One may think that families are made of people related by blood or marriage; one may also think families must consist of mothers, fathers, and children. A family can be people growing up together with common interests. A family can be a class or a team that works together to be great. However, a family always consists of a group of people that have infinite love for each other and will do anything for one another. In John Grisham’s Bleachers, Coach Eddie Rake is a father to every young man who ever played football on his team. In return, every young man who played on the team is bound as a band of brothers that look out for each other. Not every team is like this, Eddie Rake’s football team became one; they became a family. Families begin anywhere and everywhere, Eddie Rake started to build his family as he began coaching in 1958. As a Eddie Rake’s career began in 1958, he also became a father. Rake became a father to twenty-one young men that put on the forest green jersey of a Spartan. That year and thirty-three years to follow, Rake became a father …show more content…
Rake bound the team together as a family, he had them working together and making them find trust in one another. Not only did Coach Rake have the whites in the school become a team and family, but he also had a kind nature to let the black men in school become part of the family. Collis Suggs was the first black captain ever appointed on Rake’s team, this showed that Coach Rake did not care what your race or background was. He made each and every young man on the team feel as though they were brothers of a large family, light or dark skin-toned, “Eddie Rake was the first white man who ever yelled at me and made me like it” (Grisham 215). If you put forth all of your effort and could play football, Rake made a spot for you anywhere. Everyone on the team was given the same opportunities and were all working together as a family to