Simms and McConkey stunned millions of spectators when they led the Giants to victory in Super Bowl XXI. Now "the odd couple of the Giants" tell the amazing story of their outrageous fall--and rise--to Dick Schaap, author of Instant Replay. 16 pages of black-and-white photographs.

Giant underdogs Simms and McConkey talk about their lives and football careers, their teammates, and their comeback victory in Super Bowl XXI.

The inside story of the Super Bowl champion 1986 Giants, the extraordinary friendships that resulted--and stunning revelations about the hardships they faced, based on new interviews with Bill Parcells, Phil Simms, Mark Bavaro, and Bill Belichick. The 1986 New York Giants are legendary. A championship team coached by Bill Parcells and his wunderkind assistant Bill Belichick, featuring future Hall of Famers and All-Pros like Phil Simms, Lawrence Taylor, Mark Bavaro, and Harry Carson. They were dominant on the field and formed a unique and lasting bond off of it. More than thirty years later, it's the friendships that have proved more important--a matter of life and death. In Once a Giant, bestselling football writer Gary Myers tells the story of that team and what became of it. Gridiron glory eventually faded; chronic pain, addiction, and in some cases crimes have followed. Many football players face these harsh realities, but the Giants have confronted and survived them together. With unprecedented access, Myers dives into such issues as Mark Bavaro's battle with injuries, the breakup and reconciliation of Parcells and Belichick, and Lawrence Taylor's struggles with sobriety. He creates a never-before-seen portrait of the team's run to the title, and their even more challenging fight to live after it ended.

On October 28, 1986, just one day after winning one of the most thrilling World Series in history, the New York Mets were feted by more than two million fans with a parade through the city. In news accounts of the event, there was a small aside, as this one in the New York Times: "Notable in his absence was the pitcher Dwight Gooden, who Mets officials later said had overslept." No, the Mets' twenty-one-year-old phenom had not slept too late. He had not slept at all, in fact. For Gooden, his postgame champagne celebration kicked off a cocaine binge that took him to a club in Long Island and wound up with him, wired, watching his teammates roll through the streets as he sat with strangers in a public housing project. Such were the 1980s in New York City, a gilded era buttressed by fast money from a real estate boom and the explosion of Wall Street wealth. The Mets and Giants, bolstered by lightning-rod personalities like Gooden and Lawrence Taylor, brought the city sporting glory while its celebrity wealthy added a tabloid-friendly touch of intrigue and national envy. Iconoclastic real estate developer Donald Trump gained national celebrity for his deal-making skill and the flaunting of his outsize ego. Even mayor Ed Koch had gained coast-to-coast fame and mention as a potential future president. Beneath the opulence was a tenuous foundation, one that collapsed spectacularly over the last half of the decade. Away from the cameras focused on the city's nouvelle riches, New York was beset by crisis after crisis--homelessness, AIDS, crack cocaine, organized crime. The swell of outrage over the unwillingness of the city elite to address those problems took years to finally reach a tipping point. Through interviews and detailed research, Greed and Glory gives the narrative of New York during these times, tracing the arc of its sports heroes and celebrities of that era, from their memorable highs to their ultimate lows.

Big Blue Wrecking Crew presents the first in-depth examination of the team that rebuilt the New York Giants franchise, a revealing look at football in the 1980s, and how a larger than life cast of characters made something from nothing. A marauding linebacker who changed the game of football, a tough-as-nails quarterback, and a fiery head coach helped the 1986 New York Giants leave an indelible mark on the NFL. Big Blue Wrecking Crew is the no-holds-barred story of the team that created Giant Football, the pound-you-into-submission, quarterback-crushing defense, coupled with a powerful ball control offense that resulted in a 1986 Super Bowl Championship—the first in team history. In a gripping narrative of the season that changed the course of a franchise, author Jerry Barca takes readers on a wild journey filled with improbable characters. Linebacker Lawrence Taylor partied with the same level of recklessness and violence he put forth when he donned his jersey. Bill Parcells motivated his team in an unrelenting Jersey Guy way, and quiet defensive genius Bill Belichick would go on to greatness. Based on years of research and hundreds of interviews, Barca chronicles the Giants’ rise out of rock bottom to their status as a premiere NFL franchise. From behind-the-scenes personnel discussions of general manager George Young to the meeting rooms with Parcells and defensive coordinator Bill Belichick, Big Blue Wrecking Crew is filled with the riveting exploits of unforgettable players. It is an unfiltered look at how enormous egos came together to win a championship, playing hard and partying equally as hard along the way.

In this revealing biography, the exhaustive research of acclaimed sports historian Carlo DeVito sheds new light on football coaching legend Bill Parcells, exposing the two-time Super Bowl-winning coach's moxie and lifelong dedication to football. The book digs deep into Bill Parcells' past to unlock the secrets of what made him who he is today, following him from his childhood, through 15 years of college coaching, to his first big chance in the pros and the year that almost broke him. With more than 3,000 interviews, newspaper and magazine articles, and scores of primary resources, DeVito's book brings Parcells to life as readers have never seen him before.