“An elegiac yet exuberant new memoir” (The New York Times Book Review)—Bill Walton’s New York Times bestselling memoir about his recovery from debilitating physical injury and how lessons from John Wooden at UCLA (and the music of the Grateful Dead) have inspired his darkest hours. In February 2008, Bill Walton suffered a spinal collapse so devastating he was unable to get up. It was the culmination of a lifetime of injury. Although Walton had played fourteen seasons in the NBA, he actually missed more games than he played during those years due to injury. From the time of his spinal collapse until his eventual recovery, he spent most of three years flat on the ground. The pain was excruciating, and he thought seriously about killing himself. But he survived, and Back from the Dead is the story of his injury and recovery, set in the context of his amazing athletic career. Walton grew up in southern California in the 1950s and was deeply influenced by the political and cultural upheavals of the 1960s. Although Walton identified strongly with the counterculture, especially in music, the greatest influence on him outside his family was Coach John Wooden, a thoughtful, precise mentor who seemed immune to the turmoil of the times. The two men would speak every day for forty-three years until Wooden’s death at age ninety-nine. John Wooden once said that no greatness ever came without sacrifice. In this “frequently stirring memoir…Walton’s love for life and the people and things in it—including his college coach, John Wooden—is infectious. You can’t stop reading, or rooting for the man” (Publishers Weekly). Back from the Dead shares his dramatic story, including his basketball and broadcasting careers, his many setbacks and rebounds, and his ultimate triumph as the toughest of champions. “[Walton] scores another basket—a deeply personal one.” (Kirkus Reviews)
The recipe for a Failure to Communicate? Place the following ingredients in the Kalahari Park just before the rainy season: some British politicians; two Canadian snipers; two Russian snipers; a Buddhist monk; a reporter; and some ISIS and Boko Haram fighters. Add one old lion for seasoning. Stir.
For more than 20 years, Bill Walton has been one of the National Basketball Association's greatest and most outspoken players and commentators. Now, the NBA Showtime host sounds off on his own turbulent career, other players, and the cutthroat world of the NBA.
Role of a Lifetime is the story of the crucial role Larry Farmer played on teams that won three NCAA titles for UCLA under Coach John Wooden. Farmer's record at UCLA was 89-1, the greatest winning percentage in NCAA history. (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was 88-2.) Role of a Lifetime also details how Farmer, a self-taught player from the playgrounds of Denver, managed to secure a full scholarship, make the varsity team as a sophomore, and ultimately become the head basketball coach at UCLA at the age of 30--the first black head coach for any sport at UCLA. The book chronicles the reactions of black leaders to his role as the first black head coach, as well as the inside politics that led him to resign after three years as coach, just days after accepting a two-year extension. Farmer also shares new insights about UCLA athletic booster Sam Gilbert and his role in the team's NCAA probation. Farmer's insider's role during UCLA basketball's most fabled period, combined with his natural ability to relate entertaining and informative anecdotes about legendary figures such as John Wooden, Bill Walton, Jamaal Wilkes, Reggie Miller, and many other famous players and coaches from throughout the world of college basketball, makes Role of a Lifetime a must-have for all Bruin fans and fans of basketball everywhere!
The former U.S. Senator and member of two championship New York Knicks teams revisits his first career in a series of personal observations and reflections that illustrate how the "right stuff" on the court is a proving ground for the "right stuff" in life
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The NBA according to The Sports Guy—now updated with fresh takes on LeBron, the Celtics, and more! Foreword by Malcom Gladwell • “The work of a true fan . . . it might just represent the next phase of sports commentary.”—The Atlantic Bill Simmons, the wildly opinionated and thoroughly entertaining basketball addict known to millions as ESPN’s The Sports Guy, has written the definitive book on the past, present, and future of the NBA. From the age-old question of who actually won the rivalry between Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain to the one about which team was truly the best of all time, Simmons opens—and then closes, once and for all—every major pro basketball debate. Then he takes it further by completely reevaluating not only how NBA Hall of Fame inductees should be chosen but how the institution must be reshaped from the ground up, the result being the Pyramid: Simmons’s one-of-a-kind five-level shrine to the ninety-six greatest players in the history of pro basketball. And ultimately he takes fans to the heart of it all, as he uses a conversation with one NBA great to uncover that coveted thing: The Secret of Basketball. Comprehensive, authoritative, controversial, hilarious, and impossible to put down (even for Celtic-haters), The Book of Basketball offers every hardwood fan a courtside seat beside the game’s finest, funniest, and fiercest chronicler.
In this thought-provoking alternative view of history, Bill Gutman spins out the maybes and what ifs that might have followed if some of the most iconic sports moments of all time had gone another way. He imagines a world in which Lombardi returns a hero to take the helm of the New York Giants, resulting in a Packers team that never achieves dynasty status and a Giants team that stumbles to glory late in the decade, a world where Muhammad Ali can't struggle to his feet after a huge blow from Liston and winds up a floundering middle-weight who never makes it big, and yes, a world where Babe Ruth never dons Yankee pinstripes but stays in Boston and out of the record books. With a careful eye for detail and a handful of bold predictions, Gutman attacks the sports history books with gusto, outlining an alternate reality that will change the way fans look at sports forever.
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