A hilarious but nonetheless groundbreaking contribution to the argument about which force shapes American life the most. For two kinds of readers--those who know it’s football and those who are about to find out. Chuck Klosterman-- Cultural theorists talk about hyperobjects--phenomena that bulk so large in the world that their true dimensions are hidden in plain sight. In 2023, 93 of the 100 most-watched programs on American television were pro football games. The most-watched non-football game, the Oscars, landed at 40. Number 39 was a meaningless game between the Indianapolis Colts and the Jacksonville Jaguars. This is not an anomaly. And in no other country does one sport have such a chokehold. No, not even soccer in Brazil.;Odder still, when you break down the time spent in live action in a three-hour game, the average is eleven minutes. It’s as if 95 percent of Chuck Klosterman gets to the bottom of it. He takes us to Texas, from the religion of high school ball to America’s Team [ A century ago, Yale’s legendary coach Walter Camp wrote his unified theory of the game. He called it <Football<. Chuck Klosterman has given us a new Camp for the new age....

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Chuck Klosterman is the bestselling author of ten nonfiction books (including The Nineties; Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs; and But What If We’re Wrong?), two novels (Downtown Owl and The Visible Man), and the short story collection Raised in Captivity. He has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, GQ (London), Esquire, Spin, The Guardian (London), The Believer, and ESPN. Klosterman served as the Ethicist for The New York Times Magazine for three years and was an original founder of the website Grantland with Bill Simmons. He was raised in rural North Dakota and now lives in Portland, Oregon.

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**“Could this be the best book on football ever?” —Tyler Cowen

“Eye-opening and entertaining . . . a transcendent appraisal of America’s favorite sport.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

NAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2026 BY NPR

A hilarious but nonetheless groundbreaking contribution to the argument about which force shapes American life the most. For two kinds of readers—those who know it’s football and those who are about to find out.**

Chuck Klosterman—New York Times bestselling critic, journalist, and, yes, football psychotic—did not write this book to deepen your appreciation of the game. He’s not trying to help you become that person at the party, or to teach you how to make better bets, or to validate any preexisting views you might have about the sport (positive or negative). Football does, in fact, do all of those things. But not in the way such things have been done in the past, and never in a way any normal person would expect.

Cultural theorists talk about hyperobjects—phenomena that bulk so large that their true dimensions are hidden in plain sight. In 2023, 93 of the 100 most-watched programs on U.S. television were NFL football games. This is not an anomaly. This is how society is best understood. Football is not merely the country’s most popular sport; it is engrained in almost everything that explains what America is, even for those who barely pay attention.

Klosterman gets to the bottom of all of it. He takes us to a metaphorical projection of Texas, where the religion of six-man football merges with America’s Team [sic] and makes an inexplicable impact on a boy in North Dakota. He dissects the question of natural greatness, the paradox of gambling and war, and the timeless caricature of the uncompromising head coach. He interrogates the perfection of football’s marriage with television and the morality of acceptable risk. He even conjures an extinction-level event. If &#381;i&#382;ek liked the SEC more than he liked cinema, if Stephen Jay Gould cared about linebackers more than he cared about dinosaurs, if Steve Martin played quarterback instead of the banjo . . . it would still be nothing like this.

A century ago, Yale’s legendary coach Walter Camp wrote his unified theory of the game. He called it Football. Chuck Klosterman has given us a new Camp for the new age, rooted in a personal history he cannot escape.

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1.

It's Not Like That

Football is an almost impossible game to play. This is not because it requires a unique set of physical skills or mental requirements, nor is it due to any social or political barriers. It's because the game itself is so complicated and overorganized that there's no reasonable way to replicate it recreationally. Any version of football that isn't (in some capacity) "official" is not football. This would seem, on the surface, to work to the sport's detriment: The game is undemocratic. But this is actually a strength, and a big part of what makes it different from so many other seemingly similar pursuits. Football is exclusionary, and that makes it special.

When we think about sports in the abstract, the ease of participation plays a significant factor in how we view the purity of that experience. Soccer is the most popular sport in the world, largely because no team game is easier to play or understand. All that's required is a kickable object and two roughly equal teams to kick that object around. Basketball can be even more spartan-the crux of the game can be pursued and perfected by a single individual playing alone. A pickup game among ten serious hoopers can feel the same as a coordinated league championship, and half-court 3-on-3 encompasses all the core qualities of the standard full-court variety (screening away from the ball, help-side defense, the give-and-go). Baseball needs eighteen players and a geometrically specialized playing surface, which would normally present an obstruction to leisure competition-except we've already established an ancillary sport as a surrogate: Softball is not the same as baseball, but it's more similar than different, and nine million Americans play it every summer. Hockey requires ice and expensive equipment, but the sport's free-flowing nature makes low-impact amateur versions surprisingly plausible (there are at least three adult hockey leagues in Portland, a midsize market with no professional franchise). Golf can be played by anyone who can afford it. Tennis thrives as a leisure activity, and when its physical demands become too taxing, the participant can transition to pickleball (or even ping-pong). You want to play volleyball? Go to a public beach. You miss your bygone days as a high school wrestler? Have six drinks in a bar and insult a stranger who's had nine. A former prep track star can always go for a run; a former swimming sensation can always find a pool; any novice bowler can reproduce the same perfection as a PBA legend, at least for one frame. Our relationship with most spectator sports is tied to a nebulous understanding of how the sport feels. We can replicate the game we see on TV.

But football is not like that.

Tackle football is played by one million people at the high school level, eighty thousand people at the college level, and twenty-seven hundred people at the pro level. That's it. That's the total North American adult football population, equating to .002 percent of the continent as a whole. I mean-sure: You can always play touch football in the backyard, like the Kennedys on the White House lawn or the cast of Friends on Thanksgiving. And yes, 5-on-5 flag football is now an Olympic event, and there's a handful of semipro football leagues scattered across various municipalities. But tackle football does not work as a hobby. It has no wide-scale participatory component as a recreational activity, and unofficial reconstructions have no meaningful relationship to …