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The Breaks of the Game is sports reporting at its finest--basketball's equivalent to Roger Kahn's The Boys of Summer.
Join David Halberstam on his yearlong journey with the 1979 Portland Trail Blazers and witness professional basketball from the inside, where front-office egos, big-money contracts, and the colorful personalities of coaches and players collide, and winners and losers emerge.
This insightful account is evidence of how much basketball has--and hasn't--changed since 1979, before the money really started rolling in.
Available for the first time in years, David Halberstam's The Breaks of the Game focuses on one grim season (1979-80) in the life of the Portland Trail Blazers, a team that only three years before had been National Basketball Association champions.
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As Halberstam follows this collection of men through the months, through the losing streaks and occasional victories, the endless trips and the brutal schedules, we come to know them and their world--the other players, coaches, and owners; the competition, drafts, trades, and traditions; the wives, the fans, the media connections--a world of grand dreams, impossible expectations, and bracing realities.
The tactile authenticity of Halberstam's knowledge of the basketball world is unrivaled. Yet he is writing here about far more than just basketball.
This is a story about a place in our society where power, money, and talent collide and sometimes corrupt, a place where both national obsessions and naked greed are exposed.
It's about the influence of big media, the fans and the hype they subsist on, the clash of ethics, the terrible physical demands of modern sports (from drugs to body size), the unreal salaries, the conflicts of race and class, and the consequences of sport converted into mass entertainment and athletes transformed into superstars--all presented in a way that puts the reader in the room and on the court, and The Breaks of the Game in a league of its own.
Reviews:
"... One of the best books I've ever read about American sports!" By Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, The New York Times
"... David Halberstam takes us here in to the life of a sports franchise, the lives of it's players and of the environment surrounding them in the late seventies world of sport, following the merger of the two basketball league. The exposion of television coverage and of a team in the aftermath of a championship.
Halberstam is more than fair in his depiction of all the personalities involved with and on the periphery of the team. His exhaustive research is in evidence.
The players are not shown to be charming charismatic larger than life heroes but human beings with stories of their own, interesting ones at that.
Mr. Halberstam successfully conveys how the personalities all combined to make up this team.
The thing about this book is that Mr. Halberstam always presents a new take even on well covered topics. He makes you consider what you may not have considered otherwise.
Interestingly this book covers the team in something of a decline not the championship year.
That in itself gives a unique view at the end of this book you have an idea of not only why they won but of the difficulty of repeating as champions, of the tenuous relationships formed between players, the slights, the friendships, the business of sports and those behind.
Vivid and rich with color and power. This book doesn't disappoint. Everyone from the rather unique owner to the 12th man. From preseason to playoff. An excellent read. ..." By NDB (New York, NY United States)
"... I've been an NBA fan since I was a kid and I read this for the first time in summer of 2007. As someone who considers himself a knowledgeable NBA fan, I'm embarassed to say it took me so long to read this primer to the modern-day NBA.
Breaks of the Game is as well-written and thoroughly researched as any sports book you'll find. Halberstam presents fact after fact on why the NBA game has been shaped by big money and TV moreso than any player, coach, or team.
He does a tremendous job exposing the conflict between the league's big money sponsors and its actual product--a game predominantly being played and dominated by black athletes.
Halberstam's excellence isn't limited to the politics and power struggles taking place in NBA front offices. His reporting on the actual game played between the lines is insightful and intriguing.
Many of the complaints about today's NBA game--too much one-on-one play, ballyhooed rookies not paying their dues, primadonnas, lack of fundamentals, etc-- are covered in-depth by Mr. Halberstam. Keep in mind, this was written in 1978-79.
It's a great book that can easily be appreciated by anyone--hoops fan or not. And if you consider yourself an NBA fan, then you need to get on this ASAP. By Richard P. Fennimore (Seattle, WA)
• Author: David Halberstam • Paperback: 416 pages • Publisher: Hyperion (February 17, 2009) • Language: English
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