The song is a seriocomic tale of a man who now ruefully looks back on his so-called "glory days" and those of people he knew during high school.

[4] The music is jocular, consisting of what Springsteen biographer Dave Marsh called "rinky-dink organ, honky-tonk piano, and garage-band guitar kicked along by an explosive tom-tom pattern".

An alternate mix of the song includes an extra verse about the narrator's father, who worked at the Ford auto plant in Metuchen, New Jersey, for twenty years and who now spends most of his time at the American Legion Hall, thinking about how he "ain't never had glory days.

It featured a narrative story of Springsteen, playing the protagonist in the song, talking to his young son and pitching to a wooden backstop against an imaginary lineup (he eventually lost the game to Graig Nettles).

According to authors Philippe Margotin and Jean-Michel Guesdon:[9] E Street Band The B-side of the single, "Stand On It", was a rocker occasionally brought out for encores at concerts.