Peter King has spent decades documenting the NFL, and his new book, The Game, traces how the sport grew from one of baseball’s peers in the 1980s into the dominant force it is today.
King, a longtime Sports Illustrated writer and the creator of the Monday Morning Quarterback column, has packed the book into 40 chapters. They range from the career of a Steelers great who wasn’t part of the team’s early Super Bowl wins to the New York Giants’ revival in the ’80s, Bill Walsh’s difficult final years and Al Davis’s decline. There’s a lot in between, too.
In a conversation with King, I took the chance to question his Mount Rushmore of pro football figures, a section built around the kind of debate that tends to come up around a water cooler.
His list is a little more expansive than the monument itself: it names 100 people, adds 10 more, then offers honorable mentions. I pointed out the discrepancy. King didn’t miss a beat: “Armando, as you know, I always wrote long.” Fair enough.
Still, I wanted to ask about two notable omissions from his top 20: Bill Belichick and Don Shula. Belichick, the NFL’s most decorated coach in Super Bowl history, appears at No. 24.
King said the list was meant to recognize the people who most helped turn the NFL into the enormous sport and business it is now. That’s why former commissioner Joe Carr ranks fourth, he explained.
“It’s hard for somebody, unless you’re absolutely the best who’s ever done it, to say he’s more important in football history than Lamar Hunt, Pete Rozelle, John Madden or Vince Lombardi,” King said. He added that he had gone through many versions of the list before settling on people he felt were most responsible for the game’s growth.
King served for decades as a Pro Football Hall of Fame selector and believed Belichick should have been elected on the first ballot, so his ranking isn’t a sign of personal opposition.
Shula, the winningest coach in NFL history and the leader of the league’s only undefeated Super Bowl champion, lands outside King’s top 25. King said the Dolphins’ perfect season was unmatched in the modern era and a remarkable achievement, especially given the quality of the teams they beat.
But wins alone weren’t enough to push Shula higher, King said. He questioned what broader contributions Shula made to the game, arguing that Madden and Lombardi had a greater impact beyond their records.
King was generous about sparring over the rankings. And really, a book that prompts this kind of football argument has already given readers something to chew on.
