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Irishjohn

Books on Sport

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Hello all,

So, any recommendations on books dealing with modern/popular sports? I don't mean the Liverpool Football Club Annual 2008 or anything. For instance, I am finally reading through (and nearly finished) Jonathan Wilson's The Inverted Pyramid, a book on the evolution of soccer/football tactics throughout the twentieth century. It's fantastic.

I also recommend Joe Posnanski's The Machine, a book on the 1975 Cincinnatti Reds and Bryant Howard's Juicing the Game.

I've got The Ball is Round and Soccernomics on my to-read list. Oh, and Ball Four.

Not sure how many sports fans are around but I'd love to hear about notable books in this area.

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I haven't read too many full books, but I can recommend two of my favorite feature pieces. Both happen to be in the NY Times Magazine, coincidentally enough, and by famous authors:

What Keeps Bill Parcells Awake at Night by Michael Lewis is a great look at football strategy from the same author of The Blind Side and Moneyball (and other non-sports books such as Liar's Poker). It's the best piece I've read for hinting at the strategic depth of the game for those not as familiar. For advanced study, check out Smart Football.

Federer as Religious Experience by David Foster Wallace—in addition to being the best intro to DFW's style—is also a great look at just how great tennis players shape the game to their advantage, and how Federer seems to transcend it all. DFW wrote quite a bit about tennis, and A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again features an essay about Michael Joyce (an otherwise unremarkable player) where he explores the possibility that great sportsmen are being literal when they give the cliched after-game quotes. Infinite Jest also features a lot of thoughtful writing about tennis, though it's a fictional work and the tennis stuff is mixed in with everything else so I wouldn't really even call it a "sports novel" as if there is such a thing (outside of the magisterial Speed Dating).

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An old classic, Paper Lion

Journalist George Plimpton embeds himself within the 1963 Detroit Lions preseason, posing as a prospective backup quarterback from the Canadian Football League. The coaches know his secret, the players don't. What happens when you take a 'weekend warrior' athlete and put them in the middle of a professional game with professional athletes?

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"Those guys have all the fun" A story about ESPN, the multinational, global sports juggernaut. Really awesome book so far, more of a story then a history. Lots of great anecdotes from the personalities, while guiding you through how the network grew into what it is today.

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An old classic, Paper Lion

Journalist George Plimpton embeds himself within the 1963 Detroit Lions preseason, posing as a prospective backup quarterback from the Canadian Football League. The coaches know his secret, the players don't. What happens when you take a 'weekend warrior' athlete and put them in the middle of a professional game with professional athletes?

Ah, that's right! That's been on my to read list for so long I've forgotten about it. There's a film too, but I've heard it's not a patch on Plimpton's book.

Cheers for the recommendations all, some great ones here.

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For instance, I am finally reading through (and nearly finished) Jonathan Wilson's The Inverted Pyramid, a book on the evolution of soccer/football tactics throughout the twentieth century. It's fantastic.

Had a great argument about football tactics with my mates over a few beers at the weekend, centring around how in such a fluid sport tactics became so standardised for so long, and how now you have teams like Spain breaking the mould again. So that book should be perfect for me.

Has anyone read Moneyball? It's philosophy's seems to have become increasingly popular this side of the Atlantic, so much so I feel I should perhaps give it a read myself.

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Had a great argument about football tactics with my mates over a few beers at the weekend, centring around how in such a fluid sport tactics became so standardised for so long, and how now you have teams like Spain breaking the mould again. So that book should be perfect for me.

Has anyone read Moneyball? It's philosophy's seems to have become increasingly popular this side of the Atlantic, so much so I feel I should perhaps give it a read myself.

You'll really enjoy The Inverted Pyramid then, really fantastic and interesting. Directly challenges the notion of "direct" football though looks to rehabilitate poor Graham Taylor a bit.

Moneyball is excellent. Just as a book in and of itself, it's really well done. You don't need to be a massive baseball fan to enjoy it. Once you've read it though you'll probably get a bit irked by how much the term "moneyball" has been thrown around in relation to Liverpool. Not sure of some of those guys (journos) have read the book at all.

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Check out the book that the film 'The Goon' is based on. Nearly bought it, but couldn't find a decently priced copy in the UK. All the reviews say that it's great!

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You'll really enjoy The Inverted Pyramid then, really fantastic and interesting. Directly challenges the notion of "direct" football though looks to rehabilitate poor Graham Taylor a bit.

Moneyball is excellent. Just as a book in and of itself, it's really well done. You don't need to be a massive baseball fan to enjoy it. Once you've read it though you'll probably get a bit irked by how much the term "moneyball" has been thrown around in relation to Liverpool. Not sure of some of those guys (journos) have read the book at all.

Just finished The Inverted Pyramid and it easily lived up to your high praise Irishjohn. The back and forth between those playing win and those trying to play beautiful football reminded me of some of the discussion around narrative in video games in the last few years. In particular those coaches who seemed to blur the lines of those two approaches struck me as people who probably would be fascinated with video games if they had been born a generation or two later, with Arrgio Sacchi in particular having a few choice quotes.

my philosophy was teaching players as much as I could, so they would know as much as possible. This would enable them to make the right decision and to do so quickly based on every possible scenario on the pitch
Football has a script. The actors, if they are great actors, can interpret the script and their lines according to their creativity, but they still have to follow the script.

I can't currently articulate exactly why I feel there's a connection fully, but I think that Sacchi's focus on mastery of a skill set allowing player to make quick improvisation decision within a system remind (without breaking that system) reminds me of some of the qualities I look for in video games.

On a side note

Once you've read it though you'll probably get a bit irked by how much the term "moneyball" has been thrown around in relation to Liverpool. Not sure of some of those guys (journos) have read the book at all.

That may well be true but Brendan Rodgers certainly didn't seem to be discouraging them when he was at Swansea (take peak at what's on the desk).

Swansea-City-manager-Bren-008.jpg

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The best I've ever read was Tim Krabbe's The Rider. Krabbe's best known as a novelist, but was also a competitive road cyclist in his time, and a chess grandmaster too. He calls upon all three expertises to produce a compelling, strategic and sometimes surreal (think the surrealism of exhaustion) portrait of competitive cycling. It's not a sport I've ever followed closely, but the book was fascinating nonetheless.

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What Keeps Bill Parcells Awake at Night by Michael Lewis is a great look at football strategy from the same author of The Blind Side and Moneyball (and other non-sports books such as Liar's Poker). It's the best piece I've read for hinting at the strategic depth of the game for those not as familiar. For advanced study, check out Smart Football.

The Blind Side is an extension (or excerpted? I forget.) of that article. It's a great book that has suffered due to its sappy movie adaptation. There's much more analysis of the evolution of the modern NFL game in the book. I also second Moneyball. Two basketball books that are worth a read are Loose Balls which is a very funny oral history of the American Basketball Association and The Breaks of the Game by David Halberstam.

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Falling Hard by Mark Law (published in Europe as The Pyjama Game, I believe), is a very engaging story of the author's experiences with judo, which he took up as a man in his fifties. It is a great introduction to the history of the sport, and offers a lot of insight into the mental and physical aspects of the world's most popular martial art.

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Can't believe I didn't mention this book earlier but Rough Ride by Paul Kimmage is fantastic.

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If you're a baseball fan, I highly recommend The Hall of Nearly Great http://www.hallofnearlygreat.com/

Each chapter is a from a different writer about a different ballplayer who just missed greatness and the Hall of Fame for one reason or another. Awesome read. It's ebook only at present if that factors into your decision.

e: everyone should read Moneyball. It's not really about baseball, it's about people and market strategies.

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People seem to really like David Halberstam's The Breaks of the Game about the Blazers' 79-80 season, but I haven't read it.

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Ken Dryden's The Game, about his time with the Montreal Canadiens, is probably the best book written by an athlete.

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