The Hot Seat: A Year of Outrage, Pride, and Occasional Games of College Football

By: Ben Mathis-Lilley

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Synopsis: A fan&’s search for the truth about American history, human nature, and whether Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh will keep his job Being a University of Michigan football fan should be joyful. Michigan is an elite academic institution whose football team boasts forty-three Big Ten championships. But these days, college football is complicated. The NCAA is corrupt and exploitative, and Michigan keeps losing to Ohio State. It&’s hard not to wonder, as Slate writer and superfan Ben Mathis-Lilley does in this book: Why are we doing this? The Hot Seat is a chronicle of one of the wildest years in Michigan football history, but also a search for the truth about fandom, from the pages of history books to the wilderness of online forums. Is it embarrassing to care about what happens in a game? Why is Jim Harbaugh like that? Is it somehow Thomas Jefferson&’s fault? This book explores all these questions and many more. Against the backdrop of a quickly changing sport and country, The Hot Seat is an exploration of the all-consuming culture of fandom, and why it matters.