excerpts Page 5 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Pills, Bullies, And Pink Weights: Life As A Fringe Major Leaguer
From Bigger Than The Game: Restitching a Major League Life (Kensington). ...
The Zen Master Goes To LA: How Phil Jackson Started A Lakers Dynasty
The following is excerpted from Lord of the Rings, the new Phil Jackson biography by Peter Richmond. The text is accompanied by footnotes from the author, who also did an interview on The Stacks last week....
Gift Guide: Great Books That We've Featured
A couple days ago, we gave you book recommendations from the Deadspin commentariat. But we've also excerpted from a good number of books this year, too. Here's a list of those in case you're still in the market for gift ideas....
11 Of America's Most Scenic And Significant Basketball Hoops
Robin Layton's new book, Hoop: The American Dream, is the fruit of a cross-country trip during which she photographed basketball hoops of every style, shape, and size. A selection of her photos is below, accompanied by her commentary. ...
My Injury File: How I Shot, Smoked, And Screwed My Way Through The NFL
Adapted from Slow Getting Up: A Story of NFL Survival from the Bottom of the Pile (Harper)....
Why The Arguments Against NCAA Pay-For-Play Suck
NCAA president Mark Emmert, speaking Wednesday at the IMG Intercollegiate Athletics Forum, pooh-poohed the idea of paying collegiate athletes. "There's certainly no interest [among college presidents] in turning college sports into the professional or semi-professional," Emmert said. He added: "I th...
An Ode To One Of America's Best Dive Bars
You've probably never heard of Bowling Green unless its college basketball team, the Hilltoppers of Western Kentucky, has broken your bracket, one year or another. The city sits between Louisville and Nashville, and people drive there from all over southern Kentucky to eat, to shop, and, most of all...
What It Took To Get Ted Williams's Head Off His Body
Adapted from The Kid: The Immortal Life of Ted Williams (Little, Brown and Company). ...
"This Doctor Can Operate": Dr. J, Pistol Pete, And The Sexual Revolution
Excerpted from Dr. J: The Autobiography, available now from Harper Collins....
Dead Wrestler Of The Week: Chris Benoit
Excerpted and adapted from The Squared Circle: Life, Death, and Professional Wrestling (Gotham Books). For the Dead Wrestler of the Week archive, click here....
How Branch Rickey Invented Modern Baseball
Excerpted from Dollar Sign on the Muscle, named by Sports Illustrated one of the top 100 sports books of all time; postscript by Sam Miller. You can read more about the new Baseball Prospectus edition of the book here, or buy it in paperback or as an e-book....
Don't Turn Your Back On A Jealous Cokehead: A Mike Tyson Life Lesson
Excerpted from Undisputed Truth, available now from Blue Rider Press....
The '85 Bears At The Obama White House: A Historic Photo, Annotated
In 1986, shortly before the Super Bowl champion Chicago Bears were prepared to make the annual champions' trip to the White House and meet President Ronald Reagan, the Challenger exploded. The Bears' White House visit was canceled and subsequently forgotten—until, that is October 2011, when rabid Be...
This Is What It Was Like To Play For The Qaddafis' Basketball Team
Excerpted from Qaddafi's Point Guard: The Incredible Story of a Professional Basketball Player Trapped in Libya's Civil War, which is available now from Rodale. ...
Secrets Of A Hitter: How Doug Plank Inspired The NFL's Meanest Defense
Adapted from Monsters: The 1985 Chicago Bears and the Wild Heart of Football (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), available now. ...
Why Lionel Messi Is Even Better Than You Think
One of the key findings of The Numbers Game: Why Everything You Know About Soccer Is Wrong is that soccer, more than any other team sport, is a weak link game: matches are won and lost, and championships and relegation are secured, by the genius and quality of a club's superstars, but even more so b...
The Time Leo Durocher Beat The Shit Out Of A Heckler
The following is excerpted from The Victory Season: The End of World War II and the Birth of Baseball’s Golden Age, available now on Amazon....
Stealing Signs In Baseball: A Hall Of Famer's Guide
There are many fair ways to steal the signs of the enemy, so many that the smart ball-player is always kept on the alert by them. Baseball geniuses, some almost magicians, are constantly looking for new schemes to find out what the catcher is telling the pitcher, what the batter is tipping the base...
Never Give Your Kid A Cold Shower: Advice From The Worst Dad On Earth
Excerpted from Someone Could Get Hurt: A Memoir of Twenty-First-Century Parenthood, which makes a great Father's Day gift for foul-mouthed dads everywhere....
Why You're Still A Fan, Despite All The Crap: A Look Inside Your Brain
Adapted from The Secret Lives of Sports Fans: The Science of Sports Obsession....