Sports Essays

With his inimitable combination of wit and wisdom, John Gierach once again celebrates the fly-fishing life in Standing in a River Waving a Stick and notes its benefits as a sport, philosophical pursuit, even therapy: "The solution to any problem-work, love, money, whatever-is to go fishing, and the worse the problem, the longer the trip should be." After all, fly-fishing does teach important life lessons, says Gierach-about solitude, patience, perspective, humor, and the sublime coffee break.

All anglers want to catch record-size gamefish - author Robert Cunningham figured out how to do it. When the author hooks and fights a record-size tarpon in the Gulf of Mexico for more than eight hours, only to lose it at boat side, he is already many years into his 20-year effort to break as many IGFA rod and reel and fly rod records as he can. Follow him as his fishing quest takes him to the Chandeleur Islands off the Louisiana coast, the Bahamas, Florida, the backwaters of the Mobile Delta, and way offshore. His enthusiasm is catching and his angling ability well-honed - as proven by his setting 11 world records in one year!

When Dave Fromm graduated from college with good grades and high LSAT scores, he planned to apply to law school. But he actually wasn't that sure he wanted to go, at least not right away. A few years earlier, he'd been to Prague for a vacation and played a game of pickup basketball there. He was a decent basketball player, though not good enough to make the team at Boston College either time he'd tried out. So he did the kind of thing we'd all do if we had the guts (and a foolhardy sense of determination) - he moved to Prague to play basketball, even though he didn't speak Czech, or know anyone in Prague, or if the Czechs had basketball leagues.

Every summer for two decades, Ted Leeson and a maverick group of close companions have returned to an old ranch house on the bench-land overlooking the Madison River. Trout and fly fishing may be at the heart of their ritual return, but their experience goes far beyond the fishing. Leeson contemplates both the human and natural landscape brilliantly....

Since 1929, the Yankees have issued 73 different numbers to more than 1,500 players. Yankees by the Numbers tells those stories for every Yankee since ’29, providing insightful and humorous commentary about the more memorable players from a fan’s perspective.

Well-known nature and conservation writer Ted Williams is an avid fisherman who has devoted many years to writing about the sport and advocating the preservation of bodies of water and species of fish. Here, he brings together his love of angling with his profound sense of responsibility for the environment.

Step up to the plate with the greatest legends of Padres baseball - newly updated! Since they burst onto the scene in 1968, the San Diego Padres have taken fans on a roller coaster ride of ups, downs, and unforgettable moments. In Tales from the San Diego Padres Dugout, longtime Padres announcer Bob Chandler shares his memories of the team with Bill Swank in an easy-to-read recap of the team’s colorful past.

The best stories about one of baseball's most colorful teams - updated to include their recent glory years. Since 1883, the Philadelphia Phillies have been up, down, and all around. Most recently, thanks to Charlie Manuel, the Phillies have become a National League powerhouse, with four NL East titles, two pennants and the 2008 World Series championship to show for it. In Tales from the Philadelphia Phillies Dugout Rich Westcott takes listeners behind the scenes into the glorious, quirky, and victorious stories that make this team the legend it is.

In All Fishermen Are Liars, Gierach travels around North America seeking out quintessential fishing experiences, whether it's at a busy stream or a secluded lake hidden amid snow-capped mountains. He talks about the art of fly-tying and the quest for the perfect steelhead fly ("The Nuclear Option"), about fishing in the Presidential Pools previously fished by the elder George Bush, and the importance of traveling with like-minded companions when caught in a soaking rain.

Originally published in 1994, this book was a fly-fishing phenomenon in the way Howell Raines' Fly Fishing Through the Mid-Life Crisis was. Taking his fishing hobby to near metaphysical levels, Ted Leeson tells about his passions: rivers, trout, and fly fishing. With wry humor and rare insight, he explores questions that engage most fishermen: What is it about rivers that draws us so irresistibly, and why does fly fishing seem such an aptly suited response?

An inside look at the Seattle Seahawks—newly updated! From the hilarious to the surreal, from inside the huddle to inside the broadcast booth, twenty-eight-year Seattle Seahawks veteran Steve Raible takes fans to places they never knew existed. In this newly revised edition of Tales from the Seattle Seahawks Sideline, fans are offered an inside look at life in the locker room and on the sidelines of one of the NFL’s most beloved franchises.

Often compared to Garrison Keillor and Mark Twain, Patrick F. McManus maintains just the right balance between baffled innocence and conspiratorial confidence. Since 1979, this humorist has been delighting readers with hilarious stories recounting his childhood in rural Idaho and relating his misadventures in the great outdoors. Whether you're a sportsman or a couch potato, he will have you laughing out loud at his escapades.

What happens when a weekend athlete - of average skill at best - joins the professional golf circuit? George Plimpton, one of the finest participatory sports journalists, spent a month of self-imposed torture on the tour to find out. Along the way, he meets amateurs, pros, caddies, officials, fans, and hangers-on. In The Bogey Man, we find golf legends, adventurers, stroke-saving theories, superstitions, and other golfing lore and, best of all, Plimpton's thoughts and experiences.

John Gierach demonstrates once again that fishing, when done right, is as much a philosophical pursuit as a sport. Gierach travels to Wyoming and Maine and points in between, searching out new fly-fishing adventures and savoring familiar waters with old friends. Along the way he meditates on the importance of good guides, the challenge of salmon fishing, and the zen of fishing alone. On a more serious note, he ponders the damaging effects of disasters both natural and man-made.

Mark Twight is a BANFF award-winner, an extreme climber, an extreme writer, and an extreme personality. No matter what he's doing, Mark Twight takes a definite, and often controversial , stand. Anyone who knows climbing knows Twight's name, and anyone who knows Twight's name will want to listen to this audiobook. Each story is told in Twight's taut, in-your-face style. Brand-new epilogues bring each piece full circle, providing updated information and fresh, hindsight perspectives.

El nuevo libro de Martí Perarnau descifra el código genético del fútbol. Describe la evolución táctica del juego desde su reglamentación en 1863: la Pirámide de Cambridge, el mediocentro de ataque, el líbero uruguayo, la WM británica, el Método italiano, el 4-2-4 húngaro, el cerrojo suizo o el 3-2-5 argentino. El libro recorre los distintos desarrollos tácticos de la mano del falso 9, la figura más compleja y sutil que existe en el fútbol.

Hearing about hockey is not the same as being at the rink on game night, but these stories present a portrait of a small city’s team, playing a sport that has been ever-changing and always exhilarating.

In this first volume of his Frank Bascombe trilogy, Bascombe is a sportswriter attempting to cope with his failed marriage and the death of his son. Unable to establish true connections with people, Bascombe drifts into and out of various relationships, but retains an introspective eye that allows him to transcend life's obstacles.

Originally published in 1976, James A. Michener’s explosive, spectacular Sports in America is a prescient examination of the crisis in American sports that is still unfolding to this day. Pro basketball players are banned for narcotics use, while a Major League pitcher is arrested for...

Meet the Jolly Boys - five men from northern Wisconsin who built a deer hunting shack in 1955 and established a tradition that has now lasted over six decades. Hunting Camp 52, affectionately known as Blue Heaven, is a place where every trail, rock, and ravine has its own nickname; every kill is recorded by hand on a window shade; every hunter happily croons along during evening songfests; and every rowdy poker game lasts late into the night.