In the exclusive behind the scenes look, sports fans can unlock the fascinating history of the channel that changed the way people watch and interact with their favorite teams.It began, in 1979, as a mad idea of starting a cable channel to televise local sporting events throughout the state of Connecticut. Today, ESPN is arguably the most successful network in modern television history, spanning eight channels in the Unites States and around the world. But the inside story of its rise has never been fully told-until now.Drawing upon over 500 interviews with the greatest names in ESPN's history and an All-Star collection of some of the world's finest athletes, bestselling authors James Miller and Tom Shales take us behind the cameras. Now, in their own words, the men and women who made ESPN great reveal the secrets behind its success-as well as the many scandals, rivalries, off-screen battles and triumphs that have accompanied that ascent. From the unknown producers and business visionaries to the most famous faces on television, it's all here.

Twentieth-anniversary edition of a baseball classic, with a new epilogue by Jim Bouton.When first published in 1970, Ball Four stunned the sports world. The commissioner, executives, and players were shocked. Sportswriters called author Jim Bouton a traitor and "social leper." Baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn tried to force him to declare the book untrue. Fans, however, loved the book. And serious critics called it an important social document. Today, Jim Bouton is still not invited to Oldtimer's Days at Yankee Stadium. But his landmark book is still being read by people who don't ordinarily follow baseball.

Sam Smith’s seminal, New York Times bestselling “eye-opener” (The San Diego Union-Tribune) on Michael Jordan and the 1990-1991 Chicago Bulls team—perfect for fans of ESPN’s hit documentary series The Last Dance.This is the book that changed the way the world viewed Michael Jordan, while delivering nonstop excitement, tension, and thrills.The Jordan Rules chronicles the season that changed everything for Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls. After losing in the playoffs to the “Bad Boys” Detroit Pistons for three consecutive years, the Bulls finally broke through and swept the Pistons in the 1991 Eastern Conference Finals, on the way to their first NBA championship.Celebrated sportswriter Sam Smith was there for the entire ride. He reveals a candid and provocative picture of Michael Jordan during the season in which his legacy began to be defined, and seeks to figure out what drove him. The Jordan Rules covers everything from his stormy relationships with his coaches and teammates and power struggles with management—including verbal attacks on general manager Jerry Krause and tantrums against coach Phil Jackson—to Jordan’s obsessions with becoming the leading scorer, and his refusal to pass the ball in the crucial minutes of big games. Jordan’s teammates also tell their side of the story, from Scottie Pippen, to Horace Grant, to Bill Cartwright. And Phil Jackson—the former flower child who blossomed into one of the NBA’s top motivators and finally found a way to coax Jordan and the Bulls to their first title—is studied up close.“Smith takes us into the locker room, aboard the team plane and team bus, and seats us on the bench during games. Sometimes, books reflecting on a team’s success don’t reach the personal level with the people who made it happen: The Jordan Rules does” (Associated Press).Discover the team behind the man, and the man behind the living legend, in this intense, fascinating inside story of the incomparable Michael Jordan.

A Woman's Game explores the history of women's football from the Victorian era to the present day. It is the story of a rise, fall, and rise again: from the game's first appearance in England in the late 19th century; through the incredible Dick, Kerr Ladies team that at its height in 1920 drew 53,000 spectators to Goodison Park; to its 50-year ban in the UK and the aftershocks when that ban was lifted.Now, as the women's game is once again on an unstoppable upward trend, with a record 6.3m viewers for England's match against Scotland in the 2019 World Cup, Suzanne Wrack considers what the next chapter of this incredible story might be. From its relationship to the worldwide fight against oppression, to its ability to inspire change in wider at large, this is both a history of football as played by women, and a manifesto for a better game.

Billy Beane, the Oakland A’s general manager, is leading a revolution. Reinventing his team on a budget, he needs to outsmart the richer teams. He signs undervalued players whom the scouts consider flawed but who have a knack for getting on base, scoring runs, and winning games. Moneyball is a quest for the secret of success in baseball and a tale of the search for new baseball knowledge—insights that will give the little guy who is willing to discard old wisdom the edge over big money.

BOOKS

Decades after it spent weeks at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list, A Season on the Brink remains the most celebrated basketball book ever written—an unforgettable chronicle of his year spent following the Indiana Hoosiers and their fiery coach Bob Knight.Granted unprecedented access to legendary coach Bob Knight and the Indiana Hoosiers during the 1985–86 season, John Feinstein saw and heard it all—practices, team meetings, strategy sessions, and midgame huddles—as the team worked to return to championship form. The result is an unforgettable chronicle that not only captures the drama and pressure of big-time college basketball but also paints a vivid portrait of a complex, brilliant coach as he walks the fine line between genius and madness. This anniversary edition features an updated Introduction by Feinstein.

“Whether you are interested in football or not, this is tears-running-down-your-face funny, read-bits-out-loud-to-complete-strangers funny, but also highly perceptive and honest about Hornby’s obsession and the state of the game.” —GQA brilliant memoir from the beloved, bestselling author of Dickens and Prince, Funny Girl, and High Fidelity.In America, it is soccer. But in Great Britain, it is the real football. No pads, no prayers, no prisoners. And that’s before the players even take the field.Nick Hornby has been a football fan since the moment he was conceived. Call it predestiny. Or call it preschool. Fever Pitch is his tribute to a lifelong obsession. Part autobiography, part comedy, part incisive analysis of insanity, Hornby’s award-winning memoir captures the fever pitch of fandom—its agony and ecstasy, its community, its defining role in thousands of young men’s coming-of-age stories. Fever Pitch is one for the home team. But above all, it is one for everyone who knows what it really means to have a losing season.

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ANDSAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE BESTSELLERThe legendary Willie Mays shares the inspirations and influences responsible for guiding him on and off the field in this reflective and inspirational memoir."Even if, like me, you thought you had pretty much read and heard all there was to read and hear about Willie Mays, this warmhearted book will inform and reward you. And besides, what true baseball fan can ever get enough of Willie Mays? Say Hey! Read on and enjoy." ―From the Foreword by Bob Costas“It’s because of giants like Willie that someone like me could even think about running for President.” ―President Barack ObamaWidely regarded as the greatest all-around player in baseball history because of his unparalleled hitting, defense and baserunning, the beloved Willie Mays offers people of all ages his lifetime of experience meeting challenges with positivity, integrity and triumph in 24: Life Stories and Lessons from the Say Hey Kid.Presented in 24 chapters to correspond with his universally recognized uniform number, Willie’s memoir provides more than the story of his role in America’s pastime. This is the story of a man who values family and community, engages in charitable causes especially involving children and follows a philosophy that encourages hope, hard work and the fulfillment of dreams.“I was very lucky when I was a child. My family took care of me and made sure I was in early at night. I didn’t get in trouble. My father made sure that I didn’t do the wrong thing. I’ve always had a special place in my heart for children and their well-being, and John Shea and I got the idea that we should do something for the kids and the fathers and the mothers, and that’s why this book is being published. We want to reach out to all generations and backgrounds. Hopefully, these stories and lessons will inspire people in a positive way.” ―Willie Mays

**Winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Autobiography**Included in President Obama’s 2016 Summer Reading List“Without a doubt, the finest surf book I’ve ever read . . . ” —The New York Times MagazineBarbarian Days is William Finnegan’s memoir of an obsession, a complex enchantment. Surfing only looks like a sport. To initiates, it is something else: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous pastime, a way of life.Raised in California and Hawaii, Finnegan started surfing as a child. He has chased waves all over the world, wandering for years through the South Pacific, Australia, Asia, Africa. A bookish boy, and then an excessively adventurous young man, he went on to become a distinguished writer and war reporter. Barbarian Days takes us deep into unfamiliar worlds, some of them right under our noses—off the coasts of New York and San Francisco. It immerses the reader in the edgy camaraderie of close male friendships forged in challenging waves.Finnegan shares stories of life in a whites-only gang in a tough school in Honolulu. He shows us a world turned upside down for kids and adults alike by the social upheavals of the 1960s. He details the intricacies of famous waves and his own apprenticeships to them. Youthful folly—he drops LSD while riding huge Honolua Bay, on Maui—is served up with rueful humor. As Finnegan’s travels take him ever farther afield, he discovers the picturesque simplicity of a Samoan fishing village, dissects the sexual politics of Tongan interactions with Americans and Japanese, and navigates the Indonesian black market while nearly succumbing to malaria. Throughout, he surfs, carrying readers with him on rides of harrowing, unprecedented lucidity.Barbarian Days is an old-school adventure story, an intellectual autobiography, a social history, a literary road movie, and an extraordinary exploration of the gradual mastering of an exacting, little-understood art.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A deeply affecting coming-of-age memoir about family, love, loss, basketball—and life itself—by the beloved author of The Prince of Tides and The Great SantiniDuring one unforgettable season as a Citadel cadet, Pat Conroy becomes part of a basketball team that is ultimately destined to fail. And yet for a military kid who grew up on the move, the Bulldogs provide a sanctuary from the cold, abrasive father who dominates his life—and a crucible for becoming his own man.With all the drama and incandescence of his bestselling fiction, Conroy re-creates his pivotal senior year as captain of the Citadel Bulldogs. He chronicles the highs and lows of that fateful 1966–67 season, his tough disciplinarian coach, the joys of winning, and the hard-won lessons of losing. Most of all, he recounts how a group of boys came together as a team, playing a sport that would become a metaphor for a man whose spirit could never be defeated.Praise for My Losing Season“A superb accomplishment, maybe the finest book Pat Conroy has written.”—The Washington Post Book World“A wonderfully rich memoir that you don’t have to be a sports fan to love.”—Houston Chronicle“A memoir with all the Conroy trademarks . . . Here’s ample proof that losers always tell the best stories.”—Newsweek“In My Losing Season, Conroy opens his arms wide to embrace his difficult past and almost everyone in it.”—New York Daily News“Haunting, bittersweet and as compelling as his bestselling fiction.”—Boston Herald

"One evening late in his life, veteran sportswriter Mike Sullivan was asked by his son what he remembered best from his three decades in the press box. The answer came as a surprise. "I was at Secretariat's Derby, in '73. That was...just beauty, you know?"" John Jeremiah Sullivan didn't know, not really: the track had always been a place his father disappeared to once a year on business, a source of souvenir glasses and of inscrutable passions in his Kentucky relatives. So Sullivan decided to educate himself. He spent two years following horses across the country. He watched one season's juvenile crop prepare for the Triple Crown, and he tracked the animal's evolution in literature and art, from the ponies that appeared on the walls of European caves thirty thousand years ago, to the mounts that carried the Indo-European language to the edges of the Old World, to the finely tuned but fragile yearlings that are auctioned off for millions of dollars apiece every spring and fall.

The heartbreaking story of college athlete Madison Holleran, whose life and death by suicide reveal the struggle of young people suffering from mental illness today in this #1 New York Times Sports and Fitness bestseller.If you scrolled through the Instagram feed of 19-year-old Maddy Holleran, you would see a perfect life: a freshman at an Ivy League school, recruited for the track team, who was also beautiful, popular, and fiercely intelligent. This was a girl who succeeded at everything she tried, and who was only getting started. But when Maddy began her long-awaited college career, her parents noticed something changed. Previously indefatigable Maddy became withdrawn, and her thoughts centered on how she could change her life. In spite of thousands of hours of practice and study, she contemplated transferring from the school that had once been her dream.When Maddy's dad, Jim, dropped her off for the first day of spring semester, she held him a second longer than usual. That would be the last time Jim would see his daughter. What Made Maddy Run began as a piece that Kate Fagan, a columnist for espnW, wrote about Maddy's life. What started as a profile of a successful young athlete whose life ended in suicide became so much larger when Fagan started to hear from other college athletes also struggling with mental illness.This is the story of Maddy Holleran's life, and her struggle with depression, which also reveals the mounting pressures young people -- and college athletes in particular -- face to be perfect, especially in an age of relentless connectivity and social media saturation.

The astonishing true story of the Rwandan Cycling Team.Where there is hope there can be redemption.Meet Adrien Niyonshuti, a member of the Rwandan cycling team. Adrien was seven years old when he lost his family in the 1994 genocide that tore Rwanda apart. Almost twenty years later he has a shot at representing his country at the Olympics.Meet Jock Boyer, the coach of Team Rwanda. One of the top American cyclists of all time, Jock recognises the innate talent for endurance that the Rwandans possess. A man with a dark past, Jock is in need of a second chance.Meet Tom Ritchey, the visionary inventor of the mountain bike and the U.S. money man looking to recover from a profound personal crisis.In The Land of Second Chances, Tim Lewis charts the incredible true story of the Rwandan cycling team as they overcome impossible odds to inspire a nation.

In a city mired in endless decay, where the youth suffer through all the horrors of urban blight, hope comes in a most unassuming form: a tiny brick schoolhouse run by two Felician nuns where a singular basketball genius takes teenagers from the mean streets of Jersey City and turns them into champions on the hardcourt. Coach Bob Hurley had been working miracles at St. Anthony High School for over thirty years, winning state and national championships and offering his players rescue from their surroundings through college scholarships, when he met his most dysfunctional team yet. In The Miracle of St. Anthony Adrian Wojnarowski follows Hurley through a gripping and heartrending season as he struggles to lead a troubled team to glory through his unparalleled understanding of the game and his ceaseless determination to see no more children lost to these streets.In The Miracle of St. Anthony, acclaimed sports journalist Adrian Wojnarowski follows Hurley through a gripping and heartrending season, as he struggles to lead a troubled team to glory through his unparalleled understanding of the game and his ceaseless determination to see no more children lost to the city streets.

Celebrate one of the greatest and most beloved baseball players who ever lived—and certainly the most quoted. The Yogi Book is the New York Times bestseller filled with Yogi Berra’s immortal sayings, plus photographs, a career timeline, and appreciations by some of his greatest fans, including Billy Crystal and Tim McCarver.Yogi Berra's gift for saying the smartest things in the funniest, most memorable ways has made him a legend. The Yogi Book brings all of his famous quotes together in one place—and even better, gives the story behind them. "It ain't over till it's over."—that’s Yogi's answer to a reporter when he was managing the Mets in July 1973, and they were nine games out of first place (not only quotable, but prophetic—they won the pennant). "Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded."—Yogi's comment to Stan Musial and Joe Garagiola about Ruggeri's restaurant in St. Louis in 1959. "It gets late early out there."—Yogi describing how shadows crept across Yankee Stadium's left field during late autumn afternoons.

An account of the ascent of the 21,000ft Siula Grande peak in the Peruvian Andes. Joe Simpson and his climbing partner, Simon Yates, had achieved the summit before the first disaster struck. What happened and how they dealt with the psychological traumas that resulted is the subject of this book.

The book behind the Academy award-winning film starring Sandra Bullock and Tim McGraw―over one million copies sold.When we first meet him, Michael Oher is one of thirteen children by a mother addicted to crack; he does not know his real name, his father, his birthday, or how to read and write. He takes up football, and school, after a rich, white, Evangelical family plucks him from the streets. Then two great forces alter Oher: the family's love and the evolution of professional football into a game where the quarterback must be protected at any cost. Our protagonist becomes the priceless package of size, speed, and agility necessary to guard the quarterback's greatest vulnerability, his blind side.

In this instant and tenacious New York Times bestseller, Nike founder and board chairman Phil Knight “offers a rare and revealing look at the notoriously media-shy man behind the swoosh” (Booklist, starred review), illuminating his company’s early days as an intrepid start-up and its evolution into one of the world’s most iconic, game-changing, and profitable brands.Bill Gates named Shoe Dog one of his five favorite books of the year and called it “an amazing tale, a refreshingly honest reminder of what the path to business success really looks like. It’s a messy, perilous, and chaotic journey, riddled with mistakes, endless struggles, and sacrifice. Phil Knight opens up in ways few CEOs are willing to do.”Fresh out of business school, Phil Knight borrowed fifty dollars from his father and launched a company with one simple mission: import high-quality, low-cost running shoes from Japan. Selling the shoes from the trunk of his car in 1963, Knight grossed eight thousand dollars that first year. Today, Nike’s annual sales top $30 billion. In this age of start-ups, Knight’s Nike is the gold standard, and its swoosh is one of the few icons instantly recognized in every corner of the world.But Knight, the man behind the swoosh, has always been a mystery. In Shoe Dog, he tells his story at last. At twenty-four, Knight decides that rather than work for a big corporation, he will create something all his own, new, dynamic, different. He details the many risks he encountered, the crushing setbacks, the ruthless competitors and hostile bankers—as well as his many thrilling triumphs. Above all, he recalls the relationships that formed the heart and soul of Nike, with his former track coach, the irascible and charismatic Bill Bowerman, and with his first employees, a ragtag group of misfits and savants who quickly became a band of swoosh-crazed brothers.Together, harnessing the electrifying power of a bold vision and a shared belief in the transformative power of sports, they created a brand—and a culture—that changed everything.

Boys Will Be Boys, author Jeff Pearlman’s rollicking, completely unabashed account of the glory days of “America’s Team”—the NFL Dallas Cowboys of the 1990s—was a New York Times bestseller in hardcover and selected by GQ as one of the Best Books of the Year. The uncensored exploits of Michael Irvin, Deion Sanders, Emmitt Smith, Troy Aikman, and the rest of the ’Boys on and off the football field, Boys Will Be Boys makes for riveting, shocking, often wildly hilarious reading.

Winner of the 1995 William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award, this work tells the story of an unusually turbulent year on the PGA tour. It profiles stars, such as Nick Price, Tom Watson and Greg Norman, and captures the non-stop pressures of a high-profile sport with virtually no off-season.

Nobody’s baseball story is like Roy Halladay’s.He was born and raised to be a superstar. He was a first-round draft pick in 1995. He nearly threw a no-hitter in his second big-league start in 1998. But two years later, Halladay suffered arguably the worst season by any pitcher in baseball history. He was months away from being out of the game.Hall of Fame pitchers do not struggle like that. But Halladay vowed to change. He altered his pitching mechanics and rewired his brain to become one of the greatest pitchers of all time. How did Doc do it? Doc: The Life of Roy Halladay tells the remarkable story; based on more than 100 interviews with Halladay’s family, friends, managers, coaches, teammates, and competitors, including extensive interviews with his wife, Brandy; comprehensive archival research; and previously unpublished commentary from Halladay himself. Doc not only tells the story of Halladay’s illustrious baseball career in Toronto and Philadelphia, but his hard-driven adolescence, his lifelong personal struggles, and his motivation to pay forward the knowledge and philosophies that helped him achieve baseball greatness before his tragic death in 2017.This essential biography is a testimonial for baseball players and pitchers from high school to the big leagues still searching for their path to excellence, like Halladay. It’s also a celebration and a profound exploration of a generational pitcher and a beloved teammate, friend, and family man.

Adams writes what it's like playing with the best players in the game, from Gazza to Dennis Bergkamp; and working with some of the most successful managers, including George Graham, Terry Venables, Glenn Hoddle and Arsene Wenger. But above all, his story is that of a winner, a man who has brought the intense determination he has shown on the field to his recovery from illnesses off it. Adams recalls openly his descent into alcohol addiction, which at one point saw him jailed for drink-driving. Just as he was finding his feet again after the slow rehabilitation process, problems with his marriage surfaced and soon after Adams found himself heading for a divorce. He talks honestly about that traumatic period in his life and also about the pressures and demands of being a top-class footballer in the modern era.

“Raw, powerful and disturbing—a head-spinning take on Mr. Tyson's life.”—Wall Street JournalPhilosopher, Broadway headliner, fighter, felon—Mike Tyson has defied stereotypes, expectations, and a lot of conventional wisdom during his three decades in the public eye. Bullied as a boy in the toughest, poorest neighborhood in Brooklyn, Tyson grew up to become one of the most ferocious boxers of all time—and the youngest heavyweight champion ever. But his brilliance in the ring was often compromised by reckless behavior. Yet—even after hitting rock bottom—the man who once admitted being addicted “to everything” fought his way back, achieving triumphant success as an actor and newfound happiness and stability as a father and husband. Brutal, honest, raw, and often hilarious, Undisputed Truth is the singular journey of an inspiring American original.

#1 New York Times Bestseller * “A whirlwind of a biography that reads honest and true.” —The Wall Street Journal * “There is beauty and awe in this perfectly pitched biography.” —The New York Times * “Comprehensive, propulsive...and unsparing.” —The New YorkerBased on years of reporting and hundreds of interviews with people from every corner of Tiger Woods’s life this is “a searing biography of golf’s most blazing talent” (GOLF Magazine)—who has made one of the most remarkable comebacks of all time.In 2009, Tiger Woods was the most famous athlete on the planet, a transcendent star of almost unfathomable fame and fortune living what appeared to be the perfect life. But it turned out he had been living a double life for years—one that exploded in the aftermath of a Thanksgiving night crash that exposed his serial infidelity and sent his personal and professional lives over a cliff. In this “searing biography of golf’s most blazing talent” (GOLF magazine), Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian dig deep behind the headlines to produce a richly reported answer to the question that has mystified millions of sports fans for nearly a decade: who is Tiger Woods, really?Drawing on more than four hundred interviews with people from every corner of Woods’s life—many of whom have never spoken about him on the record before—Benedict and Keteyian construct a captivating psychological profile of a mixed race child programmed by an attention-grabbing father and the original Tiger Mom to be the “chosen one,” to change not just the game of golf, but the world as well. But at what cost? Benedict and Keteyian provide the starling answers in this definitive biography that is destined to linger in the minds of readers for years to come.“Irresistible…Immensely readable…Benedict and Keteyian bring us along for the ride in a whirlwind of a biography that reads honest and true” (The Wall Street Journal). Ultimately, Tiger Woods is “a big American story…exhilarating, depressing, tawdry, and moving in almost equal measure” (The New York Times).

Paper Lion

Following the 1985 final between Dennis Taylor and Steve Davis, Britain found itself in the grip of a new sporting obsession. Snooker, or 'Coronation Street with balls', was suddenly big business and 1986 was set to be a crucial year. In one corner was Barry Hearn and his Romford Mafia - Davis, Taylor and Griffiths - and in the other were the bad boys - Higgins, White and Knowles - threatening the game's good name, and its earning potential. For one year, Gordon Burn travelled with this snooker circus, from Hong Kong and China to out of season resorts in the North of England and the season's finale in Sheffield. With unprecedented access to the leading players and personalities involved, Pocket Money affords a unique snapshot into an extraordinary time and place.

There is no college ball more passionate and competitive than football in the Southeastern Conference, where seven of the twelve schools boast stadiums bigger than any in the NFL and 6.5 million fans hit the road every year to hoot and holler their teams to victory.\nIn September 2006, popular sports columnist and lifelong University of Tennessee fan Clay Travis set out on his "Dixieland Delight Tour." Without a single map, hotel reservation, or game ticket, he began an 8,000-mile journey through the beating heart of the Southland. As Travis toured the SEC, he immersed himself in the bizarre game-day rituals of the common fan, brazenly dancing with the chancellor's wife at a Vanderbilt frat party, hanging with University of Florida demigod quarterback Tim Tebow, and abandoning himself totally to the ribald intensity and religious fervor of SEC football. Dixieland Delight is Travis's hilarious, loving, irreverent, and endlessly entertaining chronicle of a season of ironic excess in a world that goes a little crazy on football Saturdays.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * Now a 10-part docuseries on Apple TV+From the #1 New York Times bestselling coauthor of Tiger Woods comes the definitive inside story of the New England Patriots—the greatest sports dynasty of the 21st century.It’s easy to forget that the New England Patriots were once the laughingstock of the NFL, a nearly bankrupt team that had never won a championship and was on the brink of moving to St. Louis. Everything changed in 1994, when Robert Kraft acquired the franchise and soon brought on board head coach Bill Belichick and quarterback Tom Brady. Since then, the Patriots have become a juggernaut, making ten trips to the Super Bowl, winning six of them, and emerging as one of the most valuable sports franchises in the world.How was the Patriots dynasty built? And how did it last for two decades? In The Dynasty, acclaimed journalist Jeff Benedict provides richly reported answers in a sweeping account based on exclusive interviews with more than two hundred insiders—including team executives, coaches, players, players’ wives, team doctors, lawyers, and more—as well as never-before-seen recordings, documents, and electronic communications.Through his exhaustive research, Benedict uncovers surprising new details about the inner workings of a team notorious for its secrecy. He puts us in the room as Robert Kraft outmaneuvers a legion of lawyers and investors to buy the team. We listen in on the phone call when the greatest trade ever made—Bill Belichick for a first-round draft choice—is negotiated. And we look over the shoulder of forty-year-old Tom Brady as a surgeon operates on his throwing hand on the eve of the AFC Championship Game in 2018.But the portrait that emerges in The Dynasty is more rewarding than new details alone. By tracing the team’s epic run through the perspectives of Kraft, Belichick, and Brady—each of whom was interviewed for the book—the author provides a wealth of new insight into the complex human beings most responsible for the Patriots’ success.The result is an intimate portrait that captures the human drama of the dynasty’s three key characters while also revealing the secrets behind their success. “The Dynasty is…[a] masterpiece…It’s a relationship book, it’s a football book, it’s a business book…you’ll just eat up these stories” (Colin Cowherd).

Provided You Dont Kiss Me

The legendary Paul "Bear" Bryant is recognized nationwide as one of the greatest coaches ever. So why did he always cite his 1-9 A&M team of 1954 as his favorite? This is the story of a remarkable team--and the beginning of the legend.\nThe Junction Boys tells the story of Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant's legendary training camp in the small town of Junction, Texas. In a move that many consider the salvation of the Texas A&M football program, Coach Bryant put 115 players through the most grueling practices ever imagined. Only a handful of players survived the entire 10 days, but they braved the intense heat of the Texas sun and the burning passion of their coach, and turned a floundering team into one of the nation's best. The Junction Boys is more than just a story of tough practices without water breaks. An extraordinary fellowship was forged from the mind-numbing pain. The thirty-five survivors bonded together like no other team in America. They profited from the Junction experience; the knowledge they took back with them to College Station, about themselves and what they were capable of, would be used for the rest of their lives. \nIn vivid and powerful images reminiscent of Friday Night Lights, Hoosiers, and The Last Picture Show, these young men and their driven coach come to life. The Junction Boys contains all the hallmarks of a classic sports story, and it combines America's love of college football with an extraordinary story of perseverance and triumph.

How money, guts, and greed built the Warriors dynasty -- and then took it apartThe Golden State Warriors dominated the NBA for the better part of a decade. Since the arrival of owner Joe Lacob, they won more championships and sold more merchandise than any other franchise in the sport. And in 2019, they opened the doors on a lavish new stadium.Yet all this success contained some of the seeds of decline. Ethan Sherwood Strauss's clear-eyed exposé reveals the team's culture, its financial ambitions and struggles, and the price that its players and managers have paid for all their winning. From Lacob's unlikely acquisition of the team to Kevin Durant's controversial departure, Strauss shows how the smallest moments can define success or failure for years.And, looking ahead, Strauss ponders whether this organization can rebuild after its abrupt fall from the top, and how a relentless business wears down its players and executives. The Victory Machine is a defining book on the modern NBA: it not only rewrites the story of the Warriors, but shows how the Darwinian business of pro basketball really works.

Named a Best Book of 2020 by NPR and Lit Hub. A Los Angeles Times Bestseller. A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice"In The Cactus League [Emily Nemens] provides her readers with what amounts to a miniature, self-enclosed world that is funny and poignant and lovingly observed." --Charles McGrath, The New York Times Book ReviewAn explosive, character-driven odyssey through the world of baseballJason Goodyear is the star outfielder for the Los Angeles Lions, stationed with the rest of his team in the punishingly hot Arizona desert for their annual spring training. Handsome, famous, and talented, Goodyear is nonetheless coming apart at the seams. And the coaches, writers, wives, girlfriends, petty criminals, and diehard fans following his every move are eager to find out why―as they hide secrets of their own.Humming with the energy of a ballpark before the first pitch, Emily Nemens's The Cactus League unravels the tightly connected web of people behind a seemingly linear game. Narrated by a sportscaster, Goodyear’s story is interspersed with tales of Michael Taylor, a batting coach trying to stay relevant; Tamara Rowland, a resourceful spring-training paramour, looking for one last catch; Herb Allison, a legendary sports agent grappling with his decline; and a plethora of other richly drawn characters, all striving to be seen as the season approaches. It’s a journey that, like the Arizona desert, brims with both possibility and destruction.Anchored by an expert knowledge of baseball’s inner workings, Emily Nemens's The Cactus League is a propulsive and deeply human debut that captures a strange desert world that is both exciting and unforgiving, where the most crucial games are the ones played off the field.

"One of the most insightful books ever written about college football." - The New York Times"Easily among the best sports books of the new millennium."- Paul Finebaum, columnist and radio hostIn this unprecedented look at college football’s secret season, Bruce Feldman rips the cover off the game’s frenzied pursuit of raw talent, taking you deep inside the SEC war room of recruiting legend Ed Orgeron,the combustible Cajun who helped build national championship teams at the University of Miami and at USC. In a stunning, blow-by-blow account of the year leading up to National Signing Day 2007, the award-winning journalist shadows Orgeron and his Ole Miss assistants as they set about hunting high school students, pleading, plotting, and inventing ways to lure them to their sleepy Oxford campus. Packed with candid confessions and outrageous off-the-field action, Meat Market makes what happens on the field seem almost tame by comparison.

Return once again to the enduring account of life in the Mojo lane, to the Permian Panthers of Odessa -- the winningest high school football team in Texas history. Odessa is not known to be a town big on dreams, but the Panthers help keep the hopes and dreams of this small, dusty town going. Socially and racially divided, its fragile economy follows the treacherous boom-bust path of the oil business.In bad times, the unemployment rate barrels out of control; in good times, its murder rate skyrockets. But every Friday night from September to December, when the Permian High School Panthers play football, this West Texas town becomes a place where dreams can come true. With frankness and compassion, Bissinger chronicles one of the Panthers' dramatic seasons and shows how single-minded devotion to the team shapes the community and inspires-and sometimes shatters-the teenagers who wear the Panthers' uniforms. Includes Reader's Group Guide inside. Now a major motion picture starring Billy Bob Thorton.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the author of the runaway phenomenon Unbroken comes a universal underdog story about the horse who came out of nowhere to become a legend.Seabiscuit was one of the most electrifying and popular attractions in sports history and the single biggest newsmaker in the world in 1938, receiving more coverage than FDR, Hitler, or Mussolini. But his success was a surprise to the racing establishment, which had written off the crooked-legged racehorse with the sad tail. Three men changed Seabiscuit’s fortunes:Charles Howard was a onetime bicycle repairman who introduced the automobile to the western United States and became an overnight millionaire. When he needed a trainer for his new racehorses, he hired Tom Smith, a mysterious mustang breaker from the Colorado plains. Smith urged Howard to buy Seabiscuit for a bargain-basement price, then hired as his jockey Red Pollard, a failed boxer who was blind in one eye, half-crippled, and prone to quoting passages from Ralph Waldo Emerson. Over four years, these unlikely partners survived a phenomenal run of bad fortune, conspiracy, and severe injury to transform Seabiscuit from a neurotic, pathologically indolent also-ran into an American sports icon.Praise for Seabiscuit“Fascinating . . . Vivid . . . A first-rate piece of storytelling, leaving us not only with a vivid portrait of a horse but a fascinating slice of American history as well.”—The New York Times“Engrossing . . . Fast-moving . . . More than just a horse’s tale, because the humans who owned, trained, and rode Seabiscuit are equally fascinating. . . . [Laura Hillenbrand] shows an extraordinary talent for describing a horse race so vividly that the reader feels like the rider.”—Sports Illustrated“REMARKABLE . . . MEMORABLE . . . JUST AS COMPELLING TODAY AS IT WAS IN 1938.”—The Washington Post

This wonderful 1980 horse racing classic never loses its luster or charm. Author Bill Barich explores explores the day-to-day internal world of horse racing― from the backside to the backstretch. This entertaining story of the lives and tribulations of various racetrack personalities is sure to extract every human emotion. The author's summer adventure after a family tragedy finds him living the life many diehard racing enthusiasts wish they could. Barich's adventure discovers more than he could ever imagine about something much bigger than racing-life itself.

The first book from the legendary New Yorker writer John McPhee, tells about Bill Bradley when he was the best basketball player Princeton had ever seen.When John McPhee met Bill Bradley, both were at the beginning of their careers. In A Sense of Where You Are,McPhee delineates for the reader the training and techniques that made Bradley the extraordinary athlete he was, and this part of the book is a blueprint of superlative basketball. But athletic prowess alone would not explain Bradley's magnetism, which is in the quality of the man himself―his self-discipline, his rationality, and his sense of responsibility.Here is a portrait of Bradley as he was in college, before his time with the New York Knicks and his election to the U.S. Senate―a story that suggests the abundant beginnings of his professional careers in sport and politics.

The hugely acclaimed novel of '70s football and the turmoil of the game's most charismatic and controversial manager, from the bestselling author of GB84 and Red or Dead.In 1974 the brilliant and controversial Brian Clough made perhaps his most eccentric decision: he accepted the position of Leeds United manager. A successor to Don Revie, his bitter adversary, Clough was to last just 44 days.In one of the most acclaimed British novels of recent years - subsequently made into a film starring Michael Sheen - David Peace takes us into the mind and thoughts of Ol' Big 'Ead himself, and brings vividly to life one of football's most complex and fascinating characters.

John Feinstein's illuminating recollections from two decades of interviews with sports legends. John Feinstein's career is a sports fan's dream-a lifetime of encounters with the great figures in sports, not just on the field, but in the locker room and behind the scenes with legends like Bob Knight, Dean Smith, Mike Krzyzewski, Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, and John McEnroe. Since his days as a young Washington Post journalist, Feinstein has written twenty-eight books and countless magazine articles and newspaper columns, covering college basketball, golf, tennis, baseball, and very nearly every sport in between. He has told us of victory and defeat, of athletes and coaches we love -- and love to hate. But some of his best stories have been left untold, until now. One on One is an incredible portal into the sports we love-from the box scores and the pageantry of game night and into the hard work and intensity that turn players and coaches into legends.

#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Far more than a superb memoir about the highest levels of professional tennis, Open is the engrossing story of a remarkable life. • "Agassi’s memoir is just as entrancing as his tennis game.” —Time“Honest in a way that such books seldom are.” —The New York TimesAndre Agassi had his life mapped out for him before he left the crib. Groomed to be a tennis champion by his moody and demanding father, by the age of twenty-two Agassi had won the first of his eight grand slams and achieved wealth, celebrity, and the game’s highest honors. But as he reveals in this searching autobiography, off the court he was often unhappy and confused, unfulfilled by his great achievements in a sport he had come to resent.Agassi writes candidly about his early success and his uncomfortable relationship with fame, his marriage to Brooke Shields, his growing interest in philanthropy, and—described in haunting, point-by-point detail—the highs and lows of his celebrated career.

For years, many of Sports Illustrated's 21 million readers turned first to the magazine's last page, because that's where they find SI's most popular feature: the Life of Reilly column, written by best-selling author Rick Reilly. A 22-year veteran of Sports Illustrated and a 10-time National Sportswriter of the Year, Reilly took over SI's back page in 1998, and his column immediately attracted a devoted following, including the legions of fans who helped make his first collection, The Life of Reilly, a New York Times best seller in 2000. Now comes Hate Mail from Cheerleaders, 100 of Reilly's favorites, along with a new foreword and column postscripts by the author. Alternately sidesplitting and heartwarming but always opinionated and provocative, these pieces are the best work by the best columnist in the business.

“An amazing book…all the iconic photographs that people took of The Champ.” —Barack ObamaGREATEST OF ALL TIME: A TRIBUTE TO MUHAMMAD ALI is a book with the power, courage, depth, creativity, and dazzling energy of its extraordinary subject. Slimmed down from the heavyweight Collector’s Edition, this bantamweight edition is smaller in size, but pulls no punches on its expertise, passion, and insight on The Champ.With thousands of images, including photography, art, and memorabilia and two gatefold sequences, the book pays vivid tribute to The Greatest both in and outside of the ring. Original essays and five decades’ worth of interviews and writing explore the courage, convictions, and extraordinary image-building that made Ali one of the most recognizable and inspirational individuals on the planet, an icon not only as an extraordinary athlete, but also as an impassioned advocate of social justice, interfaith understanding, and peace.

Noted author Darius James introduces and edits the Spring 2017 editions of the Feral House Coloring Book for Adults Series. As author of the classics That's Blaxploitation and Negrophobia: An Urban Parable, James is the perfect person to co-curate the volume created in honor of Ali.As Darius says of Ali: “Just as he was for many Americans, Muhammad Ali’s appearance on the cultural landscape was a turning point in my life. The moment he proclaimed ‘I am the greatest,’ he demonstrated it was possible to speak truth to power. This is a quality Ali reflected throughout his life.”

A.J. Liebling's classic New Yorker pieces on the "sweet science of bruising" bring vividly to life the boxing world as it once was.The Sweet Science depicts the great events of boxing's American heyday: Sugar Ray Robinson's dramatic comeback, Rocky Marciano's rise to prominence, Joe Louis's unfortunate decline. Liebling never fails to find the human story behind the fight, and he evokes the atmosphere in the arena as distinctly as he does the goings-on in the ring--a combination that prompted Sports Illustrated to name The Sweet Science the best American sports book of all time.

The definitive biography of an American icon, from a New York Times best-selling author with unique access to Ali’s inner circleHe was the wittiest, the prettiest, the strongest, the bravest, and, of course, the greatest (as he told us himself). Muhammad Ali was one of the twentieth century’s most fantastic figures and arguably the most famous man on the planet.But until now, he has never been the subject of a complete, unauthorized biography. Jonathan Eig, hailed by Ken Burns as one of America’s master storytellers, radically reshapes our understanding of the complicated man who was Ali. Eig had access to all the key people in Ali’s life, including his three surviving wives and his managers. He conducted more than 500 interviews and uncovered thousands of pages of previously unreleased FBI and Justice Department files, as well dozens of hours of newly discovered audiotaped interviews from the 1960s. Collectively, they tell Ali’s story like never before—the story of a man who was flawed and uncertain and brave beyond belief.“I am America,” he once declared. “I am the part you won’t recognize. But get used to me—black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own. Get used to me.”He was born Cassius Clay in racially segregated Louisville, Kentucky, the son of a sign painter and a housekeeper. He went on to become a heavyweight boxer with a dazzling mix of power and speed, a warrior for racial pride, a comedian, a preacher, a poet, a draft resister, an actor, and a lover. Millions hated him when he changed his religion, changed his name, and refused to fight in the Vietnam War. He fought his way back, winning hearts, but at great cost. Like so many boxers, he stayed too long.Jonathan Eig’s Ali reveals Ali in the complexity he deserves, shedding important new light on his politics, religion, personal life, and neurological condition. Ali is a story about America, about race, about a brutal sport, and about a courageous man who shook up the world.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The astonishing and hugely entertaining story that completely changed the way we run. An epic adventure that began with one simple question: Why does my foot hurt?“Equal parts quest, physiology treatise, and running history.... The climactic race reads like a sprint.... It simply makes you want to run.” —Outside MagazineIsolated by Mexico's deadly Copper Canyons, the blissful Tarahumara Indians have honed the ability to run hundreds of miles without rest or injury. In a riveting narrative, award-winning journalist and often-injured runner Christopher McDougall sets out to discover their secrets. In the process, he takes his readers from science labs at Harvard to the sun-baked valleys and freezing peaks across North America, where ever-growing numbers of ultra-runners are pushing their bodies to the limit, and, finally, to a climactic race in the Copper Canyons that pits America’s best ultra-runners against the tribe. McDougall’s incredible story will not only engage your mind but inspire your body when you realize that you, indeed all of us, were born to run.Look for Born to Run 2, out now!

There were mythic sports figures before him--Jack Johnson, Babe Ruth, Joe Louis, Joe DiMaggio--but when Cassius Clay burst onto the sports scene from his native Louisville in the 1950s, he broke the mold. He changed the world of sports and went on to change the world itself. As Muhammad Ali, he would become the most recognized face on the planet. Ali was a transcendent athlete and entertainer, a heavyweight Fred Astaire, a rapper before rap was born. He was a mirror of his era, a dynamic figure in the racial and cultural battles of his time. This unforgettable story of his rise and self-creation, told by a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer, places Ali in a heritage of great American originals.Cassius Clay grew up in the Jim Crow South and came of athletic age when boxers were at the mercy of the mob. From the start, Clay rebelled against everything and everyone who would keep him and his people down. He refused the old stereotypes and refused the glad hand of the mob. And, to the confusion and fury of white sportswriters, who were far more comfortable with the self-effacing Joe Louis, Clay came forward as a rebel, insistent on his political views, on his new religion, and, eventually, on a new name. His rebellion nearly cost him the chance to fight for the heavyweight championship of the world.King of the World features some of the pivotal figures of the 1960s--Malcolm X, Elijah Muhammad, John F. Kennedy--and its pivotal events: the civil rights movement, political assassinations, the war in Vietnam. Muhammad Ali is a great hero and a beloved figure in American life. King of the World takes us back to the days when his life was a series of battles, inside the ring and out. A master storyteller at the height of his powers, David Remnick has written a book worthy of America's most dynamic modern hero.

The true story of the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team and the Miracle on Ice, which Sports Illustrated called the greatest moment in sports history—with a new afterword by Ken Morrow for the fortieth anniversary of the Miracle on Ice“An unvarnished and captivating read.”—ParadeOnce upon a time, they taught us to believe. They were the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team, a blue-collar bunch led by an unconventional coach. Their “Miracle on Ice” has become a national fairy tale, but the real Cinderella story is even more remarkable.Wayne Coffey casts a fresh eye on this seminal sports event, giving readers an ice-level view of the amateurs who took on a Russian hockey juggernaut at the height of the Cold War. He details the unusual chemistry of the Americans—formulated by their fiercely determined coach, Herb Brooks—and seamlessly weaves portraits of the boys with the fluid action of the game itself. Coffey also traces the paths of the players and coaches since their stunning victory, examining how the Olympic events affected their lives.Told with warmth and an uncanny eye for detail, The Boys of Winter is an intimate, perceptive portrayal of one Friday night in Lake Placid and the enduring power of the extraordinary.

Norman Mailer's, "The Fight" focuses on the 1975 World Heavyweight Boxing Championship in Kinshasa, Zaire. Muhammad Ali met George Foreman in the ring. Foreman's genius employed silence, serenity and cunning. He had never been defeated. His hands were his instrument, and 'he kept them in his pockets the way a hunter lays his rifle back into its velvet case'. Together the two men made boxing history in an explosive meeting of two great minds, two iron wills and monumental egos.

The new edition of this bestseller in hardcover features never-before-published, all-new inside info on the money, personalities and politics of pro-tennis: Jimmy, Monica, Boris, Martina, et al. Now in paper.

The Tour de France is sport's most compelling battle -- an annual cauldron of heroism and treachery, spectacle and controversy, mind-games and endurance.But the 1986 Tour stands out as the year in which a show-stopping rivalry had spectators across the world gripped.When Greg LeMond -- a blue-eyed, blonde-haired Californian boy, dubbed 'L'American' -- won the 1986 Tour, he made history. The first non-European to win the Yellow Jersey, he broke the Old World stranglehold and changed the face of the competition.But LeMond's victory was hard won. It was seemingly snatched from the jaws of the man ominously dubbed 'The Badger'. Frenchman Bernard 'Le Blaireau' Hinault was five times winner of the Tour and as tough as boots. After winning the 1985 Tour, in which LeMond came a close second, Hinault vowed to return for one final Tour, and with a single purpose: to help LeMond win.But could Hinault be trusted? As the race circled France, he repeatedly attacked LeMond. Hinault claimed to the press that his apparent treachery was merely intended to make LeMond stronger. But LeMond, who didn't believe him, became increasingly fearful, anxious and paranoid.The Tour is renowned for its psychological complexity - but what played out in 1986 was unheard of. Why was Hinault putting his own teammate in jeopardy? Would LeMond crack under the pressure? Something sinister was going on but no one - not even LeMond -- knew quite what.Slaying the Badgerrelives the adrenaline, the agony, the camaraderie, the betrayals, and the pure exhilaration of the 1986 Tour. Richard Moore has interviewed all the key players including the story's two enigmatic, eccentric and fiercely different protagonists. As he delves behind the scenes, the biggest conundrum of Tour history is finally laid bare.

Open an autobiography. Coaxed to swing a racket while still in the crib, forced to hit hundreds of balls a day while still in grade school, Agassi resented the constant pressure even as he drove himself to become a prodigy, an inner conflict that would define him. Now, in his beautiful, haunting autobiography, Agassi tells

It was the World Cup semi-finals. On 4th July, 1990, in a stadium in Turin, Gazza cried, England lost and football changed forever.This is the inside story of Italia '90 - we meet the players, the hooligans, the agents, the journalists, the fans. Writer Pete Davies was given nine months full access to the England squad and their manager Bobby Robson. One Night in Turin is his thrilling insider account of the summer when football became the greatest show on earth.

The Twentieth Anniversary Edition As a young boy, growing up in London and watching his parents' marriage fall apart, Nick Hornby - author of High Fidelity, About a Boy and The Complete Polysyllabic Spree - had little sense of home. Then his dad took him to Highbury. Arsenal's football ground would become the source of many of the strongest feelings he'd ever have: joy, humiliation, heartbreak, frustration and hope. In this hilarious, moving and now-classic book, he vividly depicts his childhood life, his time as a teacher, and his first loves (after football), all through the prism of the game, as he insightfully and brilliantly explores obsession, and the way it can shape a life.

Described by Robert Lipsyte as 'the high point of American sports journalism', John McPhee's Levels of the Game, nominally about a tennis match between two of the greats of tennis history, redefined what it meant to be a sports writer. Written by four-times finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction, Levels of the Game is the best tennis book ever written, dealing with human behaviour, race, politics and the divisions of the country, all told through a single game of tennis. Levels of the Game is a narrative of a tennis match played by Arthur Ashe and Clark Graebner at Forest Hills in 1968, beginning with the ball rising into the air for the initial serve and ending with the final point. In between, McPhee provides a brilliant, stroke-by-stroke description, while examining the backgrounds and attitudes which have molded the players' games. Arthur Ashe thinks that Clark Graebner, a middle-class white conservative dentist's son from Cleveland, plays stiff and compact Republican tennis. Graebner acknowledges that this is true, and for his part thinks that, because Ashe is black and from Richmond, Ashe's tennis game is bold, loose, liberal, flat-out Democratic, When physical assets are about equal, psychology is paramount to any game.

Through 1996 and 1997 bestselling author Joe Mc Ginniss followed the Italian football season from Castel di Sangro, a small town nestled in the Abruzzi region of Italy. The motley crew that comprised the di Sangro soccer team in the early 90s masked an unparalleled prowess for playing soccer. This is the story of a team and a town with no aspirations, just a passion for the game, and how that passion allowed this team to rise to the top of the professional Italian soccer league. With the lust for life of Robert Crichton's THE SECRET OF SANTA VITTORIA and the sporting dreams of modern movie classic FIELDS OF DREAMS, THE MIRACLE OF CASTEL DI SANGRO is an ebullient story of how a two-hour game transformed a dot on the map into a place of magic, miracles and wonder.

Poker players Johnny Moss, Pug Pearson, and Titanic Thompson; tennis player Bobby Riggs; pool player Minnesota Fats; and backgammon player Tim Holland have come away with their pockets filled and their sense of infallibility intact. The dramatic descriptions of the ambience and the games are riveting, but more intriguingly, Jon Bradshaw deftly probes these gamblers’ minds and hearts as he attempts to define what makes some men winners and most losers.

A scorching and deeply personal autobiography lifting the lid on the life and character of one of English rugby's most successful ever players Brian Moore, or "Pitbull" as he came to be known during nearly a decade at the heart of the England rugby team's pack, established himself as one of the game's original hard men at a time when rugby was still an amateur sport. Since his retirement, he has earned a reputation as an equally uncompromising commentator, never afraid to tell it as he sees it and lash out at the money men and professionals that have made rugby into such a different beast. Yet, for all his bullishness on and off the pitch, there also appears a more unconventional, complicated side to the man. A solicitor by trade, Moore's love of fine wine, career experience as a manicurist, and preference for reading Shakespeare in the dressing room before games, mark him out as anything but the stereotypical rugby player, and in Beware of the Dog, Moore lays open with astounding frankness the shocking events, both personal and professional, that have gone towards shaping him over the years. Presenting an unparalleled insight into the mind of one of British rugby's greatest players and characters, Beware of the Dog is a uniquely engaging and upfront sporting memoir.

Diego Maradona, is arguably the greatest and certainly the most widely-known footballer of the modern age. During his tempestuous career he played for top clubs in South America and Europe, and was a central figure in four World Cups. With the fortunes he has earned from sponsorship and transfer deals, he personified football, both as popular sport and big business. Jimmy Burns pursued his research in several countries on both sides of the Atlantic, gaining access to Maradona's inner circle, and to other key witnesses, such as players, managers, trainers, doctors and officials. The result is a story straddling the international scene, from the slums of Buenos Aires, where Maradona was born, to the huge stadiums of the United States from where, in 1994, he was ignobly expelled after undergoing a positive drugs test. In his rise to fame - and notoriety - Maradona played for some of the world's greatest Boca Juniors, Napoli and Barcelona. He scored some brilliant goals - and cheated with others. He provoked fans into a mass hysteria of adulation, and his enemies into sinister campai. Now, as coach of Argentina, he is leading the country into the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. This new edition brings the story of Maradona completely up to date.

The #1 New York Times Bestseller"Lewis has such a gift for storytelling…he writes as lucidly for sports fans as for those who read him for other reasons." ―Janet Maslin, New York TimesWhen we first meet him, Michael Oher is one of thirteen children by a mother addicted to crack; he does not know his real name, his father, his birthday, or how to read or write. He takes up football, and school, after a rich, white, Evangelical family plucks him from the streets. Then two great forces alter Oher: the family’s love and the evolution of professional football itself into a game where the quarterback must be protected at any cost. Our protagonist becomes the priceless package of size, speed, and agility necessary to guard the quarterback’s greatest vulnerability, his blind side.

Winner of the William Hill Sports Book of the Year, the biography of Robert Enke, the international footballer with the world at his feet who took his own lifeHere, award-winning writer Ronald Reng pieces together the puzzle of his lost friend's life. On November 10, 2009, the German national goalkeeper, Robert Enke, stepped in front of a passing train. He was 32 years old. Viewed from the outside, Enke had it all. He was a professional goalkeeper who had played for a string of Europe's top clubs, including Jose Mourinho's Benfica and Louis Van Gaal's Barcelona, and was destined to be his country's first choice for years to come. But beneath the bright veneer of success lay a darker story. Reng brings into sharp relief the specific demands and fears faced by those who play top-level sport. Heartfelt, but never sentimental, he tells the universal tragedy of a talented man's struggles against his own demons.

The Death of Ayrton Senna

This is soccer comic-ery, but not as you know it. Welcome to the comically brilliant and politically engaging work of illustrator David Squires, artist extraordinaire. Soccer and comics. Once a hearty Saturday combination to match cartoons and cereal, in recent years they’ve drifted apart.Thankfully for us, David Squires is here to change all that. Based out of Sydney, his soccer comics have appeared everywhere from the Guardian to Pickles Magazine. In a sport full of handsome paychecks and corporate sponsors, his work casts a critical eye over corrupt backroom workings and helps pierce soccer’s overblown balloon. This book is an anthology of some of David's best work. WARNING! Is sure to ignite debate and spark hilarity.

In this compelling and sensationally honest book, Paul Kimmage strips away the public facade of an international football star. Tony Cascarino is a man scarred by childhood, haunted by indiscretion and troubled by a secret from his past. A man struggling to find answers as he speeds towards the most terrifying juncture in sport. The End.

Between 1980 and 1993, Simon Hughes was a regular on the county circuit, playing for Middlesex until 1991 before moving on to Durham at the end of his career. In that time, he played alongside some of the great characters in cricket: Mike Brearley, Mike Gatting, Phil Edmonds and Ian Botham. This is not an autobiography of a good county pro, but a look at the ups and downs, the lifestyle, the practical jokes and sheer hard yakka that make such a poorly paid, insecure job appeal to so many. Now a respected journalist and broadcaster, Simon Hughes has written a brilliant, amusing and wrily self-depracating book, packed with hilarious and embarrassing anecdotes about some of the greatest cricketers of the last 20 years.

A beautifully written and moving account of the author’s search for the man his father was, and the life he led as a well-known footballer at a time when the men who played the game, and those who watched it, led fundamentally the same lives together in the same communities.