Tim Green, a former football player for the Atlanta Falcons, one day had an idea for a book, called Football Genius. The main character, Troy, plays football, and has an amazing talent of being able to predict any football play before it even happens. The conflict of this book begins when Troy attempts to steal a Falcons football for a school kid you find out about later in the book. He steals the football because of a bet at school. One day, he finds out that his mom has gotten a job with the Falcons, which changes everything. This plot shows that Tim Green tried to entertain with this book.The theme of this book is pretty easy to understand. The author is trying to say that lying can get you into situations you didn’t plan for or expect to happen, because of what you have done. Troy tries to hide the football that he had taken from the Falcons, but his mom figures out where he was hiding it. After his mom figured it out, he had to return the ball to the team. A quote that would describe how he tries to lie his way out of things, and not get punished, would be: “A lie popped into my head, an easy way out. A story about headphones and loud music and being to into his book that he lost track of time”, he was thinking (152). This takes place after he goes to Seth Halloway, one of the Falcons players, to explain how he could help the team, because he is able to see football plays before they happen. He had one of his friends go into his room, playing a game, to trick his mom into thinking that he was in there, not gone with Seth Halloway.I think Tim Green’s style for this book is narrative. This books follows Troy, a football player, trying to steal a football, trying to fix his mistakes. A quote that would describe this would be: “Troy’s mom hugged him. Her laughter bubbled up around him, swirling with the cheers of the crowd and the hearty war cries of the enormous players” (226). This shows that something good is going to happen, and that the reader will want to read the next chapter. He also put cliff-hangers after every chapter, probably to add suspense to the reader, and make them want to turn the page, and read the next chapter to see what would happen. I really enjoyed this book. I knew that this book would be pretty good is because i have read Unstoppable, another book by Tim Green that deals with football. This book didn’t take too long to read for me, I would say at least 1 week. This book might not look good, and, to me, doesn’t start off the best, but it does get better over time. If I could change one thing about this, I would make it to where the book didn’t just start out with the problem happening right at the start. I would probably have a few sentences to describe Troy, what he did, and why he wanted the Falcons football, but maybe it started right away for a good reason. Even though i didn’t like that one part, the book was still really good and enjoyable for me.
I choose the book Football Genius because, my brother had read it and told me he had really enjoyed it. The setting takes place at Troys' house, and at the Georgia dome in Atlanta Georgia. When Seth and Troy are watching games on TV its mostly at Troys' house, but when Troy is calling the plays and reading the other teams plays its at the Georgia Dome. Troy is facing a major problem. His problem is that he has a power and he can predict any play that is coming next, but how is he going to get the Atlanta Falcons, and Seth Halloway to notice it? He is going to get Seth to notice it because his mom now has a job with the Atlanta Falcons. Honestly Troy could be a static character, but I'm going to have to say that he is a dynamic character because he becomes more brave as the story goes on. The first character trait for Troy is that he is patient, he is patient as he waits for the Atlanta Falcons to notice his power. The second character trait for Troy is he is Brave, Troy Stands up, and won't back down. He try's and talk to the coaches, and if they ignore him he keeps trying. The third character trait for Troy is that he is smart. If you have the ability to know what is coming next on the next play of the football game you have to be smarter than your average Joe. "my mom didn't steal anything!" pg. 27. I choose that quote to describe Troy because it shows how brave he is and that he will stand up for what he believes. I believe the theme of this book is to never give up. Troy never gave up. He might of got turned down to show his talents but he kept trying and finally Seth Halloway noticed it. The first connection this book has to my life is being a sports fan. Me and troy would be very much a like because he was a big sports fan and so am I. The second way this book connected to my life is being able to play sports all day. Troy could play catch with a football all day, and thats exactly how I am I could play baseball or football all day. The third way this book connected to my life is never giving up. Troy never gave up in showing his talent, and I never gave up sports because I was to short. We both never gave up in showing our talents. "No one wants a 12 year old kid" Thats what the falcons told Troy, but he didn't give up. Last off I thought this book was a great book for any sports fan third grade through high school. It teaches kids lessons and all sports fans enjoy reading sports books! I would deffinently recommend it to my friends because most are sports fan and I know they would really enjoy it because it's about a kid our age.
What do You think about Football Genius (2007)?
hey dude why did u make it so long but it was help full
—Michael
he is not in highschool hes in middle
—Your name...JAKE
oine hes not in high schoo ok
—jakup
“Football Genius” by Tim Green is probably one of my favorite books of all time. I found this book in my school llibrary three weeks ago. The book is so descriptive that it makes you feel like you are in the story.The book starts off with Troy White a twelve year old quarterback for a pee wee football team in Atlanta called the Duluth Tigers. He is second string behind the coach’s son Jaime Renfro, who is nowhere near as good as Troy. Troy also has an amazing talent, to be able to read any football play before it happens. He finds out that his mom gets hired for the Atlanta Falcons. This gives him a chance to show them his predictions, but comes through some problems along the way. He is not allowed past a yellow line away from the sidelines. He sees that the other team is going to run a scoring play and crosses the line. Troy yells out the play and is taken away by a security guard and not allowed back onto the field.This makes things even more difficult for Troy. Lucky for Troy the teams middle linebacker, Seth Halloway, overheard Troy call the play and asks him how he knew it the next day. The two of them sit down to watch a college game and he predicts all the plays correctly. Seth is amazed by this talent and thinks that this can make a bad season good. Troy goes on to help the Atlanta Falcons win the championship. This is a very good book. Great for sports fans. I would recommend this to anyone who has ever felt like they were the underdog. I can’t wait to read the next book in the series.
—Antonio Quintanilla
I really enjoyed this book because it is a sports book and it really interests me. Especially because there is a kid in it named Troy that is my age and he is a "football genius." He becomes the coach of an NFL team called the Atlanta Falcons. He isnt the head coach, but he tells the head coach what to do and he listens to the kid. The team improves with Troy being a part of the team, but the fans would rather have a legit coach than some teenage kid so they are dissapointed in the team as a whole. As the popularity goes down and the team chemistry also goes down, the team is still trying to find a way to keep the kid because of his amazing football intelligence that leads the team to victory every time.
—Mark Hauberg
Read this for Hudson's Lit Circles group at school. It was pretty straightforward and the multiple narrative lines helped me explain subplots, but I found the main character inherently problematic on several levels. We were able to have good conversations about whether Troy being an underdog in many senses of the word gave him a free pass to lie to his mother, and others, continually, without any kind of redemption. Author gets credit for trying to go beyond stock characters for the female characters here, though he couldn't resist pointing out Tate (the female kicker)'s physical weakness multiple times in the book. The mother, unfortunately, is only redeemed by her self-sacrifice for her son and her relationship with the star football player. But the kids in the critique group really enjoyed the jargon and realistic depictions of a professional football game, and I agreed that these were the strongest parts of the book.
—Ashley
