Summary
The fourth chapter remains with Michael, showing his athletic aptitude. The coach of the football team at Briarcrest describes how he easily lifted a practice dummy like it weighed nothing. A track coach similarly notes that he is able to throw a discus with incredible ease. These strengths make him a desirable recruit for the football team. At the same time, Michael is almost entirely unfamiliar with the rules of the game, seeing himself as more of a basketball player.
Shortly after these demonstrations, Michael plays in a football game and injures himself. He goes over to Leigh Anne, as he is uncertain of what to do with his bleeding hand. She tells him he should likely go to the hospital and seems surprised at his reluctance to tell anyone he is hurt. Lewis notes that Michael develops a closer relationship with Leigh Anne after the day they went shopping together, often turning to her with practical questions like this. Michael opens up to Leigh Anne in a way that he does not with almost anyone else.
Michael curtails his career on the basketball team after a nasty game in South Carolina where the audience hurdled racial slurs at the players. At the same time, his housing situation becomes more precarious when he doesn't want to sleep at Big Tony's girlfriend's house, as she often calls him a "freeloader." Michael moves in with Leigh Anne and Sean, becoming a permanent part of their lives. The Tuohys welcome Michael, but take note of some of his unusual behavior.
Michael is extremely neat, always taking care to keep his room tidy, a quality Leigh Anne appreciates and wishes her children shared with him. Michael also orders an extra meal when they go out to eat, often leaving it to go bad in the fridge. Sean finds this confusing as he tells Michael he owns multiple Taco Bells and can get free food for him whenever he's hungry. What he and Leigh Anne eventually realize is that this is a leftover survival tactic from when Michael was living in a state of constant uncertainty about where his next meal was coming from.
Michael plays in a football game against St. Joseph, a rival school to Briarcrest, and people are floored by his incredible performance on the field. This sets off a frenzy of interest, including the tipoff that led Tom Lemming to reach out to Michael. Michael is named left tackle and shortly afterward finds out his biological father has been murdered. While Michael never really knew his father, the news understandably upsets and disturbs him.
Lewis pans out and focuses again on the evolution of football, first describing a 1975 game between the Bengals and the Raiders. He follows the trajectory of coach Bill Walsh's career, as he becomes coach of the San Francisco 49ers and begins formulating a field strategy to counter Lawrence Taylor. He begins to shift focus from a running game to a passing game, using passes as a means to evade tackles. Lewis contrasts Walsh's more tactic-based approach with Bill Parcells' broadly offensive strategy.
Walsh's new strategy culminates in a game against the Redskins in which left tackle John Ayers is able to protect quarterback Joe Montana from Lawrence Taylor. The 49ers win that game and, later in the season, go on to win the Super Bowl, solidifying the new importance of the left tackle position as well as Walsh's innovative coaching style. Lewis ends the chapter by noting that John Ayers was something of an unsung hero, appreciated by Montana and Walsh but largely unnoticed by the viewing public.
Analysis
This part of the book spends most of its time exploring MIchael's adjustment to new circumstances, both in school and at home. He carries over many of the old behaviors of his former life, and often seems uncertain about how to function in these new spaces. Some of this is him coming to terms with his newfound safety and security, but it is also framed as the byproduct of suddenly being thrust into a predominantly white population, after spending years rarely encountering white people.
What Sean and Leigh Anne initially view as oddities in Michael's mannerisms slowly reveal themselves to be the lingering effects of growing up in dire poverty. Michael always orders extra food because he had become accustomed to doing so whenever he had the chance, because he was never certain when his next full meal was going to be. Lewis uses these moments to reveal how the aftershocks of Michael's childhood poverty were difficult to shake even when the Tuohys took him in, as he had developed these survival mechanisms and used them for many years. Both Sean and Leigh Anne realize this and assume that his reluctance to explain these choices was a reflection of the lack of attention he received. He wasn't used to people worrying about him and used these survival methods to fend for himself.
Another major thread in these sections is care. As Michael lets go of these survival tools, he begins to get used to receiving the Tuohys' love and support. However, these moments also reveal how drastically Michael was neglected as a child. In discovering minor details, like the fact that no one ever read to Michael as a child, Leigh Anne is continually upset about how Michael was clearly left entirely on his own for years. Likewise, Michael's slow opening up to Leigh Anne shows the bond of trust he builds with her, but also emphasizes how he was never able to do so with anyone previously, not even his own mother.
The fifth chapter focuses primarily on the evolution of football, returning to the idea that Michael's particular set of skills was perfectly suited to the time in which he was playing. Lewis continues describing Taylor's rampage, but shifts over to coach Bill Walsh and his carefully devised counter-strategy. Giving context for Walsh's methodical and cerebral approach to plays, Lewis sets the stage for Walsh's eventual victory over Bill Parcell's Redskins, representing an end to Taylor's unchecked power. This section not only gives context to Michael's career trajectory and the changes in football more broadly, but also explores a central tension in the game. Using Walsh and Parcells, Lewis demonstrates how the contrast in their coaching styles (brain versus brawn, as he puts it, or strategy versus sheer force) continues to play out in the approach of every major coach in the modern NFL.
Finally, the fifth chapter emphasizes the invisibility of left tackle John Ayers' major contribution to the game. While the chapter centers Ayers' successful handling of Taylor, it also notes that it was not noticed by the viewing audience. Where quarterback Joe Montana received a great deal of attention and credit, Ayers' protection of him was not remarked on. While Ayers paved the way for a whole new generation of left tackles, including Michael, he did not live to see the full impact of his legacy. In this way, Lewis frames him as a kind of tragic hero, unheralded for his indispensable role but loved dearly by both Walsh and Montana.
