Summary Of Friday Night Lights By H. G. Bissinger

In the book Friday Night Lights, author H.G. Bissinger documents Odessa, Texas’s 1988 Permian High School football season. By depicting a class of students who would rather rally at football games than get an education, Bissinger presents his belief that the school is disregarding education in order to produce a winning football team. I agree. Bissinger also portrays a well-respected player, Boobie Miles, as a quitter. I disagree, since the pressures of football contributed most to his failure.
The town and the high school’s energy devote their energy to the team’s excellence and success. As the author shows football players breezing through their classes day by day, often not even being given required tests, he demonstrates his belief that the high school is compromising proper education for the ability of its star players to stay on the team. The players are treated like royalty at Permian, giving an unfair disadvantage to students who do not play - academically and

Boobie Miles is one of these revered players. However, when a serious knee injury in a preseason scrimmage stops him from playing, his life begins to go downhill. Bissinger portrays Boobie as a quitter, who essentially gives up in the face of a challenge. On the contrary, it seems that the true cause of Boobie’s failure comes more from the pressure of the town’s high expectation of his performance. The crippling pressure eventually causes him to cave emotionally, as he loses potential football scholarships and, unable to re-achieve the level of play he once could, quits the team. He is even pushed to the point where he runs from home. Boobie states, “I had fame and glory and all that and the Lord took it away”(350). The Permian football team treats Boobie Miles as more of a commodity rather than a human being, while he becomes collateral damage the team leaves