On Rocky Top: A Front-Row Seat to the End of an Era

Description

When Clay Travis decided to spend the 2008 season up close and personal with the University of Tennessee Volunteers, he thought he was in for a rollicking ride with a leading contender for the national title. But by December, the team had suffered its second-worst season ever, and its head coach of more than thirty years, Phil Fulmer, the most beloved and recognized man in Tennessee, had been fired. In On Rocky Top, Travis, a lifelong Volunteer fan, reports on the season from the sideline and inside the locker room, creating a fascinating and loving chronicle of an impassioned state, a celebrated football culture, a beloved coach, and the sensational collapse of a once-mighty juggernaut.

Author of Dixieland Delight: A Football Season on the Road in the Southeastern Conference, Clay Travis is a writer for FanHouse.com. A former columnist at CBSSports.com and editor at Deadspin.com, he has also written for Sports Illustrated and The Oxford American, and taught creative writing at Vanderbilt University. He cohosts the daily "Midday Madness" radio show in Nashville, Tennessee, where he lives with his wife and son.

"Clay Travis's On Rocky Top is the best book on college football I've read in a generation. A truly masterful look at the passion, intensity and--quite often--insanity of America's unofficial national pastime. If you love college football, you'll love this book." -- Jeff Pearlman, New York Times bestselling author of Boys Will Be Boys and The Bad Guys Won! "On Rocky Top combines the fan's passion of Fever Pitch with the inside access of A Season on the Brink. The result is a compelling portrait of one of the SEC's premier football programs--and one of college football's most beloved coaches. A must-read for every sports fan." -- Warren St. John, nationally bestselling author of Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer and Refugees United