The Boston Red Sox's loss to the New York Yankees in the final game of last year's playoffs has been called 'the game of the century,' evidence that the rivalry between the Red Sox and the Yankees is hotter than ever. In the wake of that defeat, author and Boston Globe sports columnist Dan Shaughnessy has updated his bewitching story of the curse that has lain over the Red Sox since they sold Babe Ruth to the hated Yankees in 1920. Here he sheds light on classic Sox debacles from Johnny Pesky's so- called hesitation throw, to the horrifying dribbler that slithered between Bill Buckner's legs, to last year's stunning extra-inning home run that kept the Sox without a World Championship for yet another year. Lively and filled with anecdotes, this is baseball folklore at its best.
The Winners Manual: For the Game of Life shares Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel's "Big Ten" fundamentals for success: Attitude, Discipline, Faith, Handling Adversity & Success, Excellence, Love, Toughness, Responsibility, Team, and Hope. Peppered with personal stories from Coach Tressel's storied coaching career, this book shares the fundamental lessons that he has been imparting to his players and coaching staffs for the past 20 years. A perfect blend of football stories, spiritual insights, motivational reading, and practical application, The Winners Manual provides an inside look at the core philosophy that has positively impacted the lives of thousands of student athletes and served as the foundation for two of the most successful college football programs of all time. Includes 8 pages of color photos and a foreword from NYT best-selling author John Maxwell. All of the proceeds from the book are being donated directly to the William Oxley Thompson Memorial Library Renovation Campaign.
Other features:
-Each chapter closes with a practical application section, where readers will be "coached" on how they can apply the lessons imparted throughout the book to their own lives, via the establishment of measurable goals.
-Provides a rare inside glimpse into the mind of one of the most respected coaches in college football history and into the huddle of one of the most successful football programs of all time.
-Filled with hundreds of inspirational stories, quotes and anecdotes.
Wisecracking sports broadcaster Kenny Mayne keeps dubious score of sports' absurdities, true and unsubstantiated history, off-the-wall trivia, and all things real and possibly made-up in this hilarious book.
Drawing on rare access to an NFL team's players, coaches, and facilities, the author of the New York Times bestseller Word Freak trains to become a professional-caliber placekicker. As he sharpens his skills, he gains surprising insight into the daunting challenges---physical, psychological, and intellectual---that pro athletes must master.
What does it take to be a real team player, especially in a society that glorifies selfishness and a corporate culture that often uses 'team player' as a buzzword but rewards only the showboaters and prima donnas? Well, You Can Observe a Lot by Watching. In this happy and hilarious guide to teamwork, sportsmanship, and winning, Yogi Berra draws on the timeless wisdom handed down by example from ballplayers who came before him to inspire you to make the right choices and become not only a better team player - at sports, at work, and in life - but a better person. Filled with colorful stories from his life and career, not to mention the down-to-earth wit and insight that Yogi fans love, You Can Observe a Lot by Watching shows you how to make a bad team good and a good team great.
Pete Sampras is arguably the greatest tennis player ever, a man whose hard-nosed work ethic led to an unprecedented number one world ranking for 286 consecutive weeks, and whose prodigious talent made possible a record-setting fourteen Grand Slam titles. While his more vocal rivals sometimes grabbed the headlines, Pete always preferred to let his racket do the talking.
Until now.
In A Champion's Mind, the tennis great who so often exhibited visible discomfort with letting people "inside his head" finally opens up. An athletic prodigy, Pete resolved from his earliest playing days never to let anything get in the way of his love for the game. But while this single-minded determination led to tennis domination, success didn't come without a price. The constant pressure of competing on the world's biggest stage-in the unblinking eye of a media machine hungry for more than mere athletic greatness-took its toll.
Here for the first time Pete speaks freely about what it was like to possess what he calls "the Gift." He writes about the personal trials he faced-including the death of a longtime coach and confidant-and the struggles he gutted his way through while being seemingly on top of the world. Among the book's most riveting scenes are an early devastating loss to Stefan Edberg that led Pete to make a monastic commitment to delivering on his natural talent; a grueling, four-hour-plus match against Alex Corretja during which Pete became seriously ill; fierce on-court battles with rival and friend Andre Agassi; and the triumphant last match of Pete's career at the finals of the 2002 U.S. Open.
In A Champion's Mind, one of the most revered, successful, and intensely private players in the history of tennis offers an intimate look at the life of an elite athlete.
Das Hörbuch erzählt von blonden Heldenskippern, Regatta-Rächern, segelnden Aussteigern, Hundewachen und perfekt gemixten Anlege-Drinks. Für alle die weder Wellen, Gischt, Mast- und Schotbruch fürchten.
'Der Körper bewegt sich im Rhythmus des Schiffes. Man beginnt eins zu werden mit dem Meer. Es wird dabei kräftig unterstützt vom Wind. Wenn die beiden nicht wollen, dann kann kein Mensch dagegen an. Wobei es durchaus Möglichkeiten gibt, Meer und Wind ein bisschen auszutricksen. Man nennt das Segeln.'
Originally drawn to the game by his father, Carl Hiaasen wisely quit golfing in 1973. But some ambitions refuse to die, and as the years–and memories of shanked 7-irons faded, it dawned on Carl that there might be one thing in life he could do better in middle age than he could as a youth. So gradually he ventured back to the dreaded driving range, this time as the father of a five-year-old son–and also as a grandfather.
"What possesses a man to return in midlife to a game at which he'd never excelled in his prime, and which in fact had dealt him mostly failure, angst and exasperation? Here's why I did it: I'm one sick bastard." And thus we have Carl's foray into a world of baffling titanium technology, high-priced golf gurus, bizarre infomercial gimmicks and the mind-bending phenomenon of Tiger Woods; a maddening universe of hooks and slices where Carl ultimately–and foolishly–agrees to compete in a country-club tournament against players who can actually hit the ball. "That's the secret of the sport's infernal seduction," he writes. "It surrenders just enough good shots to let you talk yourself out of quitting."
Hiaasen's chronicle of his shaky return to this bedeviling pastime and the ensuing demolition of his self-esteem–culminating with the savage 45-hole tournament–will have you rolling with laughter. Yet the bittersweet memories of playing with his own father and the glow he feels when watching his own young son belt the ball down the fairway will also touch your heart. Forget Tiger, Phil and Ernie. If you want to understand the true lure of golf, turn to Carl Hiaasen, who offers an extraordinary audiobook for the ordinary hacker.
He was a 1930s golf legend and Hollywood trickster who adamantly refused to be photographed. He never played professionally, yet sports-writing legend Grantland Rice still heralded him as "the greatest golfer in the world." Then, in 1937, the secrets of John Montague's past were exposed-leading to a sensational trial that captivated the nation.
From three-time New York Times bestselling author Leigh Montville
John Montague was a boisterous enigma. He had a bagful of golf tricks, on and off the course. He could chip a ball across a room into a highball glass, and knock a bird off a wire from 170 yards-and when the big man arrived in Hollywood in the early 1930s, he quickly became a celebrity among celebrities. He lived for a time with Oliver Hardy (whom he could lift, one-handed, onto the country club bar) and played golf with everyone from Howard Hughes and W. C. Fields to Babe Ruth and his close friend Bing Crosby, whom he famously beat while playing only with a rake, a shovel, and a bat. Yet strangely Montague never entered a professional tournament, and in a town that thrived on publicity, he never allowed his image to be captured on film.
The reasons became clear when a Time magazine photographer snapped his picture with a telephoto lens … and police in upstate New York quickly recognized Montague as a fugitive wanted for armed robbery. As Montague was indicted in the tiny upstate town of Jay, New York, hordes of national media descended and turned a star-studded legal carnival into the most talked about trial of its day - the trial of "the Mysterious Montague."
From the glamour of 1930s Hollywood, to John Montague's extraordinary skill and triumphs on the golf course, to the shady world of Adirondack rumrunners and bootleggers, three-time New York Times bestselling author Leigh Montville captures a man and an era with extraordinary color, verve, and energy. The Mysterious Montague is Leigh Montville's most entertaining achievement to date.
America's most visible sports commentator tells the stories of the most dramatic moments in sports and pays tribute to the man who inspired him to pursue his broadcasting dream-his beloved father, who has fallen victim to Alzheimer's disease.
Any golfer will understand this:
You go out to the driving range, you warm up with your irons, everything is going right. You pull out your utility clubs, you are hitting great. Your driver -- boom. The ball flies far and lands just where you want it. You head for the practice green...you drain every putt from 30 feet in.
Time to play with your friends. Eighteen delicious holes and you are going to show them how good you are. Your mind starts racing a bit. Am I too confident? Am I too relaxed? Thoughts starts creeping in, but you still believe. You line up over the first tee ready to drill it. Everything is going to be great....
Whack! You can't believe it -- you spray the ball 30 yards to the right, short and in deep rough. You try to punch out to the fairway...only it goes to the other rough. And so on . . you end up quadruple bogey. Your day is shot...
It happens to every golfer. The mind becomes their worst enemy. It's not physical. It's all in the head. How do listeners get their brains back to practice range? Why did it change?
The preeminent golf psychologist Bob Rotella, whose counsel and knowledge is sought by hundreds of thousands, including the world's top players, has spent years trying to discover a way to get golfers to stay in the mindset that they can thrive in. In Your 15th Club, Rotella has done just that: come up with a plan to help golfers play at their optimal best. It is something that every golfer will want to learn.
Pitchers are the heart of baseball, and John Feinstein tells the story of the game today through one season and two great pitchers working in the crucible of the New York media market.
