Content Warning: The source text and this guide contain references to murder, violence, suicide, racism, sexism, and addiction.

American football appears throughout the novel as a symbol of the balance between teamwork and individual glory. Jenny Wolf and her ex-husband Ted Skyler have very different attitudes toward football: While Jenny sees football as a team sport that brings her joy, Ted sees football as an opportunity to bring himself fame and financial gain.

At the beginning of the novel, Jenny has rejected her place in the Wolf family’s business empire in favor of coaching the Hunters Point High School football team. Jenny herself acknowledges the disparity between her background and her current position, saying: “[U]ndergrad at Cal. Stanford Law. And about to read an eighteen-year-old the riot act because he’d messed up at a high school football practice” (10). Although her position with the Hunters Point High team will not bring her glory, she stays on at the school because it brings her joy. Even when she does take control of the Wolves, the professional football team her family owns, Jenny maintains her humble attitude toward football, telling her players that she “knew football but had no intention of trying to sound as if [she] had invented it” (57).