5 comments about King of the Cowboys.

1. I have always been a huge Ty Murray fan as he embodies all the things any athlete should strive to emulate. He is not bragging at all in this book, simply listing the facts as they actually happened. Ty didn't just stumble onto the sport of rodeo, he was passionate about it from a very young age. He didn't reach the professional level by pure talent, he relentlessly trained and practiced throughout his entire career. The true Ty Murray fans will love the detail with which he describes his accomplishments and his struggles. You have the chance to see his true character as he struggles back from FOUR back to back injuries. His injuries (both shoulders and both knees) would have been career ending for almost any other athlete. However he worked harder than ever through three years of rehab and intense training to come back and still be at the top of his game.
   When Ty decided to stop riding it wasn't because his skill level was declining, it was because he drive to win and to compete just wasn't there anymore. Ty doesn't believe in doing anything half-heartedly and if he wasn't going to go out there and try to win every round of every event then he decided he shouldn't be competing anymore.
   This book is a great lesson in dedication and the hard work it takes to be a champion.



2. When I first saw the reviews for this book I shied away from it but then I decided to form my own opinion. I'm glad I did. Not only was it a look into his life but I also got a glimpse of other greats like Cody Lambert, Tuff Hedeman and Lane Frost. I don't believe he was bragging but saying things as they are. It's a very positve book and I had my teenage sons read it. He talks about living your dreams and doing your best. I think it's awesome he went to college and graduated cum laude. He has lived a most interesting and busy life. I don't know about "King of the cowboys" but he's most certaintly at the top the list.



3. I used to be a Ty Murray fan and then I read this book. Where is the the tough but humble image that cowboys are famous for? And what is all of this about chasing down wild elk on snowmobiles? Perhaps he was coming off a three-kegger-Friday and didn't know what the heck he was doing! Or, more than likely, we can attribute his embarrassing behavior to one too many hits in the head by a well-meaning bucking bull.
   
   Give me Dan Mortensen, the great Saddle Bronc champion. Give me Larry Mahan, the man who had all the records (and appropriate behavior) before Murray came along. And, given the track that he is on, Trevor Brazile, probably the greatest roper in rodeo history, is sure to break Murray's records in the All Around category. It will be good to forget Murray.
   
   THE HORSEMAN



4. I'm amazed at how well Ty packed his life into such a neat little package. I feel as though I grew up next to him and followed his progress as close as a proud parent. Any rider with so many marked achievements is going to have positive and motivating things to say and though this may draw fire from some, I feel it's well deserved. If you are good enough to rack up the wins as consistently and methodically as Ty did, then you are good enough to be admired and ignore the sour grapes. Once again, I feel as though I were standing right beside Ty from the time he was a toddler to the day he retired from rodeo and I was able to cheer and cry at the appropriate times. I recommend this book to anyone interested in either Rodeo or Good Sportsmanship. Ty shows how hard work, taking responsibility, passion and determination pay off in the end and provides a good role model to all.



5. Ty Murray's undeniable talent starts and ends with staying atop bucking animals. In his self-patronizing autobiography, this spoiled rodeo superstar proves to be a redneck in the worst sense of the word, not a "cowboy" as he claims. His description of the time he chased down the elk on a snowmobile and then rode the exhausted animal in the deep Colorado snow would have been a mature mea culpa had he not used the incident instead to lash out at the wildlife officer and the newspaper reporter for doing their jobs and exposing him as a creep in a cowboy hat.

No comments about Champ in the Corner: The Ray Arcel Story.

5 comments about Bad News for McEnroe: Blood, Sweat, and Backhands with John, Jimmy, Ilie, Ivan, Bjorn, and Vitas.

1. When Bill Scanlon played on the professional circuit, he was a solid player. The only time you'd hear him mentioned in the same breath as McEnroe is on his book. The obvious animus he has for McEnroe is really uncalled for. It seems to be merely there to sell the book. Plus, the book is filled with factual inaccuracies--it was Vitas who said, "Nobody beat Vitas Gerulaitis 17 times in a row." It was Barazutti's mark that Connors erased in the Open semifinals, not Vilas'. He has Connors turning to his box with Marjie Wallace and Gloria Connors, while Gloria was in Illinois.
   Scaz is a tennis Forrest Gump who injects himself in situations in which he really wasn't a part of. The first 49 pages, though filled with inaccuracies, represent the best part of the book. After that, the reader wants Scaz to pee in the cup, for what he discusses sounds like drug-induced rantings.
   He repeatedly says Connors had two bodyguards at the Open, when the two friends Connors had only appeared together with Connors at 2 Opens. But I guess Scaz needed to sell his book by exaggerating minor points like this. Unfortunately, sensationalizing trivial points subtracts from the overall book--for it begs the question what else is he embellishing?
   After much ballyhoo, I expected more. This book is Bad News For Avid Tennis Fans.



2. As an avid tennis player and reader I looked forward to his book. While I enjoyed watching McEnroe and enjoy his broadcasting ability, I can't say I'm much of a fan of his outsized ego. You'd think this book would therefore be much to my liking. Unfortunately, I only found this book mildly entertaining. There are a lot of subjects I liked but nothing that makes this a compelling exciting read for the average fan. Tennis aficionados may still want to read however.
   
   After a brief background Scanlon supports his book title by attempting to hook the reader by blasting McEnroe's gamesmanship in their matches. But unlike Brad Gilbert's book with quality matches against McEnroe and Becker, Scanlon's case is weak as he RARELY beat McEnroe. It almost projects an image of envy spending so much time commenting on McEnroe and frankly, using it in the title to sell the book. Well, it worked in getting my money. OK, McEnroe's an @ss. Now let's move on. But he keeps coming back to it to where eventually it's pitiful.
   
   The book really isn't about Mac other than in a tabloid manner. That's just an excuse to write a memoir about tennis in its greatest era. There is a very good chapter on the evolution of racquets and how that unnerved players who began with wooden racquets. Also, a chapter on fitness focusing on Navratilova and Lendl are quite interesting as well as a chapter on coaching and the evolution of the tennis entourage. But another dear subject to Scanlon which tends to lose the reader is the evolution of the ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals). Substantial time is spent here with a chapter on the controversial head Hamilton Jordan. Then we have a complete retelling of the battle inside the tennis establishment. This will be interesting only to people with interest in the business side of tennis.
   
   Would I read this book again? Yes, but I love to read and love tennis. For the casual fan, I couldn't recommend this book. It covers subjects of interest to Scanlon but not in my opinion in a cohesive manner to entertain a casual fan. And, at the end of the day, I found the constant whining about the whiner McEnroe to be beneath the type book Scanlon was trying to write.



3. Bill Scanlon has brought back the good old days of great tennis. I was only unhappy that the book wasn't longer because with every chapter I found myself reminded of another great tournament or match between McEnroe and Connors or Borg or Lendl.
   
   I found it interesting to learn some of the behind the scenes maneuvering in the politics of the game but far and away the most fun I had was reliving the rivalries between Borg and McEnroe and Connors and Lendl.
   
   This book is written in a very fun way and I even get the impression that Scanlon has an underlying respect for John McEnroe and the contribution he made to the sport, even if the contribution was made in a way that caused fits for Scanlon and other players.
   
   Definitely a fun read and highly recommended!



4. This is an excellent book. The book is short and very well written. As a result, it reads as easily and quickly as just a few long articles from a tennis magazine. It is a lot more than just a rebuttal to McEnroe's book "You Can't Be Serious." McEnroe's book, although greatly entertaining was pretty much about McEnroe and not much more. Given whom McEnroe is, that still made for fascinating stuff. This book is not so much about Bill Scanlon, an extremely talented but unknown name outside tennis. Nor is it so much about McEnroe. It is much more about what Scanlon describes as the Golden Era of tennis (70s and 80s) in which he was privileged to participate.
   
   Scanlon, in the shadows of the titans of the sport, had an incredible career that crossed paths with most of the superstars of the modern era. When he got started, he faced a mature Ilea Nastase (10 years his elder). Near his twilight, he faced the new teenage wonder - Andre Agassi. In between, he played against all the demi gods of the games, including Borg, Vilas, Connors, McEnroe, Gerulaitis, Lendl, and even the younger generation of near mythological characters: Becker, Edberg, Wilander.
   
   This book is extremely insightful. The chapters about the fights for the control and governance of the game between the WTC, MIPTC, and the emerging ATP are fascinating. Some of these absurd fights culminated back in 1973, when 79 players boycotted Wimbledon, and Jan Kodes, an athletic East European better known for his clay court performances won Wimbledon due to a truly impoverished men's draw.
   
   Chapter 4 on equipment is also very interesting. It discloses how in the late seventies and early eighties modern graphite racquets took the tennis world by storm. This caused a near crisis for most of the existing stars whose game had been developed with wood racquets. Scanlon shared that none of these stars adapted well to the change. And, this included both McEnroe and himself. The oversized stiffer racquets facilitated the modern power game that left touch players behind.
   
   Scanlon noticed that while Nastase's tantrums affected his results, McEnroe's tantrums helped his. McEnroe's tantrums were well timed just to break an opponent's hot streak. More often than not, McEnroe's tantrum strategy worked. It allowed him to regain his footing in a match and beat his opponent. Thus, contrary to what McEnroe suggested in his own books, that is tantrums were outbursts of his own angered perfectionism; Scanlon suggests they represented an unfair strategy to beat opponents. I have little doubt that Scanlon is right. Thus, while McEnroe's theatrics were often hugely entertaining for the crowds, they must have represented a real pain in the neck for all his tennis opponents.
   
   There is also a lot of entertaining stuff, including the exploits of Vitas Gerulaitis with the ladies. This is one aspect that both McEnroe and Scanlon books have in common. Both players/authors were quite awed by the amount of energy Vitas could exhibit on and off the tennis courts. Apparently, Vitas could easily handle a near sleepless night and win the Australian Open the next day. I am not so sure he could do that today. Marat Safin and Mark Phillippoussis are trying Vitas hedonistic route to success. But, so far they have frittered away their respective immense talent. And, they are both running out of time.
   
   The book includes many more themes and topics equally interesting to the few I described above. If you like tennis, you'll love this book. I obviously have to also recommend McEnroe's "You cannot be serious." It is an excellent book too, even though it is narrower in scope than this one.



5. Bill Scanlon has a place in tennis history as the only player to win a set without the loss of a point in a tour event. He also was a nemesis of John McEnroe's, as much as Brad Gilbert ever was.
   
   While providing a nice glimpse of the Borg-Connors-McEnroe era from the inside, Scanlon's book puts forth the theory that McEnroe's enmity toward him was based on a case of mistaken identify. Wow!
   
   Unfortunately, as Scanlon asserts that McEnroe's memory is faulty, he raises credibility questions by revealing some memory problems of his own. This book is an extreme example of Walsh's Rule, which is that if you know anything about a subject, you'll find errors in just about any article or book on the topic.
   
   Among Scanlon's dozens of errors are some doozies. He incorrectly recounts two anecdotes that are so well known it's almost a cliche to even mention them.
   
   It was Connors, not Borg, who lost to Vitas Gerulaitis for the first time at the Masters, prompting Vitas to quip that nobody beats Vitas Gerulaitis [number of losses plus one] times in a row. (In fact, Borg never lost to Gerulaitis on the pro tour.)
   
   And it was Corrado Barazzutti, not Vilas, against whom Connors rubbed out a ball mark at Forest Hills.
   
   I could go on. Scanlon misspells Lleyton Hewitt and Henri Leconte. His recollections about rackets are particularly error-filled.
   
   Still, this is a book that hardcore tennis fans should read.

5 comments about The Wicked Game: Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, and the Business of Modern Golf.

1. A generally quick and easy-reading overview of the lives of Palmer, Nicklaus, and Woods is ruined by the author's insistence of sticking racism and sexism in your face.
   
   Sounes uses a self-important journalistic style dripping with preconceptions. And this: A player uses a masturbatory grip on a golf club. Please ...
   
   Sounes is hip and investigative - OK, I got it. No wonder personalities in the limelight avoid characters like Sounes posing as authors who demand their time, then produce drivel like this.



2. Only a racist can so incorrectly evaluate racism in golf and only a true sexist can incorrectly evaluate sexism in modern golf. Shame on Mr. Sounes for attempting to sully a great game with contrived evidence.



3. The game of golf is racist and sexist. I get it. In fact, I got it after the first twenty times Sounes whines about it.



4. Tartly written, well researched, and consistently entertaining, I can't believe this book ranks so low on Amazon's list right now. I've been a casual golf fan for a very long time and played golf as a kid on the course Tiger Woods grew up on (Meadowlark, in Huntington Beach), and I found Sounes' book well worth the read. As a Tiger "fan" myself, being almost a hometown boy, I found the book to have a great deal of verisimilitude and accuracy. In fact, I have a lot less respect for Tiger now than I did before. Then again, I can't imagine what it's like to have such celebrity thrust upon you before you've even had a chance to mature as a person.
   
   Sounes really has the tart, dry British reporting style mastered. He is blunt and direct (humorous at times - check out the "heavily bosomed" comment about Phil Mickelson) and holds consistently to a theme in this book, which is that golf is truly a hidebound cultural phenomenon marked by a grimly maintained tradition of racism and elitism - and not just in America. Sounes marshals a large battery of evidence to buttress this view, and some of the information he unearths about golf clubs in the American South is just astounding. He also manages to cover pretty much every key golf event in the last 50 years in a compelling and entertaining manner. This is a remarkable achievement in his limited page count.
   
   The book focuses on three primary personalities - Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, and Tiger. The first two made themselves very available during the course of the book; in some ways they may regret having done so, as Sounes is not unsparing in his analysis and criticism. But surprisingly enough, Sounes saves his most stinging commentary for Tiger, and to some extent for his father, Earl Woods. Palmer and Nicklaus, despite their credentials as rock-ribbed Republicans, still come off as human beings. Tiger decidedly does not.
   
   I won't go much further to avoid spoiling the book, but any open-minded golf fan really must read it. It's a minor classic. I feel that it's one of the few of its kind that actually comes from the real world, instead of being a hagiography. He sounds a little bit like Edward Gibbon, another English writer with a tart tongue regarding his subjects.



5. The story of men's professional golf since the 1950s is laid out in an easy-to-read, highly enjoyable style. The chapters are well-crafted, and lively and fun. The stories of the classic major tournaments are re-told in a fresh way, based on new interviews. But the heart of the book is what we don't usually learn about the likes of Palmer, Nicklaus and Woods (also Gary Player, Lee Trevino, Byron Nelson et al): the business deals, the politics, the personal lives. And some of these golfing heroes have feet of clay. Criticism is well-balanced and fair-minded, however, unless you happen to think pro' golf already has an open-handed attitude to women and ethnic minorities. Sounes obviously has a low opinion of the golf establishment, bodies like the PGA and PGA of America. But at the same time there is real affection here for the great tournaments and genuine appreciation of big characters like Arnie Palmer who are, whatever their faults, interesting men who have lived rich lives. Now I know exactly how rich.

5 comments about Taking Shots: Tall Tales, Bizarre Battles, and the Incredible Truth About the NBA.

1. I read a ton of books, mostly history and sports books. This book does have some interestng stories, he tries to hard to preach and the book never seems to flow. Granted, I bought it for 6 bucks but it's simply not worth the cover price.



2. Keith Glass takes us behind the scenes on what goes on behind the glitz of an NBA game. He gives us lots of behind the scenes action, insider information and laugh-out loud anecdotes, which are all fun to read. However, that lies the shortcoming of this book. It is just that. Full of anecdotes. According to the cover copy, it's about the incredible truth about the NBA. The problem is, the book is so scattered, there's no central topic, even if Keith Glass said it's about NBA player's sense of entitlement, it doesn't come out that way since there are chapters that digress from this subject. Reading the book, it switches from an autobiography, to the pratfalls of being an honorable agent to stories about his clients to an advice on how to improve the US Men's Basketball team. The topics meander and Glass seems to be trying hard to be a comedy writer in his next life. Still, Taking Shots is an enjoyable if not (very) light read. It is not in the level of Terry Pluto's Loose Balls or as controversial as Phil Jackson's last book. The supposed subject on what makes the NBA fail today (as written in sleeves) is not discussed in-depth and if it was discussed, the writing is not that clear to be understood what the point is all about. Keith Glass, being an agent, should've called his agent so he could've secured a good editor for his book.



3. My largest disappointment with this book was the lack of focus on the agent aspect of Glass's life. The stories were about his clients, and there are some situation he's found himself that are the result of being an agent, but they often weren't about actually what it was like to be an agent. Negotiation tales were vague and general, most of the players he told stories about were non-stars if not entirely unrecognizable.
   
   His portion of the book that addressed what was wrong with the NBA was hardly a revelation; I think most people know that the basketball being played in the NBA is lousy, so that assessment from Glass is not shattering any illusions. Further, his suggestions for how to "fix" the NBA are pipe dreams, at best, even if some would make sense.
   
   There is enough humor and behind-the-scenes type of stories to keep the book interesting, but there's an awful lot of pages for what seems like very little substance. The content does not live up to the expectations created by the title.
   
   Finally, and this is a very picky detail, there are typos galore in this book. I generally thought books had editors to catch such things, but there is a variety of glaring errors throughout.



4. Keith Glass tells a great tale, and his many years of experience representing NBA players has given him many to tell. Glass' book is a great insight into the other side of the NBA that the general public would otherwise have no access to. But one of the greatest elements of this book is Glass' true passion for the sport, and for the part he has played in it.
   
   The book looks at Glass' upbringing, with basketball in his life from a very young age. Glass discusses how Larry Brown ended up living with his family, how Glass saw the evolution of basketball, and how he became a coach at UCLA. There's a very nostalgic and homely feel to these earlier chapters, and they definitely show a man who really loves the game and loves the relationships he has been able to establish through it.
   
   The book then looks at Glass' adventures in representing top level NBA stars and how he came into this career. The greatest stories in here are the tale of Mahamoud Abdul-Rauf, the making of Scott Skiles (current head coach of the Chicago Bulls) and the sad story of Thomas Hamilton. It really is the stories like Hamilton's, a seven-foot-four giant with exquisite skills who could never get his NBA career started due to personal problems, that make this book. The power this story has is it makes you look at how some people can throw their God-given talent away, which gives you perspective to appreciate what you have in your life.
   
   The latter chapters lack the same level of interest, as Glass discusses the various ways he NBA could improve the league and take it back to it's roots more, and further away from the greed-driven monster it has become. Glass makes some great points, but they could have been better illustrated through his stories, rather than telling the reader, point-blank. His various tales deliver this message through subtlety and through reading between the lines of what's going on, so to have this opinion forced onto the reader in the end weakened the overall tone of the writing a bit.
   
   It also plays down some of Glass' other failings, in that he makes little to no mention of his previous marriages and doesn't discuss things he has done that he has regretted. It seems, at times, that Glass is a little too ethical in a world of no ethics, and to survive in this arena, Glass says himself, you can't always hold to your morals. There would appear to be a level of censorship and restraint at times. The book could have had more effect if there were no barriers, no holds barred.
   
   There are also two times that Glass refers to the story of Lloyd Daniels, and says that he would need an entire book of it's own to tell Daniels' story. Lloyd Daniels was shot three times in the late eighties and still, to this day, has a bullet lodged in his right shoulder. He never played in college, yet went on to play for five NBA teams. Now that's a story I want to hear. Daniels' story should have made the book, even in brief form.
   
   At the end of the book you get the sense that this is the story Keith Glass wanted to tell in exactly the way he wanted to tell it, which is not so bad, but it felt like it could have explored so much more about the dark side of the glamourous life of pro-ballers. As it stands, it's an interesting read, great at times, but overall more focussed on presenting a portrait of a man who loves the game and who holds a special place in his heart for 'his' players. Again, this is not so bad, but a but more controversy and a couple more first-hand accounts of back-room dealings would have made this a more important and compulsive book.



5. I recently met Keith Glass and his wife at a college graduation party for my niece. His son, Tyler, is dating my niece, and my sister-in-law, knowing that I'm a sports fan, made sure I was introduced to Keith because, as she put it, "You know sports, you'll like him." Well, she was right. After a few minutes I realized that I did, indeed, like him. When the book came up in conversation I told Keith that I would order it from Amazon as soon as I got home, and I'm glad that I did. This was a very entertaining read. OK, it's not going to be used as a textbook in school, and it's got its share of glaring typos (I proof read books as a favor to friends who are authors) but if you're a basketball fan you're going to love this book. Keith is truly an "insider" and gives perspectives that can only be gotten from an insider. His anecdotes are filled with conversations that you would normally not hear anywhere. One, in particular, stands out. Keith used to represent the former Chris Jackson, who subsequently became Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, whom you may recognize as the Denver Nuggets player who refused to stand for the National Anthem after he converted to Islam. Keith's insight into Mahmoud's background and battle with Tourette's Syndrome is very helpful in understanding him. Heck, just imagining a Jewish agent representing a Muslim player is fun.
   At then end of the book Keith decides to opine on his "ways to fix basketball" and , while some are dead-on and interesting, I found some to be, in fact, either ideas that we've all bandied about in tavern conversation, or non-implementable. Still, it doesn't detract from the overall "fun-to-read" aspect of the book. I sense a follow-up to this book from Keith and, if so, I'll be sure to get the next one. I've already promised to lend the book out to my son-in-law and a good friend in Massachusetts, so Keith will be losing out on a few book sales. When it does return to me I'm going to see what I can do about getting him to autograph my copy.

5 comments about The Doing of the Thing: The Brief, Brilliant Whitewater Career of Buzz Holmstrom (New Edition).

1. Anyone remotely interested in white water rafting will thoroughly love this book. Buz Holstrom was a true Maverick in the sport. The authors bring him to life through their wonderful narrative and easy writing style. He is truly an individual that was remarkably talented in his boat building and navigational skills. This book left me wanting more of Buzz Holstrom and wishing he were still around to tell us more about his short remarkable life.



2. The legendary Buzz Holmstrom was a more complex figure than I knew. His journal entries express the feeling of all who really love rivers and the famous entry that includes "the doing of the thing" should be read on every river trip.
   This is the second Brad Dimock book I've read (the other on Bert Loper) and I am impressed with not only his skill as a writer, but his careful research. His handling of the tragic end to Buzz Holmstrom's life was that of a journalist with a sense of humanity.
   I've already loaned this book to friends.



3. If you like white water rafting, this is a wonderful book about the birth of white water fun.



4. Even today, with rescue not so far away, few of us would have the nerve to go down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon alone, so imagine the nerve it took when Buzz was totally alone, with no chance of help if he made a mistake. But the most amazing thing about Buzz was that in the midst of an adventure that would leave most people totally preoccupied with survival, Buzz had the soul power to look for and see the poetry in the river and the canyon. Merely knowing how to survive can be much easier than knowing how to live.



5. I remember years ago when I was a kid a story my father told me about an amazing river rafter and boat builder. My Dad grew up in Coquille and went to school with Buzz's younger brother. His story always ended with how Buzz had been on a rafting trip in eastern Oregon and went off and committed suicide. I could never understand how someone who had done the amazing things he did could end his life on that note. I thought about that story many times over the years and always wished I knew more. This book is incredibly well researched and documented. Even though many questions were answered, many more were raised. Such was the enigma that was Buzz Holmstrom.

5 comments about Three Finger: The Mordecai Brown Story.

1. If you want to know more about Mordecai Brown, this is the book. The book appears to have been thoroughly researched, and it seems unlikely a future writer or historian will be able to add much to the story. The quality of the writing isn't great, but it is solid, and the organization and clarity of the presentation is good. If you're trying to pick out a book to entertain your teenager, this is probably not it. But if the goal is to learn more about this fascinating baseball star who is too often overlooked when the all-time greatest lists are assembled, you won't do better than this book.



2. As a Deadball Era fan and researcher, I have been waiting for this biography for several years. Three Finger Brown was one of the main keys to the Cubs' success from 1906-1910, when they were the premier team of the National League. Cindy Thomson and Scott Brown have done their homework in the research that they did for this book, and they have also made it a highly enjoyable and easy read, despite the amount of research that backs up their writing.
   
   This book is also good for general baseball readers who want to read about one of the greatest pitchers in the game. And of course, Cubs fans will enjoy it, as pointed out by the introduction by Ferguson Jenkins. Finally, it is a tribute to a man who overcame a disability with hard work, humility, and grace.



3. I have hundreds of baseball books in my library including several biograhies. I found this book to be okay, but certainly not up to the standards of other five star books I have. Mordecai Brown is certainly worthy of a biography, but parts of the book didn't hold my interest the way I thought it would. I did find some interesting anecdotes such as Chicago Federal League owner Charles Weegham locating seats near the field (today's Wrigley Field) to be fan friendly, introducing concession stands so vendors wouldn't block the fans' view, and allowing fans to keep foul balls as souvenirs. Another interesting story is a conversation that baseball great George Sisler had with Brown following their retirement from the game regarding baseball when Sisler was in Terre Haute, Indiana, scouting for the Brooklyn Dodgers, and neither knew who the other was until somewhat into the conversation. Several of Brown's teammates died in the year 1947 and Brown, himself, passed away in 1948 the same year as the Babe. Incidentally, the name of former Brooklyn Dodger outfielder Pete Reiser is misspelled on page 206. The author has it spelled "Reecer". It is not a typo since it is spelled the same way in the index. The book was an okay read, and three stars is not bad. However, it certainly doesn't rate as a baseball classic by any means, and probably wasn't meant to be.



4. It took longer than it should have for a bio of this early twentieth century top pitcher to be written, considering some of the baseball bios that have been produced. Perhaps the greatest Cub pitcher ever, Mordecai Brown was also a kind, good man. This book provides good insight into his life, and some photos never before published. If anything, it could have used a bit more detail on his pitching, at least in regular season games. But we are treated to detail on some of the famous Mathewson-Brown match-ups (Brown won the career duel), and the World series appearances.
   
   Brown is the hero, but his success and abilities are underplayed, if anything. That's a relief next to several current books about players whose authors are trying to get them into the Hall of Fame. A pleasurable, easy read. The baseball stats are reliable except in one instance where the authors must have had a petite mal seizure. Page 78 states that Brown's 213 innings pitched in 1908 were "more than any other single year in his career." The number is a typo for 312, but anyway, as the authors later note, Brown pitched 343 innings the following year. But not to worry, this is a unique lapse, and pointed out here only to help readers, or correct any future edition. Thanks for this book!



5. Remember the last time the Cubs won the World Series? Mordecai Brown was one of the starting Pitchers. For you Cubs fans this is a another book on one of the keystones of those World Series years. This is a light read not too heavy, but well worth the price. Learn about another baseball great who was a great person and lived a simple life not full full of scandal. An example of a person who overcame life's problem and became a decent and humble person. I am proud to say he is from Indiana!

5 comments about Yzerman: The Making of a Champion.

1. Douglas Hunter's subtitle "The Making of a Champion" tells the prospective reader what the author's focus is, as does the introduction. He sticks within those parameters and does a fairly good job of relating Yzerman's growth as a player throughout his career. I won't reiterate previous reviewers' listing of some factual errors. Those errors were annoying and caused me to subtract a rating star. I wasn't too bothered by the lack of information on his family because they were obviously a portion of Yzerman's maturation. Overall it's worth reading, although you may want to avail yourself of your local library's resources to obtain it because it's not a keeper for rereading, as Boys of Summer is.



2. Yzerman by Douglas Hunter is a revealing portrait of how an individual star player becomes a champion by transforming his game to a more defensive all around skilled player. He sacrifices his personal time to achieve team-based success and improves the players and organization around him. The book is packed with detail on the draft and how the organization built the team around him. Yzerman gets in depth on how the star changed from a goal scoring all about points man, to the captain who would do the checking or dice in front of a puck. Hunter talks about his off ice experience that Yzerman has throughout his career.
   
   Douglas Hunter has never met or even talked to the famous Stevie Y while he writes this book and probably from my take on the book never even saw him play. As I read Yzerman I found the book was very bland. It was hard to keep reading and picking it up because it was just packed with detail and a bunch of nonsense that had really nothing to do with Yzerman too much. The book just doesn't grab your attention the way watching Steve Yzerman play does. That kind of took the excitement from the book. Yzerman is a great star today and he doesn't really show off his talent but just makes hockey look so easy. He sacrifices his body often and will pass before he ever shoots. I think the book kind of takes away Steve's relaxed playing style. I wouldn't really recommend this book unless you're a die-hard Yzerman fan or a detail wiz.



3. Let's see, what can I say that might actually be helpful. Let me preface this by saying that I'm a die-hard Detroit sports fan, and have been ever since I moved to Michigan in 1984. I love the Tigers more than anything, but Yzerman is my favorite athlete of all time.
   
   In doing research for any book, a competent author would usually have pages and pages of notes. Through careful editing, only the most important and relevant details would actually be placed in the book itself. However, in this book, Hunter's laziness is evident. It looks as if he conducted maybe 7 or 8 interviews for this book, and in order to fill space, inserted every mundane detail of every interview into this book. The bibliography is shamefully short. Hunter even has the audacity to use information from his book about Tim Horton and insert it into this book to try and fill space. What does Tim Horton have to do with Steve Yzerman? Nothing. I'm not even going to start on the factual inaccuracies.
   
   In addition, the narrative is lost and directionless. Hunter keeps the narrative jumping around in time, going off on tangents that don't contribute anything but waste the reader's time. Hunter also fails to provide details of Yzerman's on ice career, aside from cumulative season statistics. This makes me think that Hunter did not watch Yzerman play much, because anyone who saw Yzerman in his prime would want to describe Yzerman's electrifying play. There isn't even any satisfactory mention of Yzerman's Game 7 overtime winner against St. Louis.
   
   Bottom line, it looks like Hunter was churning this out to try and fill the vacuum in the market for Yzerman books. Do a couple interviews, surf a couple websites, write a crappy book, make a quick buck. This book is very poorly and lazily written; it might be the worst thing I've ever read. And I read a lot. It is a disgrace to Yzerman, books, authors, and humanity. Do not buy this book.



4. I was ecstatic when I saw a book based solely on Steve Yzerman was finally being published. I was completely misguided. This book wasn't about Steve Yzerman the person/hockey all-star, this book was about all the things that happened around Yzerman over the last 3 decades. I was also horrified that the author never even interviewed Yzerman. Makes me think I should write a book. I know Gerard Gallant would talk to me and I know that I would remember that he coached the Summerside Hemphill Pontiac Western Capitals who won the Royal Bank Cup in 1997. Which leads me to the comment that not only was this book a huge disappointment because it gave us nothing about the real Yzerman, but it was replete with errors. Essentially it is wrong to have this book in the non-fiction section of the bookstore because most of the information is so inaccurate that the novel is fictional. Don't waste your money.



5. I read Hunter's book on Scotty Bowman and thoroughly enjoyed it. Likewise, "Yzerman" is a good book told by this strong storyteller. The factual errors (noted here in other reviews) brought the breezy read to a screeching halt for me, but it didn't prevent me from liking it and sending my copy on to friends. If you're a Detroiter (or a transplant) you'll enjoy the look back on Yzerman's early days with the Wings - which went largerly unnoticed thanks to the Tigers surge in the standings. The factual stuff is the only reason I give it a four-star and not a five. I highly recommend the Bowman book.

5 comments about The Player: Christy Mathewson, Baseball, and the American Century.

1. I agree with just about all the positive and negative critisms I've read here about this book. It's definitely worth reading...but just don't expect too much.



2. When I was given this book, the gift-bearer informed me that it was the perfect gift for me, "... a book about baseball AND U.S. history.". Being the grateful recipient of said gift I of course bit my tongue, didn't respond, "How do you separate the two?", and accepted the gift in the spirit it was given. Now, after reading it, I realize how smart my niece is. The book is indeed about both, and without wandering too far from its subject, (Christy, in case there is some confusion), is a very enagaging read. Similar books about this time period in baseball tend to get repetitive and somewhat choppy to read by piecing together newspaper reports and box scores. This author alleviates that problem by also tracking events in the U.S., (and the world as 1914 approaches), while Christy pitches his way through his baseball career. This is recommended for baseball novices, hard core fans and anyone in between as it's a nicely written book.



3. "The Player" provided a trip back in time to what it was like playing ball around the turn of the century through the times of the first World War.
   
   To understand what Mathewson meant to the game itself is truly amazing. Not only being a phonomenal pitcher with exceptional control, he realized that he was a role model for others, not only the young kids that idolized him, but the everyday american worker. To know what he gave of himself to others off the ball field, his charity work, volunteering for WWI at the age of 37, gives us a better insight to the individual.
   
   The book also tells of his attempts to clean up the game, before the Black Sox scandal. He knew it was going on, tried to warn others, but no one would listen.
   
   A great read if you want to get a much clearer insight into one of the greatest ball players of all time. One that is unfortunatelly forgotten by too many in today's game.



4. This book is a decent read but it is less a biography of Mathewson than it is a commentary on the times and events that he lived through. I had hoped to learn about who Christy Mathewson was and what made him so great and instead I felt like I read an overview of the major events in baseball and history during the late 1800's to the mid 1900's.



5. As a fan of baseball history, I have been looking for a modern, definitive biography of Christy Mathewson ever since I grew to admire him many years ago. I was hoping that Philip Seib's The Player would be that elusive work, but I was wrong. Although it covers the major events of Matty's life, Seib works very hard to put him in context as the first major baseball star and the times that he lived in, so what we're left with is less of a biography and more of a social history.

   This is all well and good, and the premise is an interesting one, except that Seib doesn't take it far enough and when he tries to expound on his theory, he ends up giving more info on other figures of the times like Billy Sunday and Woodrow Wilson than on Mathewson.

   Almost contradictorally, the main problem is that it all just feels too thin. At less than 200 pages it's a one and a half day read at best and you come away not knowing anything more about Mathewson than you would reading any history of baseball. Were I Seib's editor, I would have recommended that he go in the opposite direction and really blow out his research. Joseph Durso wrote an excellent double biography of John McGraw and Casey Stengel that captured the general history of American society as well as baseball and that is clearly what Seib is aspiring to but falls short.

   I don't want to knock the book too much since I enjoy general history as much as anyone, but I guess I just expected so much more. Also, Seib labors in spots to draw his conclusions and ends up being extremely repetitive. His reverence for Mathewson is well-appreciated, but borders on overindulgence.

   If you are interested in reading more on Mathewson, I would recommend seeking out the Jonathan Yardley essay "The Real Frank Merriwell" for a terrific mini-bio and tribute to a great pitcher.

5 comments about Corner Men: The GreatBoxing Trainers.

1. This is one of those books that's tough to read "just once";there are no dull spots-or characters in it.For anyone who loves reading about boxing characters,you can debate endlessly about which colorful character in this terrific book makes the most impact;teachers in any field should put this book in their required reading lists.Two of the chapters in this classic are devoted to Freddie Brown and Ray Arcel;seeing them in Roberto Duran's corner was like seeing my grandparents at my Bar Mitzvah.



2. I picked this up on a recommendation from a friend who's into boxing. That's the last time I ever ask him for advice. I found in a used bookstore on a recent visit overseas to Prague.

   While its obvious Mr. Fried has knowledge. he doesn't know how craft a project that makes you want to keep turning the page. Its just information. His book has all the depth and warmth of the back of a trading card. He must have spent months putting this book together but to what end, a boring book.

   You want good boxing books try:
   Night Train. The Sonny Liston Story. By Nick Tosches

   And

   Finnegan. Self Portrait of A Fighting Man. By Chris Finegan




3. All the chapters in this book were captivating. Ronald Fried shows that the most interesting and knowledgeable people in boxing are the trainers. The chapters on Whitey Bimstein and Charley Goldman truly give a flavor of New York when Stillman's gym was still the epicenter of boxing.



4. If you appreciate A. J. Liebling, then you'll be delighted by Fried's important book. He clearly has a great passion for his subject, and it comes through. He captures the lingo and the feel of an earlier era with precision and subtlety.



5. Forget the title! This is a "How To" book. How To Box, How To Win Fights, How To Lose Fights and, even, How To Watch Fights - but especially How To Write the Best-ever Boxing Book.