A short list of acronyms and football-speak used in the book

For basic American football concepts and definitions, such as "quarterback," "tight end," "receiver," etc., I highly recommend Wikipedia. It has good explanations of most terms.

AFC: American Football Conference, one of the two conferences comprising the National Football League (NFL). The other conference is the NFC, the National Football Conference.  

BCS: Bowl Championship Series. A system for selecting the ten top-ranked college football teams to play in five postseason bowl games: the Rose Bowl, the Orange Bowl, the Fiesta Bowl, the Sugar Bowl, and the BCS National Championship Game.

The BCS bowls are considered the "elite" games featuring the best teams in the country, but there is endless criticism of the BCS system and its preferential treatment of certain athletic conferences and its circular reasoning in ranking teams ("teams playing in BCS bowls are the best teams because they play in BCS bowls").

D: defense; the defensive line; the defensive players.

D-Line: the defensive line.

ILB: inside linebacker.

NCAA: National Collegiate Athletic Association, the association that regulates and oversees college sports in the United States.

Athletic programs are required to follow NCAA rules and regulations. NCAA violations can lead to a range of penalties and sanctions, including shutting down a program entirely. Some recent examples of NCAA sanctions against football programs are the Penn State case and the 2010 sanctions against the University of Southern California.

NFL Combine: an annual event for college football players entering the NFL draft to undergo physical and mental tests and meet with representatives from NFL teams.

O: offense; the offensive line; the offensive players.

O-Line: the offensive line.

OLB: outside linebacker.

OTAs: organized team activities (often mandatory) for players on NFL teams.

Pro Day: an exhibition of athletic skills held on a college campus to showcase its football players entering the NFL draft. Representatives from NFL teams and members of the media attend to evaluate the draft prospects.

PWAC: Pacific West Athletic Conference (a fictional conference).

College sports are divided into conferences. In football, the teams that win their conferences usually go on to play against other conference-winning teams in postseason bowl games. Although all teams want to win all their games, a win against a conference opponent has more weight than a win against a non-conference opponent, unless the non-conference opponent is a dominant or powerhouse team.

QB: quarterback.

QB1: first quarterback on the depth chart; the starting quarterback.

RB: running back.

redshirt: a player on the college team's roster who is not a starter and does not play in any games.

A redshirt freshman is a player who spent his academic freshman year on the sidelines. This extends his eligibility to play at the college level for five years (4 years eligibility+1 redshirt year). A player who is academically a senior (in his 4th year at college) who redshirted for a year is called a redshirt junior because he's eligible for another year athletically. Redshirt seniors or fifth-year seniors are players who redshirted for a year and are playing in their final year of eligibility.

safety net: a receiver the quarterback can throw to when his other receivers aren't open; a quarterback's preferred receiver.

SC: University of Southern California, known for its historically strong football program. Also known for periodically violating NCAA regulations to build up its athletics (particularly football) programs. A.k.a. USC.

State: statewide high school football championship games.

TA: teaching assistant.

TD: touchdown.

TE: tight end.

WR: wide receiver.