Sports books

[Strider]

Yeah, the phrase may seem a bit unusual to some of you out there, but such a thing does exist. I want to see if any of you have read any good ones.

Personally, I'm such a diehard for sports books. I just got done reading Faithful the other day, which is diary-type entries by Stephen King (a noted Boston Red Sox fan) and Steve O'Nan throughout the historical 2004 baseball season. I've also been poring over and over the 2003 version of the Bill James Baseball Abstract, which is some of the most fascinating material I've ever read.

In the past, I've read things ranging from Willie Mays' biography (Say Hey!) to Rob Neyer's Book of Great Baseball Lineups to collections of famous sports writing by everyone from Grantland Rice to Rick Reilly. There's a lot of good stuff out there, if you know where to look for it.

Sooner or later, I'd like to take a look at Bob Perlman's The Bad Guys Won, his account of the 1986 New York Mets; David Halberstam's The Teammates, insights into players from the 1940s Red Sox teams; Jim Bouton's Ball Four, which I've heard from some is the best baseball book ever, and some other stuff.

What kind of sports books have you read and recommend?

[krissy]

i read the novel about skateboarding teens
they snuck into the community pool and skated in it

but then the mayor was like 'we'll make them stop'

so they took matters into their own hands

and later the main char fell ini love with the mayors daughter

[IGN64skanker]

I haven't read too many of them, but I am going to be getting more into them soon. I just read "Moneyball," and that was really good. I can't wait to get my hands on all that Bill James stuff after reading that. Anything about baseball, I'm sure I'd like. I also really want to read Phil Jackson's book. Crazy Lakers...

[Doc Sark]

I've read Futebol: The Brazilian Way of Life which I would highly recommend to football (soccer) and non football fans alike. It's by Guardian writer Alex Bellos and illustrates how the sport is intrinsically linked with Brazilian culture and Brazilian history. One of the greatest disasters ever to hit Brazil, in the eyes of the Brazilian people, was losing the World Cup Final in 1950 on their own soil at the Maracana stadium. They are the only country ever to host the cup, get to the final (in this case not strictly the final, but deciding game), and then lose. You can find thousands of poems and shorts dedicated to this event alone. Anyway it's a fascinating book.

I also read Kevin Keegan's autobiography, which was great, dealt with his time in European Football as the original David Beckham if you like and at the moment I'm reading Marks and Spencers A History of Football. All very interesting.