The Best Sports Writing Of Pat Jordan

Download or read book The Best Sports Writing of Pat Jordan written by Pat Jordan and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2016-04-19 with total page 446 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The acclaimed author of A False Spring profiles athletes famous and obscure in this captivating and incisive anthology Once a young pitching prospect with the Milwaukee Braves, Pat Jordan went on to become one of America’s most revered sports journalists, writing for Sports Illustrated, Esquire, the New York Times Magazine, and a host of other major league publications. The Best Sports Writing of Pat Jordan showcases his finest journalism, with twenty-six extraordinary articles covering virtually the entire range of professional sports in America—from baseball, football, and basketball to boxing, tennis, and Formula One racing. Jordan offers indelible portraits of some of the most legendary sports figures of our time, exposing the imperfections often obscured by the bright lights of fame. He explores the miracle of the Williams sisters and their brash, charismatic father, Richard, and turns his unflinching gaze on such controversial sports personalities as Roger Clemens and O. J. Simpson. Other highlights include a poignant account of Duke basketball legend Bobby Hurley’s rehabilitation after a devastating car accident, a profile of transsexual tennis star Renée Richards, and fascinating side-trips to the Professional Poker Tour, the child beauty pageant circuit, and a depressed, blue collar town in Pennsylvania where high school football offers the only solace.

Download or read book A False Spring written by Pat Jordan and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2016-04-19 with total page 211 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “One of the best and truest books about baseball, and about coming to maturity in America.” —Time In the late 1950s, acclaimed sportswriter Pat Jordan was a young pitching phenom, blowing away opposing batters for his Fairfield, Connecticut, high school baseball team. Fifteen major league clubs offered him a contract, but it was the Milwaukee Braves who won out, signing Jordan to a $45,000 bonus—one of the largest paid to any new player by the organization—and shipping him off to McCook, Nebraska, to play for their Class D ball club. It did not take long, however, for Jordan to realize he was out of his depth in professional baseball’s backwoods. He battled with inconsistency and a lack of control for three dismal seasons in such far-flung locales as Keokuk, Iowa, and Palatka, Florida, before the Braves released him and he gave up his dreams of big league greatness. Declared “unforgettable” by the Los Angeles Times and “a major triumph” by the Philadelphia Inquirer, A False Spring is a powerful and deeply affecting memoir about the gift of athletic talent and the heartbreak of unfulfilled promise.

Download or read book Rules of the Game written by Matthew Mills Stevenson and published by American Retrospective. This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Harper's Magazine has been America's preeminent monthly periodical for more than 150 years. Rules of the Game: The Best Sports Writing from Harper's Magazine takes a look into this storied magazine's unparalleled archive and uncovers funny, touching, exciting, intriguing stories of the sporting life, both professional and amateur, and what it means to us. These essays show that how we play and write about sports not only reflect our nation's character, but challenge it. Including stories from Mark Twain and James B. Connolly at the turn of the twentieth century, visiting with George Plimpton, Tom Wolfe, Bill Cardoso, and A. Bartlett Giamatti along the way, and continuing with Lewis Lapham, Rich Cohen, and Pat Jordan today, this collection is the definitive voice on sports-writing through the last hundred years. Edited by Matthew Stevenson and Michael Martin, with a humorous, insightful preface by Roy Blount Jr. (Fifth in the American Retrospective Series.)

Download or read book Black Coach written by Pat Jordan and published by Dodd Mead. This book was released on 1971 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: African American football coach Jerome Evans takes over as football coach at predominantly white Walter Williams High School in Burlington, North Carolina, in the fall of 1970.

Download or read book The Cost of These Dreams written by Wright Thompson and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2019-04-02 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The instant New York Times bestseller! From one of America's most beloved sportswriters and the bestselling author of Pappyland, a collection of true stories about the dream of greatness and its cost in the world of sports. "Wright Thompson's stories are so full of rich characters, bad actors, heroes, drama, suffering, courage, conflict, and vivid detail that I sometimes thinks he's working my side of the street - the world of fiction." - John Grisham There is only one Wright Thompson. He is, as they say, famous if you know who he is: his work includes the most read articles in the history of ESPN (and it's not even close) and has been anthologized in the Best American Sports Writing series ten times, and he counts John Grisham and Richard Ford among his ardent admirers (see back of book). But to say his pieces are about sports, while true as far as it goes, is like saying Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove is a book about a cattle drive. Wright Thompson figures people out. He jimmies the lock to the furnaces inside the people he profiles and does an analysis of the fuel that fires their ambition. Whether it be Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods or Pat Riley or Urban Meyer, he strips the away the self-serving myths and fantasies to reveal his characters in full. There are fascinating common denominators: it may not be the case that every single great performer or coach had a complex relationship with his father, but it can sure seem that way. And there is much marvelous local knowledge: about specific sports, and times and places, and people. Ludicrously entertaining and often powerfully moving, The Cost of These Dreams is an ode to the reporter's art, and a celebration of true greatness and the high price that it exacts.

Download or read book The Year's Best Sports Writing 2021 written by Glenn Stout and published by Triumph Books. This book was released on 2021-10-05 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A must-read collection featuring the best in sports journalism Glenn Stout, founding editor of the Best American Sports Writing, has curated an essential anthology showcasing incredible feats and diverse perspectives across the world of sports. Selected from a wide range of newspapers, magazines, and digital publications during the previous year, these stories capture enduring moments while celebrating the craft of writing at its most sublime. This extraordinary collection reveals the fascinating stories behind the sports we love, the competitors who push their boundaries, and the cultures they are ultimately embedded in.

Download or read book A Nice Tuesday written by Pat Jordan and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2005-09-01 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In A Nice Tuesday, Pat Jordan chronicles his decision to reclaim the failed potential of his youth. A young baseball pitcher of inordinate promise, Jordan had been one of the Milwaukee Braves first ?bonus babies.? His struggle through the minor leagues and ultimate failure to play in the majors, eloquently chronicled in A False Spring, defined his youth. At fifty-six, Jordan realizes that ?this trivial thing? has also defined his life and decides to make a comeback. He whips himself back into playing condition and convinces an independent minor-league team, the Waterbury (Connecticut) Spirit, to let him return to the mound one last time. In this memoir, Jordan lays bare his midlife quest with honesty and humor, making A Nice Tuesday about much more than baseball.