Basketball Memoir

Welcome to Fannie Lou Hamer Freedom High School, in a working-class corner of the Bronx, where a driven coach inspires his teams to win games and championships - and learn Russian history and graduate and go on to college.

Story of Green tells how entrepreneur Alan Foster disrupted the basketball world by creating a unique brand and multi-million-dollar company for the Ball family, centered around the three sons Lonzo, LaMelo, and LiAngelo being signed for the NBA. It's a story of betrayal and a cautionary tale about financial management and the forces arrayed against anyone who tries to make sure that athletes control their brand.

The inspiring story of Isaiah Austin, the man who captured our hearts when he was made the honorary NBA draft pick after a shocking diagnosis ended his professional basketball career before he could even step onto the court.

Paul Westhead was teaching high school in his native Philadelphia when he was named La Salle University’s men’s basketball coach in 1970. By 1980 he was a Los Angeles Lakers assistant, soon to be hired as head coach, winning an NBA title with Hall of Fame center Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and rookie guard Magic Johnson.

Caitlin Clark, a standout player in women's college basketball, has risen to prominence with her impressive skills, breaking records, and drawing widespread attention. However, her meteoric rise has been subject to controversy. This book explores why Caitlin Clark has become such a contentious figure, why mainstream audiences love her, and why she faces criticism from minority communities.

Learn the inspirational story of basketball's rising superstar point guard: Russell Westbrook. Russell Westbrook's ascent into the top ten point guards in the NBA amongst the likes of Chris Paul, Steve Nash, and Rajan Rondo has definitely been a surprise. From once struggling to make his high school varsity team to spending his freshman year at UCLA as a benchwarmer, few would have predicted that Russell Westbrook would be selected as the fourth overall pick in the 2008 NBA Draft.

From the smallest kid on every team to the game-changing, record-breaking NBA All-Star he is today, Steph Curry’s journey to stardom is a master class in excellence. Bolstered by what he calls his irrational confidence, the “baby-faced assassin” shattered expectations and accrued millions of fans as he led the Golden State Warriors to championship after championship, garnered multiple MVP awards, and emerged as the greatest three-point shooter of all time. Steph Curry: Life Lessons from a Legend gives you courtside seats to the incredible highs and lows of his phenomenal career.

Steve James has made a lifetime study of Michael Jordan’s rise from repeated failure to NBA legend. And now he’s here to share the secrets behind Michael Jordan’s winning record so you can follow in his footsteps. Michael Jordan: A Unique Insight into the Career and Mindset of Michael Jordan is an incredible account of the many trials and tribulations the legendary baller overcame so he could dominate the courts.

The college basketball scandals of 1951 were to basketball what the 1919 Black Sox scandals were to baseball - a loss of innocence, after which the game would be permanently tarnished, its relationship to power and big money firmly established. In Scandals of '51, Charley Rosen identifies all the major figures - including players, coaches, gangsters, clergymen, politicians - that made up the elaborate network that controlled the outcomes to many games or protected those who did so.

Tim Duncan has kept the San Antonio Spurs relevant in the NBA for every year of his long NBA career. In this short book, we will learn about how Duncan became the incredible power forward that he is today. Starting first with a look into his childhood and early life, we'll learn about Tim Duncan prior to entering the NBA, along with his time in the NBA playing alongside David Robinson to his time playing with Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili leading the San Antonio Spurs.

In The Jump, one of America's great sports writers follows high school phenom Sebastian Telfair on his quest for NBA stardom - and exposes all that big-time sports in America has become, the good and the bad. Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James - all became NBA superstars without playing a day of college ball. In 2004, Coney Island's 5-foot-11 Telfair became the first small player ever to jump straight from high school to the NBA when he signed contracts with the Portland Trail Blazers and Adidas worth $25 million.

In Above the Noise, DeRozan opens up about both his proudest triumphs and the times he felt so weighed down he couldn’t get out of bed. He reflects on what it took to make a name for himself in a new country after getting drafted by the Toronto Raptors. He recounts the pressure of playing with veteran athletes as a twenty-year-old rookie, and the pain of losing role models. And he reveals what it felt like to be traded away from the team that he wanted to play with for the rest of his career.

Julius Erving, aka Dr. J, was a wizard with the basketball, performing feats the world had never seen before: midair spins and whirls punctuated by powerful slam dunks, which he was the first to glamorize. In a career that lasted from the 1970s well into the 1980s, he was one of the first players to make extemporaneous individual expression an integral part of the game, setting the style of play that has prevailed ever since. He's also long been respected as a gracious, dignified, and disciplined man. As there are great men of history, there are great men of sports, and Dr. J is just such a man.

On the night of March 2, 1962, in Hershey, Pennsylvania, right up the street from the chocolate factory, Wilt Chamberlain, a young and striking athlete celebrated as the Big Dipper, scored 100 points in a game against the New York Knickerbockers. As historic and revolutionary as the achievement was, it remains shrouded in myth. The game was not televised; no New York sportswriters showed up; and a 14-year-old local boy ran onto the court when Chamberlain scored his hundredth point, shook his hand, and then ran off with the basketball.

Magic Johnson is one of the most beloved, and at times controversial, athletes in history. He lifted the dowdy sport of American pro basketball into the global spotlight, a transformation driven by his ability to eviscerate opponents with a grand sense of fun. He was a master entertainer who directed basketball to the heights of both glory and epic excess, all of it driven by his mind-blowing no-look passes and personal charm.

When all she wanted was to fit in, Tamika Catchings stood out and felt left out, never knowing one day she'd stand out - as a basketball superstar and an inspiration. She faced being set apart by her hearing loss, separated from family, living up to high expectations, and the pain and discouragement of debilitating physical injury. Yet she reached for the stars with hard work, perseverance, and her faith in God. Through the silence, she found the way to shine.

Moritz und Franz Wagner sind internationale Basketballprofis und Weltmeister. Ihre Mutter Beate Wagner beschreibt, wie sie auf ihren großen Traum hingearbeitet haben und was sie brauchten, um erfolgreiche Basketballer zu werden. Sie spricht mit Wegbegleitern und Coaches und natürlich kommen auch Moritz und Franz immer wieder selbst zu Wort. Ein ganz persönlicher Einblick in das Privat- und Sportlerleben zweier NBA-Stars.

Learn the incredible story of Devin Booker, one of basketball's most exciting young shooting guards. As the 13th overall pick in the 2015 draft, Devin Booker become a prominent piece of the Suns franchise, as they continue rebuilding post-the-Steve-Nash-and-Mike-D'antoni era.

Manute Bol was the first African-born player in the NBA and, at seven foot seven inches, the tallest. In the 1980s and 90s he was also among the league's most fearsome shot-blockers and its most beloved figures. Off the basketball court, however, Bol's story was more remarkable than most fans ever knew. Activist, gambler, joker, rebel-Bol was a complex man whose fate was inextricably bound with that of the Sudan, his homeland.

At the age of 15, high school sophomore and basketball player David Cooks experienced a spinal aneurism, leaving him a T-6 paraplegic. Refusing to let the wheelchair determine the man, he made the decision to persevere from the very beginning - and he never let go of his passion for life the game of basketball. In Getting Undressed, David describes his journey to independence and purpose, and how “getting undressed” for change can pose huge challenges, literally and figuratively, while creating opportunities for victories.