life is like for players trying to make the team, and he gives slightly more detailed descriptions about some of the individual players he interviewed. But most of his book seems to focus on himself and his efforts to perform like an NFL kicker. After a while it gets boring reading about him practicing, missing kicks, wanting to perform better, standing around watching others practice, wanting to kick in a preseason game, whining because the NFL won't let him play in an exhibition game, blah, blah, blah. I would much rather have read more about the other players and what trying out, training, and/or playing for the NFL was like for them.

If you are a die-hard Broncos fan you may enjoy reading most of this book just to read about some of the players with whom you are surely familiar. Anyone else will likely get bored after the first 40 pages or so.