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Boys Will Be Boys | 
 enlarge | Author: Jeff Pearlman
Publisher: HarperCollins e-books
Category: EBooks
List Price: $19.95
Buy New: $9.99
You Save: $9.96 (50%)
Rating:  31 reviews
Sales Rank: 128
Format: Kindle Book
Media: Kindle Edition
Pages: 416
Number Of Items: 1
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.33264097642812
ASIN: B001F76U0G
Publication Date: September 3, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
They were America's Team -- the high-priced, high-glamour, high-flying Dallas Cowboys of the 1990s, who won three Super Bowls and made as many headlines off the field as on it. Led by Emmitt Smith, the charismatic Deion "Prime Time" Sanders, and Hall of Famers Troy Aikman and Michael Irvin, the Cowboys rank among the greatest of all NFL dynasties. In similar fashion to his New York Times bestseller The Bad Guys Won!, about the 1986 New York Mets, in Boys Will Be Boys, award-winning writer Jeff Pearlman chronicles the outrageous antics and dazzling talent of a team fueled by ego, sex, drugs -- and unrivaled greatness. Rising from the ashes of a 1-15 season in 1989 to capture three Super Bowl trophies in four years, the Dallas Cowboys were guided by a swashbuckling, skirt-chasing, power-hungry owner, Jerry Jones, and his two eccentric, hard-living coaches, Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer. Together the three built a juggernaut that America loved and loathed. But for a team that was so dominant on Sundays, the Cowboys were often a dysfunctional circus the rest of the week. Irvin, nicknamed "The Playmaker," battled dual addictions to drugs and women. Charles Haley, the defensive colossus, presided over the team's infamous "White House," where the parties lasted late into the night and a steady stream of long-legged groupies came and went. And then there were Smith and Sanders, whose Texas-sized egos were eclipsed only by their record-breaking on-field perfomances. With an unforgettable cast of characters and a narrative as hard-hitting and fast-paced as the team itself, Boys Will Be Boys immortalizes the most beloved -- and despised --dynasty in NFL history.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 26 more reviews...
 RICK "SHAQ" GOLDSTEIN SAYS: "SCORING ON THE FIELD... SCORING OFF THE FIELD... *COWBOYS-STYLE!*" September 20, 2008
Rick Goldstein (Danville, Ca, USA)
30 out of 31 found this review helpful
When the first chapter of a non-fiction football book starts off with future Hall Of Fame receiver Michael Irvin stabbing a teammate in the neck with a scissors... and blood is shooting all over the room... and the intensity of the lurid details... on and off the field... regarding the famed "dynastic" Dallas Cowboys of the 1990's... never lets up for the next three-hundred-fifty-eight pages... you know you've got a great book in your hands. Any true football fan, regardless of what team you root for will want to read this book. There are so many riveting... outlandish... insider... stories... that you will constantly want to stop reading for a moment or two... just to call one of your buddies to tell him what you just read!
This book has it all. From the "humble" beginnings (as far as wins and losses that is... nothing about any of the key individuals in this story could ever be considered humble!) concerning the 1989 Cowboys who had a one-win fifteen-loss season... to the three-time Super Bowl Champions. The author smoothly gives you detailed background information on everyone from owner Jerry Jones to coach Jimmy Johnson to Troy Aikman/Emmitt Smith/Michael Irvin/Nate Newton/Charles Haley/Deion Sanders... and every Cowboy large... small... or in between... who effected the team on or off the field... good or bad. Absolutely no punches are pulled.
From drug busts, that included Michael Irvin and teammate Alfredo Roberts being caught with 10.3 grams of cocaine, more than an ounce of marijuana, assorted drug paraphernalia and sex toys... and oh yea... two strippers... to shocking exposes regarding eventual FIVE-TIME-SUPER-BOWL-CHAMPION Charles Haley who would expose himself... and "pleasure-himself"... in front of teammates in the locker room... training room... and meeting rooms... to famous quotes from players, that truly thought they were above the law, are provided... such as when three-hundred-sixty pound Nate Newton said: "WE'VE GOT A LITTLE PLACE OVER HERE WHERE WE'RE RUNNING SOME WHORES IN AND OUT, TRYING TO BE RESPONSIBLE, AND WE'RE CRITICIZED FOR THAT, TOO."
Did you know that when former Cowboy owner Bum Bright sold the team to Jerry Jones... that one of the conditions of the sale was that Jones had to fire Tom Landry? Landry was probably the most popular man in Texas, but Bright couldn't stand him. How did the Cowboys code of ethics compare to other big name NFL teams? One Cowboy said: "WHEN I WAS WITH THE REDSKINS COACH GIBBS WOULD SAY, "OK FELLA'S, DON'T MESS WITH STREET DRUGS OR STEROIDS, BECAUSE THAT'S NOT HOW WE DO THINGS HERE." COACH JOHNSON ON THE OTHER HAND, WOULD SAY, "DON'T MESS WITH STREET DRUGS OR STEROIDS, BECAUSE THE DRUG TEST IS IN A WEEK AND YOU DON'T WANNA GET CAUGHT." "IT WAS OBVIOUS JIMMY LACKED SOME CHARACTER IN HIS PURSUIT OF GREATNESS."
It's all here in exquisite detail. Nothing is held back. The way players... coaches... and owners... really feel! Who they think is stupid... who is smart... who had courage and who didn't. One Cowboy whose valor won over his team was Troy Aikman, of whom linebacker Garry Cobb said: AS A ROOKIE AGAINST THE CARDINALS AIKMAN "WAS KNOCKED COLD FOR NEARLY FIVE MINUTES BEFORE BEING HELPED OFF THE FIELD. TROY EARNED ALL OUR RESPECT. HE GOT KILLED AND REFUSED TO CRY. I'VE BEEN ON THE FIELD WHEN QUARTERBACKS CRY, AND IT AIN'T PRETTY. DAN MARINO WAS A CRIER - "WHOSE MAN WAS THAT! WHERE'S THE BLOCKING! WHAH!" "BUT AIKMAN - NEVER. AIKMAN WAS A MAN."
The author, Jeff Pearlman, magically, and seamlessly, weaves a story that gives you equal servings of statistical game information... unwavering disections of diverse psychological profiles... including Jerry Jones's jealousies and Jimmy Johnson's insecurities... and the sensitive human backdrop's... such as Michael Irvin... the third youngest of SEVENTEEN CHILDREN... who never had his own bed until college.
I recommend this book highly to any football fan.
More than just a tell all September 17, 2008
Rabid Reader (New York)
9 out of 11 found this review helpful
I loved this book and I actually read it (Unlike the person's comment before mine). I read it straight through. I had to go to the bathroom at work to finish it up. I enjoyed hearing about the off the field experiences of the team members. As reported, it was salacious. However, I enjoyed even more the making of the team. The trades and behind the scene conversations that made this team what it was. Pearlman dug up amazing details with extensive reporting. There may have been a few Cowboys who didn't speak with Pearlman, but most of them did and had plenty to say. To quote Bill Simmons "Go buy this book."
Boys SHOULD sometimes not be boys September 16, 2008
Martha Frankel (Boiceville NY)
Almost 35 years after Peter Gent's seminal "North Dallas Forty" showed us what untamed beasts football players could be, Jeff Pearlman delivers "Boys Will Be Boys," which, not coincidentally, is also about the freewheeling, demented, and fiercely determined Dallas Cowboys, once and always dubbed "America's Team."
Except Pearlman's Cowboys are those of the 1990s, the ones who followed the firing of legendary coach Tom Landry, and who make the men of "Forty" look like altar boys.
The dean of Dallas decadence was wide receiver Michael Irvin, known as The Playmaker. "Did he love snorting coke? Yes. Did he love lesbian sex shows? Yes. Did he love sleeping with two, three, four, five (yes, five) women at the same time in precisely choreographed orgies? Yes. Did he love strip clubs and hookers and house calls from exotic dancers with names like Bambi and Cherry and Saucy? Yes, yes, yes."
But because Texas is football, Irvin's antics, including an arrest for cocaine possession and stabbing a teammate who Irvin believed dissed him by cutting in line to get a haircut, were waved away with a smile. And when Irvin helped turn the hapless Cowboys around, from 1-15 losers in 1989 to multiple Super Bowl champs by the mid-'90s, well, hookers were practically handed out with the after-game painkillers.
Pearlman, a former senior writer for Sports Illustrated and a contributor to [...] Page Two, also wrote "The Bad Guys Won!" about the 1986 Mets and "Love Me, Hate Me," about Barry Bonds. So he has some experience with talented villains you love to hate.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the story of Charles Haley, who came to the Cowboys when they most needed "a disruptive, no-holds-barred defensive lineman - the type of player who put fear in the hearts of rival quarterbacks."
Haley "quickly earned high praise as one of the league's dominant quarterback killers. And as one of its most imbalanced."
A lot of it had to do with Haley's exceptionally large penis, which he liked to expose to players, trainers, management and reporters. Sometimes he would take it out and stroke it inches from another player's face; the players tried to laugh it off but Haley was relentless. He would masturbate during meetings, all the while trash-talking other player's wives. Once Haley wrapped an Ace bandage around it and strolled through the locker room, screaming, "I'm the last naked warrior!"
How, you might be asking yourself, did the team's coach, Jimmy Johnson, or it's owner, Jerry Jones, allow this to go on? Simple - Haley, who had helped the San Francisco 49ers win two Super Bowls in six seasons before coming to Dallas, "knew the game better than any of us," said former teammate Antonio Goss. "He could pick up little patterns and cues that nobody else would see. Charles might have been odd, but he was intelligent and incisive."
The drama between coach and owner was equally fascinating. Jones and Johnson had come to the Cowboys together, but despite appearances, had little love for each other. In fact, the coach learned he was being fired from a local Dallas reporter. "It's not always pleasant," Jones told a reporter. "But leadership means making tough decisions."
The Cowboys kept taking chances on players that other clubs were thrilled to cut from their rosters. And what did they get for their troubles? Hoodlums, nutcases and out-and-out psychopaths, who somehow managed to pull it all together on Sunday afternoons, piling up more and more winning games and seasons. So what's a little coke and hookers?
Hats & Eyeglasses: A Family Love Affair with Gambling
The 1990s Cowboys are perfect for Pearlman's "The Bad Guys Won" oeuvre October 25, 2008
Andy Orrock (Dallas, TX)
Jeff Pearlman continues his excellent "The Bad Guys Won" oeuvre with this enthralling behind-the-scenes look at the 1990s-era Dallas Cowboys. It's a perfect subject for Pearlman, given his previous takes on the 1986 New York Mets and Barry Bonds.
What's notable here is the level of cooperation Pearlman received from all corners - dozens of ex-Cowboys, Jimmy Johnson, Jerry Jones, Barry Switzer and scads of insiders all contribute to a warts-and-all retelling of a wild ride. What's also notable is that Pearlman plays no favorites and pulls no punches - Jones, Johnson, Switzer and Michael Irvin get both praised and skewered despite their cooperation.
Reading between the lines, it's clear that Pearlman failed to get direct cooperation from two of the Triplets: Troy Aikman and Emmitt Smith. Both suffer from that, especially Smith. While the league's all-time rushing leader is lauded for his toughness, the prevailing tone depicts a selfish, me-first player. Aikman, as always, comes across as guarded and wary of being used, but ultimately is rightfully judged as supremely skilled, self-effacing and simple in that he demanded only loyalty from friends and teammates. It's left to long-time confidante Dale Hansen to defend the player against rumors and innuendo.
Oh, and as others will surely note on these pages: the passages about Charles Haley pretty much defy any description on these pages without running afoul of Amazon's censor bots.
Superb!!! October 25, 2008
L. Charles Wimer III (Coatesville, PA United States)
I'm not a Cowboy fan but I am a diehard football fan. This book takes the reader inside the Cowboys of the 1990's. The author does a tremendous job giving brief but poignant details of the characters on these teams. To say the very least: Boys Will Be Boys might be one of the most entertaining sports I have ever read. Egos, womanizing, drugs -- everything you thought possible is discussed in this book. Some have compared this book to North Dallas Forty. I beg to differ as North Dallas Forty is summer camp compared to the tales in this book. Make it 12 Stars -- guaranteed not to disappoint the true sports fan!!!
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