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Tale of great football moment not quite a literary touchdown

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By JOHN LAWSON III

The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 4, 2009

"The Catch: One Play. Two Dynasties. And the Game that Changed the NFL," by Gary Myers (Crown, $26)

If you are a fan of the Dallas Cowboys or the San Francisco 49ers, you must read "The Catch." If you have a more general interest in the National Football League, you may want to read it. But if you like sports books as long as they are well written, you'll want to avoid "The Catch."

The topic is fertile ground for a book. Dwight Clark's leaping, fingertip touchdown reception in the 1981 National Football Conference Championship Game's final minute is a football landmark. It's the most famous play of the San Francisco 49ers' dynasty, the most important call 49er coach Bill Walsh ever made, the most amazing pass quarterback Joe Montana ever threw, and, arguably, the most consequential reception any football player ever made.

Beyond all that, it's also a symbol of decline for Tom Landry's Dallas Cowboys, which only a few years before had been dubbed "America's Team."

If you had to pick someone to write this book, Myers would be among the first candidates to consider. He spent many years reporting on the Cowboys for the Dallas Morning News, and he was at Candlestick Park that day covering the game.

Three decades covering the NFL for newspapers and television have given him many contacts, and he harnessed that network of sources to research this book. The people he interviewed for "The Catch" were major figures in the game and, in many cases, major figures in modern NFL history. They include Clark, Montana, Ronnie Lott, Tony Dorsett, Randy Cross, Charlie Waters, Drew Pearson and Everson Walls, the man covering Clark on the touchdown that sent the 49ers to their first Super Bowl.

As a writer, however, Myers fails to synthesize his material. The book lacks structure. It's supposed to be about the 1981 NFC Championship Game, but too often it meanders.

At times, the reader strongly suspects Myers was so disorganized even he lost track of what he was saying.

For example, during the second quarter, Montana hit Clark with a 38-yard reception. Myers describes this play early in the book. Twenty-four pages later, Myers describes the 38-yard reception again, as if it's completely new to us. Then, 48 pages after that, Myers describes the play yet again, as if we haven't memorized it.

In Myers' defense, he's probably so disorganized because he has more material than his topic can accommodate. Three of the game's stars - Pearson, Waters and Cowboy fullback Ron Springs - suffered personal tragedies after their careers ended. Myers does justice to each story. Unfortunately, the lengthy accounts simply don't fit this book.

Myers is at his best when this book about the 1981 NFC Championship Game tells the story of the 1981 NFC Championship Game. For example, Myers carefully explains why the one indispensable play wasn't Clark's catch, but a tackle on the game's next offensive play.

Clark's catch occurred on third down, which meant the 49ers might have won the game without it.

After Clark scored, Dallas began a possession at its own 25. Cowboy quarterback Danny White dropped back and hit Pearson with a perfect pass. San Francisco defenders bumped into each other like clowns at the circus, and Pearson sped into 49er territory. Flying at top speed, cornerback Eric Wright barely caught up with Pearson, barely got his hands on him, and barely brought him down. What looked like a 75-yard touchdown pass was instead a 31-yard gain, and on the next play, White lost a fumble. As Myers shows, Clark may have made The Catch, but Wright made The Tackle. The Tackle was indispensable. Without that, Landry would have gone to his sixth Super Bowl.

John Lawson III, a former Tribune reporter, is writing a book about modern football, and several of his book's chapters discuss the 1981 NFC Championship Game.

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