Sports Biblio Digest Holiday Edition, 12.20.2015
News, Views and Reviews About Sports Books, History and Culture
Welcome to the Sports Biblio Digest, an e-mail newsletter delivered each Sunday, free of charge. You can subscribe here and search the archives.
This is Digest issue No. 22, published Dec. 20, 2015. The Digest is a companion to the Sports Biblio website, which is updated every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I’d love to hear what you think. Send feedback, suggestions, book recommendations and requests for interviews to Wendy Parker, sportsbiblio@gmail.com.
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A special note: This is the last Sports Biblio Digest of 2015. The newsletter will pop back into your inbox on Jan. 10, 2016.
Merry Christmas!
Happy Holidays!
Happy New Year!
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More Notable 2015 Sports Books: American Football, Boxing, Cricket, Rugby, Soccer and More
This week on the Sports Biblio blog I continued my listings of best sports books of the year, with three posts covering a variety of sports: cricket, cycling, golf and water sports; boxing, MMA, rugby and soccer; and American football.
I organized these posts for the purpose of easy categorization. The cricket/cycling post included other warm-weather, outdoor sports (interestingly, I didn’t find much on the tennis front this year), while the rugby/soccer post also contained the pugilistic arts of boxing and MMA.
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I went a bit longer on American football for reasons I explained in the post. It was a very good year for books on the sport, both college and the NFL, and the game’s popularity in the U.S. continues to soar despite concerns over concussions and the off-field behavior of some of its biggest stars.
Next week I will finish up my look at the top sports books. On Monday, the topics include ice hockey, winter sports and outdoors/adventure; followed by basketball and biography/memoir/miscellany.
Serena Sauces It Up For SI Cover
The always-bashful, never-provocative Serena Williams really outdid herself when she picked out a frumpy, girl-next-door cover pose after being named the 2015 sportsperson of the year by Sports Illustrated. 😜
The first female to have the honor to herself since Mary Decker in 1983, Serena stoked the anger of a handful of fusspot feminists and at least one trolling male sportswriter. If the cover wasn’t a Maxim sendup, then she was a poor role model for young women by dolling up.
The troll I’m referring to is Rick Morrissey of the Chicago Sun-Times, who actually wrote these words in dying days of the Year of Our Lord 2015:
“Williams, who won three majors this year, said she agreed to pose in the way she did to reflect female power, which is a noble idea. But I’m afraid it accomplishes exactly the opposite. It objectifies women. Her intent won’t line up with the reception, which will be a bunch of men leering at her the way they do at every SI swimsuit model. She might be selling power, but they’re buying sex.”
How patronizing! To suggest that a fully-grown, 34-year-old woman isn’t capable of deciding how she wishes to portray herself is to be completely oblivious to her glittering career and dazzling persona, both on the court and in her life.
“I liked the idea of the throne,” she said in response to the troglodytes and prudes. “I wanted it to be really special, really Serena.” And so it was.
Morrissey pointed out that last year’s SI honoree, San Francisco Giants pitcher Madison Bumgarner, humbly posed in his uniform. In no way does Serena do flabby threads, of course; did the writer notice her black catsuit at the 2002 U.S. Open? She’ll never be confused with Whistler’s Mother.
Ah, forget all that and enjoy S.L. Price’s cover piece on Serena instead.
Best Read of the Week
I’m not quite off the soapbox yet. Instead of huffing and puffing about media types demanding New England Patriots QB Tom Brady talk about his political views in light of his friendship with Donald Trump, I’ll let Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports do it instead:
“The politically obsessed from all sides are now screaming, probably because it's easy and a cheap score, not because there is any importance to the issue … a private citizen who has no interest in the endorsement game is refusing to make a definitive statement on his choice in an election that is months away.”
Every single word of this is pitch perfect. Bravo Dan!
The Tragedy of Pete Rose
Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred this week declined to reconsider Pete Rose for Hall of Fame eligibility, prompting somber columns everywhere. Two of the best I saw came from the ESPN.com ranks: Jayson Stark and Buster Olney, who wishes the HOF could go back to what it’s supposed to be: “a museum that neutrally presents history.”
Interestingly, Rose issued his response through his most recent biographer, Kostya Kennedy of SI.
One Last ‘Best of’ List For the Year
The excellent Longreads site rounded up some of the best longform sportswriting for 2015, as chosen by various sports media figures. I don’t agree with all of the selections, and wished some other pieces would have been included, but there’s plenty good stuff to read over the holidays.
From the UK, the Bookish podcast devoted itself this week to a sports books episode, covering top books of the year and discussing the outlook for the genre. This is a very good listen!
The Voice of James Naismith
A University of Kansas professor has discovered what’s believed to be the only known recording of James Naismith, the inventor of basketball. It’s from a 1939 radio program, “We the People,” recorded in New York, a year before Naismith’s death.
That artifact might go well with a year-long observation set to begin soon by the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, which will be marking the 125th anniversary of Naismith’s invention in November 2016.
The Hall of Fame this week also announced some major changes for eligibility. Players can be inducted four years after retirement, instead of five, and the women’s committee can put forth four finalists, instead of the current limit of two. The work of the old ABA committee is being put to rest, however. Long live the league with red, white and blue ball!
Passings
Phil Pepe, 80, was a longtime Yankees beat writer and columnist for the New York Daily News. One of his more famous stories was the notorious 1973 wife-swapping incident between Fritz Peterson and Mike Kilkenny that essentially cost both Yankees pitchers their careers.
Pepe also wrote quite a few sports books, and baseball blogger Ron Kaplan offers this compendium.
Merry Christmas!
Before we leave you for the holidays, how about a little soccer-related celebration, courtesy of the Portland Baroque Orchestra? The ensemble reworked a part of Handel’s “Messiah” to honor the Portland Timbers, who won their first Major League Soccer championship earlier this month.
Hallelujah indeed! And Happy Holidays to you!
The Sports Biblio Digest will return on Jan. 10, 2016, but I will be sending out a special holiday message to readers very shortly.
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