Sports Essays

Bill Littlefield (NPR's Only a Game) presents the second installment in the Library of America series devoted to classic American sportswriters, a definitive collector's edition of the pathbreaking writer who invented the long-form sports story.

In this love letter to his father, former professional golfer Nathaniel Crosby shares memories of Bing Crosby on the golf course and the lessons he taught him about the game and about life. With a foreword by Jack Nicklaus.

In Against Football Steve Almond details why, after 40 years as a fan, he can no longer watch the game he still loves. Using a synthesis of memoir, reportage, and cultural critique, Almond asks a series of provocative questions: Does our addiction to football foster a tolerance for violence, greed, racism, and homophobia? What does it mean that our society has transmuted the intuitive physical joys of childhood--run, leap, throw, tackle--into a billion-dollar industry?

Rescue offers riveting stories about what happens when things go terribly wrong in some of the world's most perilous places: Himalayan peaks, African plains, vast oceans, remote Arctic wilderness. The result is a collection of first-rate prose read by masterful narrators that makes for compulsive listening.

In 1976 Roger Kahn spent an entire baseball season, from spring training through the World Series, with players of every stripe and competence. The result is this book,in which Kahn reports on a small college team’s successes and hopes, a young New England ball club, a failing major league franchise, and a group of heroes on the national stage.

Augusta National is golf’s Holy Grail. Navigating the azaleas to play the exclusive course that hosts The Masters is a pipe dream for every golfer. Imagine being afforded the opportunity not only to play the course, but to be able to bring your father along for the ride. To complete the priceless fantasy, Jack Nicklaus - “The Golden Bear” - hosts the round. Through fate, coincidence and good fortune, Joe Wessel managed to find a way to make that happen. In White Fang and The Golden Bear, Wessel recounts that special round, how it came about, and what happened....

We love them. We cheer for them like we know them personally. We name roads, buildings, and even towns after them. These are the sports heroes and heroines whose athletic accomplishments amaze and inspire us. Many are remarkable not only for their accomplishments in sports, but also for the courageous ways they approached life.

Golf, the writer Jim Bishop once said, "is a game played by 20 million mature American men whose wives think they are out having fun." For so many golfers, this description of the great game is all too true. That innocent thrill of striking a drive cleanly for the first time, or holing that amazing putt, is all but a distant memory. Bogged down by getting up at some ridiculous hour to get a decent tee time, their average round is a frustrating four hours of miss hits, hooks, slices, and bad putts. But a whole group of modern players have left their regular course behind, and rediscovered the magic of the game in the process.

今も語り継がれる世紀の名勝負 総勢50名の証言で紐解く史上最高の日本シリーズ。1992年、93年と2年間にわたって激闘が繰り広げられた西武ライオンズとヤクルトスワローズの日本シリーズ。

Pat Williams has drawn on his basketball industry connections to compile great stories from on and off the court. Fans will be inspired, surprised, and even amused, by inside stories from well-known coaches and players, fascinating looks behind the scenes, and anecdotes from the people who make it all possible - the fans. Includes first person stories from 21 basketball celebrities, plus Pat Williams.

The colorful, sentimental, funny, affectionate, cantankerous memoir by the most colorful, funniest, most cantankerous-- and probably the most revered-- sportswriter of the last fifty years. Dan Jenkins is accepted as one of the greatest (if not the greatest) golf writer of all time, wrote beloved bestselling novels and abused more corporate expense accounts than anyone who ever lived. It's a touching, laugh-out-loud tribute to the romanticism of old-time sportswriting-- and the glory days of sports.

Each week, when Sports Illustrated's 21 million readers open up their magazine, many turn right to the last page - because that's where to find SI's most popular feature: the Life of Reilly column, written by best-selling author Rick Reilly. This new collection includes 100 of Reilly's favorite columns from the last six years, along with an introduction by Lance Armstrong.

A tribute to America's favorite past time, Chicken Soup for the Baseball Fan's Soul is written by people at every level of competition, from World Series champions to tee-ball moms. Their inspiring stories highlight the best of baseball, the importance of sportsmanship and a love of the game. Whether these stories take place on the field of a local YMCA or under the bright lights of a major league ballpark, the focus is the same: The Love of the Game.

New York Times reporter Gerald Eskenazi brings us back to 1954, when the New York Giants began a decade of success as an iconic American sports team, winning six division titles between 1954 and 1963. Emerging from years of slumber, going from the Polo Grounds to Yankee Stadium, they produced a crop of hall of fame players whose names still resonate, including Tittle, Gifford, Greer, and Robustelli, making a then $7 New York Giants ticket the toughest to buy in the world of sports.

Though he made his name and fortune as an author of Western novels, Zane Grey's best writing has to do with fishing. There, he was free from the conventions of the Western genre and the market's expectations, and was able to blend his talent for narrative with his keen eye for detail and sense of humor (much of it self-deprecating) into his books and articles.

50 runners, from the world's elite to passionate amateurs, share the races they'll never forget. Every runner that enters a race has a unique reason for competing: racing for the challenge, for the achievement, for the health benefits, or for more personal reasons. But whether they are twenty-mile-a-day elite marathoners or twenty-mile-a-week recreational runners, each of them can invariably point to a singular performance as "the best race I ever ran."

After Grant Wahl died of an aortic aneurysm at the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, collapsing in his press seat during a quarterfinal match, tributes to Wahl poured in from around the globe. Wahl was beloved for good reason—he was kind, generous, and unflinching in the face of injustice. He was also clearly one of the best journalists covering sports of his generation. Spanning four decades of storytelling, World Class collects for the first time the finest work of Grant Wahl.

なぜ 語らないのか。

なぜ 俯いて歩くのか。

なぜ いつも独りなのか。

そしてなぜ 嫌われるのか――。

中日ドラゴンズで監督を務めた8年間、ペナントレースですべてAクラスに入り、日本シリーズには5度進出、2007年には日本一にも輝いた。

In this memorable account of 17 trips he made to Hawaii's North Shore starting in 1974, Bruce Jenkins, considered the Kerouac of surf writers, profiles the area's elite, the superstars who live to conquer Hawaii's deadliest waves. Here are the egoists, stylists, gladiators, and purists of the sport, from big-wave greats Darrick Doerner and Mark Foo to bodysurfer Mark Cunningham and bodyboarder Mike Stewart.

Spanning the course of 39 frantic days, Josh Swade embarked on a fanatical journey that would take him across the country. His nearly religious obsession brought him face-to-face with NBA players Paul Pierce and Steve Nash, NBA greats Jerry West and Larry Brown, and many others who knew the importance of this relic. With multiple hurdles ahead of him, will Josh be able to find the money and support to purchase the rules before it's too late?