The main character is a man named Michael Ore.  At the beginning of the book he is shy and goes to a very hard high school to him.  he was struggling in school because his family was very poor and he couldnt go to school for about 4 years.  he then gets a tutor to help him with all his subjects and starts to get better at them.  It takes a little time but he still learned all the stuff to quilify to play football.  Also at the end of the novel he becomes way less shy then in the beginning of the book.  He gets this way because he gets involved with other activities with the football players and his new family.