“The definitive look at the 1970s Steelers . . . The book is part history, but it never loses sight of the humanities of the people who made that history. There are some funny moments and some sad ones . . . Guaranteed, you’ll learn something you didn’t know.”
-Steelers.com

 

"Their Life’s Work will be compared to Roger Kahn’s The Boys of Summer (1972), a nostalgic look back at the 1950s Brooklyn Dodgers. As good as Boys is, this is better. It’s less sentimental and more harshly objective in its portrayal of the toll modern football extracts from its players. A wonderful book."
-Booklist (Starred)

 

“Reading this book, I'm learning things that were going on in the town I lived in that I had no idea about. It's all behind-the-scenes stuff, but it's about what it is like to be on a championship team of anything. You know, most people do not ever know what that's like. Not just football, not just baseball, not just sports, but a winning team doing anything. It's probably the same kind of feeling people have at Apple right now. They're winning big. Google may have the same kind of team thing -- although they're so big, maybe not. But it's something most people will never experience. But everybody loved 'em, and everybody that loves football wonders what it would be like . . . Pomerantz has just done a terrific job writing about the city, the Rooneys, everybody that mattered on that team. The players and what they've done, what they've become and so forth. It's just fascinating.”
- Rush Limbaugh on The Rush Limbaugh Show

 

“A wonderful read. It really is. Gary has always been a wonderful writer. It’s a tremendous piece of reporting. Highly recommend it.”
- John Feinstein, The John Feinstein Show, CBS Sports Radio

 

“Their Life's Work is that rare book that is brutally authentic, vigorously reported, smoothly written, and hauntingly sympathetic all at the same time. Sport, coach, team, city, sensibility all powerfully rendered.”
- David Maraniss, author of When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi

 

“A remarkable tale of extraordinary men, definitively captured in their prime and, with precious present narrative, as autumn lions almost in winter . . . Pomerantz is at his bittersweet best in a deeply moving chapter on Webster, the nutty but steady center who was too tough for his own good. . . Most of the Steelers gathered for Webster’s 2002 funeral. It was a reunion full of give and take, reflective of the wide range in a book that provides insight to glory, the heavy price some players paid and a brotherhood that beats on.”
-Gene Sapakoff, The Charleston (SC) Post and Courier

 

“Gary Pomerantz, as fine a writer/reporter as you’ll find in the country, goes deep into the 1970s Steelers in Their Life’s Work.”
-Bruce Jenkins, The San Francisco Chronicle

 

“Pomerantz creates a wonderful image of all of them - they are just men, only far more accomplished than others. They have four Super Bowl rings and survived a savage and beautiful game. But they appear approachable, and, above all else, human . . . Each member of that team as highlighted by Pomerantz has a memorable role in a dramatic, inspiring and wondrous tale of brotherhood, camaraderie and spirit . . . It's the text book for Steelers 101. It's the Bible for Steelers Spirituality 201. It's the reading material necessary to pass a citizen's test for entry into Steeler Nation, and all residents should be issued it upon their arrival.”
-Neal Coolong, BehindTheSteelCurtain.com

 

“By describing the players’ unique on-field and off-field relationships, Pomerantz reveals a brotherhood that transcends wins and losses.”
- Publishers Weekly

 

“What sets Their Life's Work well above other books that tell us about teammates in their glory and their dotage, is that Gary Pomerantz not only brings such flair to the Steelers' glory days, but he also instructs us so vividly how, in football, teammates don't just grow old, they grow in pain and fear.”
-Frank Deford, commentator, author of Over Time: My Life as a Sportswriter

 

“If you were a follower of the Steelers of the 1970s or if have any interest at all about what was arguably the greatest team in NFL history, you will absolutely love the book, "Their Life’s Work," which is the best ever done about that historic dynasty. Author Gary Pomerantz has captured the essence of the brotherhood of those players with never-before-told anecdotes and superlative writing.”
-Bob Smizik, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

 

“The great strength is the author’s hard but sympathetic look at what’s happened to everyone since those years: the drugs (Joe Gilliam), the madness (Mike Webster), the estrangements, the financial successes and failures, the effects of injuries and the many deaths . . . Pomerantz ends with a series of portraits of his key subjects, and [John] Stallworth imagines just one more sauna experience with the old crew who used to gather there to avoid celebrity’s crush. A work of great affection—for people, a violent sport and magical moments.”
-Kirkus Reviews
 

 

“One of the great sports books ever written . . . sculpted into a monument. Prepare to be stunned by how fresh and compelling it looks with Mr. Pomerantz's near-maniacal research, searing interviews, and more of the highly polished writing for which he's become famous and esteemed . . . By parts history, comedy, tragedy and sweeping 40-year epic, Pomerantz's is a loving work that somehow refrains from being romantic, never flinching from the brutal realities of both the game and too real brutalities of some of its greatest players . . . As with David Maraniss' When Pride Still Mattered, a monumental work about Vince Lombardi, Mr. Pomerantz has taken a story way overtold and done it the way everyone wished they had.”
-Gene Collier, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

 

"I've been waiting for a book, written in an exhilarating and cogent and intelligent way, on the best football team of my adult life, and now it's here. I loved the Steelers way back when, and now that I know them in their middle age and beyond, I love their story. That's not just because Joe Greene and Terry Bradshaw and Jack Lambert are compelling figures. It's because Gary Pomerantz wrote it the way Roger Kahn wrote 'Boys of Summer.' This book will be 'Men of Fall' for my football generation.''
- Peter King, senior writer, Sports Illustrated

 

“Pomerantz devotes the first half of the book to a discussion of how the 1970s Steeler championship teams were built and were able to rule the NFL. Then he profiles some of the stars today, as well as the team-founding Rooney family and former coach Chuck Noll. He pays special attention to the physical impact the game has had on the subsequent lives of those he interviews. Both parts are richly examined and the subjects movingly depicted . . . Pomerantz insightfully gets at why so many of these aging, damaged men would do it all again. For all sports fans.
-Library Journal (Starred)

 

“Pomerantz is a smooth story teller and the pages fly by like Lynn Swann in his prime.”
- Mike Patterson, The Oklahoman

 

“The book has a "Boys of Summer" feel to it at times because Pomerantz visited with many of the players and coaches, not only to get their perspective on life in the 1970s, but their lives today . . . To go with the exhaustive research and interviews, the writing is superb, as anyone who read Pomerantz through the years would expect … Pomerantz, who covered football once upon a time for The Washington Post, served the past seven years as a visiting lecturer at Stanford University. By reading his book that was published this fall, you would swear he spent those past seven years researching and interviewing people for it.”
-Ed Bouchette, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

 

“What has become of the best team ever? Pomerantz has the story, the lowdown and the afterglow. A wealth of prime Steeler stuff.”
-Roy Blount Jr., humorist, author of About Three Bricks Shy of A Load

 

"A lovely look at the Steelers' glory days."
- The Buffalo News

 

"Having competed against the 1970s Pittsburgh Steelers, I didn't think it was possible to learn more about this team, but Gary Pomerantz has uncovered so many intriguing  details on how this great ball club was masterfully put together, along with fascinating new insights into the great characters who played on these championship teams, I see them in a new light.  This is one great football book.”
-Ernie Accorsi, former General Manager of the New York Giants, Cleveland Browns and Baltimore Colts

 

“In this season of Steelers discontent, Gary Pomerantz offers rattled fans some balm. "Their Life's Work" is a thoroughly reported and clearly written account of the Steelers' sensational '70s, framed through the "brotherhood" of the players and their interplay with the owners . . . Pomerantz uses his journalistic storytelling skill to describe how the Steelers went from zeroes to heroes over the course of some hard decades. At times, the technique is reminiscent of historian Barbara Tuchman writing about the onset of World War I in "The Guns of August": Everyone knows how the story is going to end, but as the details unfold, the suspense is gripping.”
-John Allison, Pittsburgh Quarterly

 

“The author calls the Steelers of the late '70s the best team ever, and it's hard to argue. Four Super Bowls in six seasons, an 80-22-1 record, a dozen Hall of Famers, and a dozen more unforgettable characters. Pomerantz tracked them down the way Roger Kahn did in the baseball classic "The Boys of Summer" and lets them speak their peace. It's lively, moving and tragic."
-Jeff Baker, The Portland Oregonian
 
© 2000 - 2020 Gary M. Pomerantz