Summer sports reading list is Crazy Good

The leisurely days of summer are nearing an end, signaling the beginning of the high school sports season and less time to get caught up on my reading.

I always enjoy the summer because it gives me the chance to head out to a ballgame and bring along a good book to read in between innings. And since I figure I saw about 90 baseball games since the season began in mid-March, that means a lot of books.

Here’s a few that I found interesting, and you might, too.

Who was the most popular athlete around the turn of the 20th century? Not Ty Cobb or Honus Wagner or Jim Thorpe. No, it was a horse named Dan Patch. While Ty Cobb, Major League Baseball’s best player, was pulling down about $20,000 a year, Dan Patch, a pacer, was pulling in nearly a million dollars.

Charles Leerhsen tells the story about Dan Patch in his book Crazy Good. The book states that Dan Patch never lost a race in his career, although that stat is a little bit misleading. In harness racing in the 1910s, races were usually best out of three or five races. So while Dan Patch did lose a couple of individual heats (some of them apparently on purpose to drive up the bets), he never lost an overall race.

According to Leerhsen, Dan Patch only raced against other horses for a very short time in his career. For the majority of his career, he raced against the clock, with 20,000 people coming out to see if Dan Patch could run the mile under two minutes.

Leerhsen gives good insight into what life was like in the Midwest prior to World War I. He also makes Dan Patch’s owners out to be less than virtuous, which was probably the case. Leerhsen also employed a bit of a conversational style of writing, making the story easier to read and less dry.

If you are fan of horses and horse racing, Crazy Good is the book for you.

Back in June, Will Leitch, the editor of the blog Deadspin, appeared on the Bob Costas Live with Friday Night Lights author Buzz Bissinger. The altercation between Bissinger and Leitch was quite interesting. Bissinger, who grew up as a journalist, did not hide his disdain for Leitch and the new world of internet blogs.

I bring up the Bob Costas episode because Leitch also recently wrote a book called God Save the Fan. The book purports to be “blackballed by ESPN” and attempts to show “how preening sportscaster, athletes who speak in the third person, and the occasional convicted quarterback have taken the fun out of sports and how we can get it back.”

I have to admit I was pulled in by the title and the fact that some of the stuff on Deadspin is pretty funny. However Leitch’s altercation with Bissinger was a lot more interesting than the book.

While there were some funny anecdotes, the book was mostly whining about fairly trivial and petty stuff. It seemed to ramble at times and I’m not sure he ever proved how fans can get sports back.

Fans of Deadspin might enjoy the book, but the avid sports fan might not. Bissinger certainly wouldn’t.

I’ve always felt that the Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain rivalry is one of the more interesting rivalries in sport. So I was compelled to read The Rivalry, Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain and the Golden Age of Basketball.

The 1960s seems to be a lost time in NBA history. I don’t know if there just isn’t any video footage of the games from back then, but you rarely see any archival videos of the great battles between Russell and Chamberlain.

The interesting thing about the rivalry is that Chamberlain often dominated Russell in the individual battle, but Russell’s team often when the game.

The book gives great insight into the lives of Russell and Chamberlain, both of whom were controversial players during their time in the NBA. You also find out interesting biographical info about Jerry West and Elgin Baylor and their struggles to beat the Celtics during the 60’s.

If you grew up watching Russell and Chamberlain battle on the hardcourt, you will enjoy this book.

I was able to read two other books on nearly the same subject. The first was Johnny U, the Life and Times of Johnny Unitas by Tom Callahan. The other was The Best Game Ever by Mark Bowden.

While I knew the basics about Johnny Unitas’ life, Callahan’s book shows how Unitas was able to overcome an extremely difficult childhood to become one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history. I was particularly interested in his early life growing up in Pittsburgh, his time as the quarterback at the University of Louisville and his time with the Pittsburgh Steelers, who drafted Unitas and eventually cut him.

Unitas was unorthodox, not very athletic looking (especially in his younger days before he hit a growth spurt) and usually underestimated. However he proved at every level that he was a leader, and a tough one at that. He is considered by many NFL historians as the toughest player in NFL history.

The Best Game Ever centered around the first overtime game in NFL history, the 1958 championship game between Unitas’ Baltimore Colts and the New York Giants.

Bowden actually quotes several anecdotes from Callahan’s book in helping to tell the Baltimore Colts’ side of the story. Bowden makes the Colts a bit more sympathetic and more heroic in this story while the Giants come off as braggarts and sore losers.

Nevertheless, the book is well researched and contains some very interesting anecdotes about Ray Berry, who, along with Unitas, helped revolutionize the position of wide receiver in the NFL.

Both books are recommended, especially if you are old enough to remember watching the 1958 championship game on television. The game is considered the turning point that made the NFL the influential business that it is today.

Finally, there is the Paolantonio Report. Much in the same vein as Jayson Stark’s book that listed baseball’s most overrated and underrated players, ESPN’s Sal Paolantonio does the same with the NFL.

I can’t say that I was surprised that Joe Namath was listed as the most overrated quarterback of all time. I have never been too impressed with his credentials, Super Bowl III aside. And I was happy to see Bart Starr listed as the most underrated quarterback of all time since I’ve always felt that he didn’t quite get the credit he deserved for all of the Green Bay Packers’ championships. He is still the greatest QB in Green Bay history, regardless of what Brett Favre fans have to say on the matter.