At age 37, St. Amant (Committed: Confessions of a Fantasy Football Junkie) joined a football teamthe Boston Panthers of the EFL, a semipro league based in southern New Englandand narrates that first season with the team. It was a stiff test for a man who hadn’t engaged in a minute of serious athletics since college; besides being old and out of shape, Amant played an outcast position, kicker, and was a ghost-white face on a black team drawn from the toughest Boston neighborhoods. Over the Panthers season, Amant tries to gain the respect of his teammates and comes face-to-face with his lifelong fear of choking during the big game. In contrast to the glamour of the NFL, semipro football takes place in obscurity on stony fields, the bleachers empty and the uniforms mismatched. The players are an equally heterogeneous lot, too small or too slow to have had a shot at the pros or kept out by injuries, bad decisions or psychological issues. At times, Amant relies too much on humor, but he gives good insight into the makeup of his fellow athletes as well as into his own motivations. (Oct.)
Copyright Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. –This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

*Starred Review* As a follow-up to his entertaining examination of fantasy football, Committed (2004), St. Amant thought he would write a book about semipro football: has-beens, wannabes, never-weres, and other oddballs banging each other around on sandlot fields. His first interview was with the coaching staff of the Panthers, based in the predominantly black Roxbury neighborhood of his hometown Boston. Suddenly, St. Amant was writing a different book. His high-school and college soccer experience was enough to land him a job as the Panthers’ kicker. In the tradition of George Plimpton’s Paper Lion (1967), St. Amant shares the experience of his first year on the Panthers. He’s worried about both fitting in and failing on the field, but soon he’s caught up in the team dynamic, which is very supportive of a newcomer, any newcomer, even a middle-aged white guy who lives in upscale Beacon Hill. He has some success and the team has some, too, but this isn’t a Hollywood story in which the hero kicks the winning field goal to claim the league championship. St. Amant’s focus is on his teammates, why they play, and how being a part of something outside their daily struggles enhances their lives. Portions are laugh-out-loud funny, but, at other times, reading through misty eyes will be a challenge. St. Amant documents the timeless magic of team sports, and his words will take former athletes back to the best moments of their sporting lives. A good bet to be one of the year’s best sports books. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright American Library Association. All rights reserved –This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Nearing 40, standing five feet eight, weighing in at 160 pounds, Mark St. Amant was most definitely not a football player. He had never played a single down of real football in his life and even in the sports he did play, his greatest skill seemed to be choking when the game was on the line. So why on earth did he suddenly become, of all things, a semi-pro football kicker?

Fantasy football writer and self-described poster child for suburban-raised white boy Mark St. Amant tells the unlikely story of how he ditched his television and laptop to join an inner-city football squad the mostly African-American Boston Panthers, one of more than 600 semi-pro teams around the country. With warmth, insight, and his trademark offbeat, self-deprecating humor, Mark recounts the strides he made on and off the field and reveals the powerful bonds that developed among teammates young and not-so-young, struggling and successful, black, white, and Hispanic, all clinging tightly to their dreams and playing the game they love.

From couch potato to field goal kicker, Mark lived out a real-life football fantasy, discovering true teamwork, staring his lifelong fear of athletic failure in the face, witnessing testosterone-fueled hilarity both on and off the field, and achieving gridiron glory in ways he d never imagined.

Just Kick It: Tales of an Underdog, Over-Age, Out-of-Place Semi-Pro Football Player

Committed: Confessions of a Fantasy Football Junkie

Little boys fantasize about being NFL players, but grown men fantasize about owning themdrafting them, trading them and arranging them in starting lineups that compete against other “teams” based on the players’ performances in real games. St. Amant quit his advertising job to pursue a fantasy football league championship and pen this boisterous celebration of the burgeoning pastime. He mixes hyperbolic commentary on his own travails with a recap of the hobby’s origins, conversations with aficionados and pointers for neophytes. He depicts fantasy football as fandom on steroids; by placing the traditions of sifting stats, critiquing players and kibitzing strategies in a formal competitive setting, the essentially passive experience of watching football gains an imaginary dimension of control and mastery. In fact, watching becomes as grueling as playing (“My stomach feels as if it’s been stopping cannonballs,” St. Amant groans after one Sunday in front of the tube). The author writes like the life of the locker-room party, dishing out sarcastic trash talk and assaultive anal sex banter, but undercutting his macho bluster with self-deprecation. It’s a fitting, if sometimes overbearing, tone. St. Amant’s obsessiveness lacks critical perspective, but those who share his addiction will find his voice authentic.
Copyright Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. –This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

For one man, football is more than just a fantasy…

As seen on ESPN’s Cold Pizza

Fantasy football — one of America’s most popular, and profitable, virtual pastimes — became a way of life for sports humorist and author Mark St. Amant. Utterly fed up with never having won his league championship, St. Amant abandoned a successful advertising career to make fantasy football his full-time job, embarking on a sprawling reconnaissance mission to discover what really makes this game, and its 20 million players, tick. Committed is the result of St. Amant’s ranting, relentless, and strategic pursuit of his own obsession.

In this wickedly funny and deeply informative work, St. Amant offers readers an all-access sideline pass to his wild, unprecedented fantasy football season, and to the hobby itself. From its humble beginnings in a New York hotel in 1962 to a multibillion-dollar business today, from local and online leagues to high-stakes, cutthroat Las Vegas competitions, St. Amant lays bare the facts, figures, and fanaticism of fantasy football in all its multidimensional glory.

Committed: Confessions of a Fantasy Football Junkie