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What: “Phil Simms on Passing--Fundamentals of Throwing the Football” by Phil Simms with Rick Meier, William Morrow and Company Inc., New York. Price: $14

Anyone who picked up an auto-repair manual probably found out the hard way that car parts don’t like to cooperate with unpracticed hands. Purchasers of “Phil Simms on Passing” however, will be heartened to learn that even the mitts of an accomplished New York Giant quarterback had their share of problems transporting a football.

By his own admission, it wasn’t until Jim Fassel, then the Giants’ quarterback coach, started working with him in the twilight of his career that Simms, a former all-pro and Super Bowl hero, learned the techniques to throw consistently accurate and catchable passes--”something Bill Walsh had tried to teach me 14 years earlier.”

It’s a candid comment that sums up the spirit of this book. If a grand master of the game couldn’t persuade young Simms to adopt these techniques on the gridiron, you can’t expect words and diagrams printed on a page to do the trick. But that doesn’t mean you won’t understand what it takes to become a better all-around quarterback. In fact, it’s learning from the author’s mistakes that makes this book a valuable learning guide.

Anecdotes and insider tips from Dan Marino, Troy Aikman and John Elway are included. The reader could choose between adopting Elway’s 1-and-4 grip or Aikman’s (his palm across the laces) for his own, and also discover how the quarterback’s catapultlike power is generated.

The book never makes itself out to be anything more than a learning resource. Aspiring quarterbacks are still going to need to make sure they are sticking to the fundamentals, to create pressure situations as they develop their games and to make sure the footwork diagrams don’t have them doing the Texas two-step instead of the seven-step drop.

Even armchair quarterbacks will be rewarded--there are plenty of insights to sharpen the barbs with and seasoned pros might be able to use some of the information for their own arsenals.