Steve Young - QB: My Life Behind the Spiral

Copyright 2016 by J. Steven Young

All rights reserved

For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.

www.hmhco.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Young, Steve, date, author. | Benedict, Jeff, author.
Title: QB : my life behind the spiral/Steve Young with Jeff Benedict.
Description: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, [2016] | Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016024863 (print) | LCCN 2016027360 (ebook) | ISBN 9780544845763 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780544845770 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH : Young, Steve, date. | Football playersUnited StatesBiography. | Quarterbacks (Football)United StatesBiography.
Classification: LCC GV939.Y A 3 2016 (print) | LCC GV939.Y 69 (ebook) | DDC 796.332092 [B]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016024863

Cover design by Brian Moore

Cover photograph Bill Fox

v1.0916

To Barb, my soul mate, my best friend, my everything.

To Braedon, Jackson, Summer, and Laila,

the most precious gifts of my life.

This is for you.

HEAD GAMES

I M GRIPPING A football with my left hand, standing on a perfectly manicured grass field at the San Francisco 49ers training facility in Santa Clara, California. Im wearing cleats, gray sweats, and a red jersey bearing my last name YOUNG and number8. No pads. No helmet. Practice starts in a few minutes. Its a walk-through, a final chance to go over tomorrows game plan.

Deep in thought, I start spinning the football like a basketball on the tip of my left index finger. It looks geometrically challenging. But at this point in my life there isnt much I cant do with an oval-shaped ball made of leather sewn together by white strings. Im thirty-three and Im a professional quarterback. On weekend afternoons I run around a place called Candlestick Park pursued by eleven men who want to hammer me. I throw passes to Jerry Rice, the greatest receiver in the history of the game. Im the MVP of the NFL and the highest-paid player in the league. Im also a bachelor with a law degree.

People think I live a charmed life. Maybe I do. After all, I play a boys game for a living. But its not just a game to me. Its more like life or death. Standing here today, I feel as though Im climbing Everest, nearing the summit. Ive been this far twice before, yet never beyond. Today, though, I am determined to get to the top. Suddenly, threatening clouds gather and the sky darkens. There is a fierce headwind, and I have no ropes or safety harness. Fighting a building sense of nausea, I keep reaching, keep moving forward, like I always do. Almost there now. Then a familiar, heavy voice in my head says: What if I cant get it done?

I hear that same voice before every big game. But today that voice is louder than ever. Its Saturday, January 14, 1995. Tomorrow is the biggest game of my life. We face the Dallas Cowboys in the NFC Championship game for the third straight year. In 92 and 93 they beat us and went on to win back-to-back Super Bowls.

This year we are the two best teams in the league again. We are 14-3 and have the number-one offense. They are 13-4 and have the number-one defense. No AFC team can touch us. Whoever wins tomorrow will go on to win the Super Bowl. In short, San Francisco versus Dallas is the Super Bowl.

Our team owner, Eddie DeBartolo, hates losing to anyone. But he especially hates losing to Dallas. Around here, passing titles, MVP awards, and division titles are nice. But success is defined solely by winning the Super Bowl. Anything less is failure. Thats the Joe Montana effect. He won four Super Bowls before I replaced him. And thats what Im up against.

The team trainer is heading my way. He looks worried. I know whats on his mind. Its my neck. I jammed it a week ago in a playoff game against the Chicago Bears. After I ran for a touchdown that put the game away, safety Shaun Gayle drilled me. It was a late hit that sent me sprawling. I finished the game, but by the next day I had trouble turning my head. The medical staff has been working on me all week in preparation for tomorrow. Traction. Chiropractic adjustments. Electric stimulation.

How does it feel? the trainer says.

Ready to go, I tell him.

To illustrate I turn my head from side to side, displaying nearly full range of motion.

Satisfied, he walks off.

This year my quarterback rating112.8is the highest in league history: over 4,000 yards passing, with 35 touchdown passes and just 10 interceptions. But I still run the ball more than any other quarterback. I have eight rushing touchdowns, and I average over five yards per carry.

All week the Cowboys have been promising the media that they will make me pay if I try to run against them. My biggest nemesis is future Hall of Famer Charles Haley, the Cowboys six-foot-six, 255-pound defensive end. Hes one of the most disruptive forces in the NFL, and he used to play for us. Because of bad blood between him and our coaching staff, we traded him to Dallas two years ago. Big mistake. He helped them win two Super Bowls, and nothing motivates him more than knocking me down. His teammates say they are going to nail me, punish me the way Shaun Gayle did.

Im mindful of Haley the way a surfer is mindful of a shark in the water. But once I take the field I fear nothing, especially not the hits. I might be the only quarterback who gets a thrill out of being chased. When I first joined the 49ers my teammates started calling me Crash because sometimes I initiate contact by lowering my shoulder and barreling into oncoming tacklers. I didnt become a football player to run out of bounds. I want to experience every aspect of the game, including the physicality.

But theres another reason I dont shy away from contact. The physical beating I take on the field every weekend is therapy for the mental beating I go through each week just to get myself on the field. I am the fastest quarterback in the NFL. I can hit the whiskers on a cat with a football from a distance of forty yards. I have a photographic memory that enables me to visualize what everyone in the huddle is supposed to do on each of the hundreds of plays in our playbook. Still, on game day, I dont want to get out of bed. Its the riddle of my anxiety:

I long to be the best quarterback in the NFL.

I dread being the best quarterback in the NFL.

Its hard to explain anxiety to those who dont experience it. Deion Sanders thinks Im too serious, too uptight. He goes by the nickname Prime Time, wears a red bandana on his head, and dances on the field. He tells me I need to learn to have fun.

Fun? That doesnt enter into it at all. For me, football is a quest. Quests entail overcoming hardship, trials of adversity in the pursuit of true joy. Im now in my eleventh season in this league. Ive had my share of hardships, adversity, and trials. I long for more of the joy part.

Its time for practice to begin. I bend over to tie my shoes. Suddenly, out of nowhere, something hits me with tremendous force. The point of contact is the crown of my head. Im propelled backwards, landing on my back. Stunned, I look up. Defensive end Richard Dent is standing over me. Hes six-five and weighs 270.

Steve, are you okay? Im sorry, man. Im really sorry.

I grimace and reach for my forehead. What just happened?

Dent explains. He had been playing catch. A teammate threw him a long pass. He was running and looking back over his shoulder for the ball when he barreled into me. It was a freak accident.

Inside I laugh. Dent is third all-time in career quarterback sacks. Hes one of the fiercest pass rushers in NFL history. Eddie and Carmen signed him specifically to help us beat Dallas. Yet on the eve of the Dallas game he takes out his own quarterback.