Introducing the Pride of Detroit Offseason Book Club!

The offseason is long and painful for the typical NFL fan. We’ve still got seven months ahead of us with only one more football game to be played. Sure, there are temporary distractions like free agency, the NFL Draft and offseason workouts, but none of them really do the trick.

So we here at Pride of Detroit are looking for ways to make us better, more informed fans during the offseason while also trying to keep the football flame alive during this dry spell.

So this year we’re introducing the Pride of Detroit Offseason Book Club!

Here’s the plan, as I envision it, though I welcome any of your suggestions. First, we assign a football related book. It can be any kind of football book: fiction, non-fiction, Xs and Os detail oriented, historical, Lions related or anything else in between.

We’ll then give readers ample time to procure the book and read it. We’re going to try and keep the price low on our choices for everyone’s sake, but also don’t forget to look in your local library.

Then after about a month, we’ll reconvene and the Pride of Detroit staff who read the book will pose some questions, answer them in a roundtable-like fashion, and of course, open it up for the comment section to discuss, as well.

We’re thinking about adding some discussion in the PODcast, as well, but we’ll see. This is the first time we’re doing this, so we’ll be working out some kinks. Again, any kind of suggestions are welcome.

I have chosen the first book assignment, though we have eight others in our queue. You’ll all get to have your input on what we read, but out first book will be “Football Scouting Methods” by Steve Belichick.

Here is the Amazon description of the book:

“Considered the bible of scouting techniques” according to the Los Angeles Times, Football Scouting Methods explains the basic scouting strategies and insights of author Steve Belichick. He was widely viewed as the ablest football scout of his time and coached at the U.S. Naval Academy for 33 years; his son is New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick, a three-time Super Bowl winner. When Steve Belichick died in November 2005, the New York Times headline described him as “Coach Who Wrote the Book on Scouting,” and cited Houston Texans General Manager Charley Casserly calling Football Scouting Methods “the best book on scouting he had ever read.” In recent years this title has been one of the top ten most sought out-of-print books; used copies have been quite scarce. This reissue edition makes the original 1962 text available once again in exact facsimile. The book explains how to scout opponents, recognize defenses, analyze offenses, discover “tip-offs,” compose a useful report, self-scout, and conduct postgame analysis.

There are several reasons I chose this book. First and foremost, I want to become a better scout. With the draft three months away, what better time to improve upon my scouting eye? Also, it’s Steve Belichick, father of Bill. Bill obviously drew a lot of his football knowledge from his father, so to know how Steve Belichick views football is to learn more about Bill. And if we understand how Bill sees the game, we probably have a pretty good idea of what both Bob Quinn and future Lions coach Matt Patricia are seeing.

The book is also extremely cheap. You can get it for $12 or under on Amazon, and the Kindle version is just $0.99.

We will reconvene on Thursday, March 1 to discuss the book.

If you’re in, let me know in the comment section and feel free to give book recommendations or ideas on how to format our POD Book Club.