By Tim Morris
If you thought you knew everything about the 1986 New York Giants football team, think again.
Author Jerry Barca has made the ’86 Super Bowl champions the subject of his latest book, “Big Blue Wrecking Crew: Smashmouth Football, a Little Bit of Crazy and the ’86 Super Bowl Champion New York Giants.”
Barca, who lives in Freehold, will be at the Barnes and Noble bookstore on Route 9 in Freehold Aug. 25 for a Q&A session and to sign copies of the book at 7 p.m.
Growing up, the Giants were Barca’s team. The 1985 loss to the Chicago Bears still stings, he noted. Of course, it turned out to be a prelude to the ’86 championship, which helped ease the pain. In writing the book, he said he was writing about something that he knew.
Besides the Giants being his team growing up, the reason that Barca chose to do a book on the team with an in-depth look back (he’s done a similar book on the 1988 Notre Dame football season, “Unbeatable”) was something that was missing.
“There hadn’t been a retrospective,” he said. “The season was exciting, fun and entertaining.
“I wanted a fresh perspective, fresh insight and tell the stories [players] could tell.”
Barca set about talking to not only the Giants players themselves, but also former NFL players, coaches (such as Mike Ditka and Don Shula) and front office personnel. He went to Baltimore to learn more about the late general manager George Young, who coached high school football in the city before joining the Baltimore Colts as a coach in 1968. He became the Giants’ general manager in 1979.
The Freehold author/journalist wanted readers to learn about more than the final score or key plays.
“We know the results. My job was to go deeper, to tell you about the characters, how they responded to the circumstances they were faced with,” he said.
“I’m happy with the depth and layers to the book.”
The book actually begins in 1978, the year of “The Fumble,” the low point in Giants history. He puts together piece by piece all the decisions and player moves that culminated in the championship season with the 39-20 defeat of the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XXI. The debacle in 1978 ultimately led to the hiring of Bill Parcells as head coach and Young.
“The book captures Bill Parcells before he became an elite coach,” Barca said. “It shows how he had to transform himself.”
Parcells was almost fired after a 3-12-1 debut season. Young was flirting with the idea of bringing on University of Miami head coach Howard Schnellenberger — something that did not sit well with Parcells and led to a rift between the two.
The book reveals how Bill Belichick came to the Giants to begin what is surely a Hall of Fame coaching career of his own.
Barca said that quarterback Phil Simms’ story will surprise readers. His road to the top was far from smooth growing up poor and having to overcome so many obstacles throughout his career, such as playing for Morehead State University, which was not a big-time college football school, and overcome a series of injuries and being benched. He constantly had to prove himself.
“Simms was one of eight children and had a paper route,” Barca said. “What he went through will surprise people.
“Looking back, all he wanted to do was compete. He was tough. He had to battle back and back [from injuries]. He had great confidence.”
Linebacker Lawrence Taylor looms large. Barca reports that Taylor had signed a personal contract with Donald Trump, the owner of the New Jersey Generals of the USFL, and how the Giants had to get him out of that. It also deals frankly with his drug addictions.
The Giants may have come off as all business because of Parcells’ reputation for holding a tight rein, but the Giants’ players didn’t miss out on the New York nightlife of the 1980s. They got around.
Punter Sean Landetts got to know rocker Jon Bon Jovi through the nightclub scene then, which led to Bon Jovi, a Giants fan, getting credentials as a Giants team photographer.
When the Giants had road games, the team would leave on Saturday mornings. On Friday night, the players would park their cars in the stadium parking lot and then sleep in their cars and pay the ball boys to wake them. They slept in their cars so that they would be sure to be at the facility on time in order to make their flight in the morning.
The ’86 Giants were certainly a group of characters in addition to being a great team, and Barca captures the players and coaches, warts and all.