I’ve been without power with distressing frequency lately, giving me plenty of time to read books by flashlight. As a result, I offer this The Last Folk Hero review after only picking up the biography a couple days ago.

To anyone my age who even thought about playing sports, the last folk hero, Bo Jackson, needs no introduction. He was, simply put, the greatest athlete in pro sports during my teenage years. The Heisman Trophy, professional baseball, professional football—Bo knew them all.

I’ll admit I’m always a little hesitant when picking up a biography. Biographies are ridiculously hard to do well. Too many turn into uncritical, fawning pieces of hero adoration. At minimum, it seems, authors feel compelled to make a case for the greatness/amazing contributions to humanity/praiseworthy character of their subject. Why else would they be worthy of a biography?

Also, the full title of this one—The Last Folk Hero: The Life and Myth of Bo Jackson seemed to lead in that direction. But, when a longtime friend is kind enough to gift you a book, you’re thankful and you read.

The Last Folk Hero Book

First of all, whence the title? The author, Jeff Pearlman, calls Jackson the last folk hero, and has a reasonable rationale for doing so. Pearlman maintains that Jackson was part of the last group of athletes to perform before the Internet made video of everything instantly accessible. For the last two decades, no one has to ask “Did you see that?” about an athletic feat with any doubt about the answer. One simply goes to the appropriate website and looks up video.

Jackson’s career ended a few years before that became possible. He was from the last set of athletes who, when you asked “Did you see that?”, only people who actually saw it in person could tell you about it. This, of course, lends itself to considerable embellishment at times. Thus the word “myth” inserted into the title.

Sure, we’ve got some nice Youtube highlight videos. If you want to see someone who runs a 4.13 40-yard dash, and see how much faster that is than even really good NFL football players, try this link.

But we don’t have every major league at-bat broken down by Statcast. No cellphone video of Jackson in high school. Often, it’s just the stories of those who saw him play.

Finally, we have the fact that injury ruined Jackson’s athletic career prematurely. When it ended, fans were left to wonder “What If?” What if Jackson hadn’t injured his hip, leaving the second half of his career a shadow of what the first half had been? This only adds to the myth.

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The Last Folk Hero Review – What I Learned

In an attempt to create a The Last Folk Hero review in a few paragraphs, here it is. Bo wasn’t always a great guy. His behavior in his early life was, in fact, pretty crummy. Growing up without a father and with a working mother at home didn’t help. Jackson had major trust issues before and during his sports career because numerous people wanted to take advantage of him. But sports saved him by giving him something to care about.

When playing sports, Bo Jackson was as much a natural as anyone in any sport has ever been. He didn’t train much and disliked lifting weights. The intricacies of strategy rarely concerned him. Supposedly, he played four years for the L.A. Raiders without learning the entire offensive playbook.

But when it came to pure athletic ability, Jackson had no equal. Incredible speed and leaping ability. (Again, watch the link above.) Awesome raw power. And he weighed about 225 pounds. Once, during a baseball game, Jackson was on third. The opposing catcher called a conference at the pitcher’s mound. He told his infielders that, in the event of a fly ball to the outfield, they should cut off the outfielder’s throw no matter what. His rationale? He wanted to live to play tomorrow rather than risk a home plate collision with Jackson.

Jackson made his share of mistakes in life. Getting engaged to two women (one already married at the time) at once. Using his stature to get away with things regular teammates couldn’t. His behavior toward teammates was rather uneven, being caring at times and abrasive at others.

But he had endearing qualities, too. Jackson finished his college degree at Auburn after his playing career was over. He could be kind to people who were no one—the status of the person didn’t matter much. Jackson was unmotivated by the lure of money, at least by the standards of most modern athletes. At times, he tried to do things simply to see if they could be done, like playing two professional sports at once. He sought greatness.

One of the most interesting revelations for me was that Jackson didn’t obsess over the results of the games in which he played. Winning was more fun, sure, but Jackson didn’t live and die over wins and losses. Accordingly, he wasn’t beset by the stress and strain many pro and college athletes feel over their performance. Perhaps you don’t have to obsess about performance when you’re a folk hero.

The Last Folk Hero Review – Was it a Good Biography?

Despite my initial misgivings about biographies in general, I enjoyed the book. Jeff Pearlman is a writer with considerable talent. He had a few annoying habits. Like. Writing. Every. Word. Followed. By. A. Period at times. His talent is sufficient that he doesn’t need gimmicks like that. If he wanted emphasis, italics do the same thing.

One thing Pearlman did very well was to speak to tons of people from all stages of Jackson’s life. Bo himself wouldn’t grant the author an interview, so Pearlman had to work with what others said and wrote. But he managed to speak to some fairly obscure people from Jackson’s high school and college years who I’m sure took considerable effort to track down.

One interesting choice Pearlman made was to spend 95% of the book discussing Jackson’s early years and sports life. His career after sports was only one chapter. But I was okay with that. Partly because I remember Jackson the athlete, but partly because Jackson had various business pursuits of a fairly nondescript nature. Nothing mythical or heroic, just a man in his forties and fifties living his life.

So, if you enjoy biography and sports, you’ll probably like this book. This is especially true for those who remember watching Jackson play. Despite what I wrote above, most of the writing is quality. Other than trying to mythologize some of Jackson’s feats, which perhaps was necessary given the title of the book, Pearlman gave a fairly even account of Jackson’s life.

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