Bleachers (novel)

Bleachers(0-440-24200-2) was published on June 22, 2004. The hardcover edition was published by Doubleday and the paperback edition by Dell.

The book focuses on whether or not the famous Eddie Rake, former coach of the Messina High School football team, was loved or hated by his former players. [1]

Main characters

Neely Crenshaw (born 1969) is a fictional high school All-American quarterback, who was Messina's golden boy who was going to lead them to the state title.

"Number 19 was a high school all-American, a highly recruited quarterback with a golden arm, fast feet, plenty of size, maybe the greatest Messina ever produced", the book mentions in its opening pages. When Neely was younger, he was out playing football with his friends and a man was watching him. After the game the man came up to Neely and said "You're going to play football for the Spartans.

In 1987, trailing 31-0 at halftime to East Pike, crippled by a broken hand, caused by punching Eddie Rake in the face after a punch from Rake broke his nose, and without the assistance of legendary head football coach Eddie Rake due to an incident in the locker room at half time, the gutsy quarterback rallied the Spartans to a 34-31 victory for Messina's first state championship in seven years.

The following season, his high school number was retired at Messina. No number had been retired since.

After graduation, Crenshaw received 31 scholarship offers and chose Tech, a fictional university. He received $50,000 (violation of NCAA rules) for signing with the school.

In the second half of the 1989 Gator Bowl, Crenshaw came off the bench for Tech in the second half, threw for three touchdowns, ran for a hundred yards, and led a last-second comeback.

As a sophomore, he was national player of the week when he threw for six touchdowns against Purdue University. But against A&M later that year, he suffered a career-ending knee injury on a late hit

“I rolled out, into the flat, saw an opening, tucked the ball and ran, didn’t see a linebacker and I got hit out of bounds."

and drifted across the country. He now lives in the Orlando, Florida area and is involved in the estate business.

Eddie Rake was the fictional head football coach for whom hundreds of former players gather to mourn.

In Bleachers, most of the 714 football players Rake coached in his 34 years at Messina High School returned to the towns about the legendary coach, a man who was both beloved and reviled.

Rake ended his career with 418 wins, 62 losses, and 13 state championships. During a grueling, unsanctioned, Sunday morning practice in 1994, Messina player, Scotty Reardon, died of a heat stroke. Rake's brutal training methods were called into question, and the superintendent of education, who also was Reardon's uncle, fired Rake.

In a letter revealed at Rake's funeral, the coach states the two regrets of his life were losing Scotty Reardon and for punching All-American quarterback Neely Crenshaw at halftime of the 1987 championship game against East Pike.