Showing titles in Sociology of Sports

Lauren Fleshman has grown up in the world of running. One of the most decorated collegiate athletes of all time and a national champion as a pro, she was a major face of women’s running for Nike before leaving to shake up the industry with feminist running brand Oiselle and now coaches elite young female runners. Every step of the way, she has seen the way that our sports systems—originally designed by men, for men and boys—fail young women and girls as much as empower them. Written with heart and verve, Good for a Girl is a joyful love letter to the running life.

Baseball is “the New York game” because the city is where the white lines were first drawn, where a bunt was first laid, and where the curve ball was first thrown. It’s also where the superstars first emerged, and where social progress in the sport was first made. With nuance and depth, historian Kevin Baker brings this all back to life: the games–World Series in 1905, 1919, 1932; the players–Babe Ruth, Joe DiMaggio, Lou Gehrig; the coaches and managers–John McGraw, “Foxy Ned” Hanlon, Clark Griffith; and even the writers, reporters, and spectators.

In this extraordinary tour de force, David Goldblatt tells the full story of soccer's rise from chaotic folk ritual to the world's most popular sport - now poised to fully establish itself in the USA. Already celebrated internationally, The Ball Is Round illuminates soccer's role in the political and social histories of modern societies, but never loses sight of the beauty, joy, and excitement of the game itself. 

The Sports Parents Solution gives you the strategies and methods you need to transform the parent culture in your team, allowing you to better support each athlete’s growth, improve your team’s performance, create an extraordinary experience for all involved—and take your program to a whole new level.

In the spring of 2013, a study showed that despite huge economic problems, 27 states were awarding their highest salaries to college football coaches. College football has doubled in size in the last decade thanks to generous tax breaks, lavish TV deals, and corporate sponsors eager to slap their logos on everything from scoreboards to footballs and uniforms. In one recent year, the 10 biggest programs took in $800 million from football, with profit margins far surpassing those of Fortune 500 companies.

Never have the best sportspeople seemed so far removed from the rest of us. So how are these extraordinary athletes made, and what do their achievements tell us about success? The Best reveals how the most incredible sportspeople in the world got that way. It is a unique look at the path to sporting greatness. This is a story of origins, training, luck, and serendipity, as well as of sports science and cutting-edge technology.

Based on dozens of shocking interviews with some of the most influential names in sports, this is the urgent and revelatory examination of racial inequality in professional athletics America has been waiting for. With an encyclopedic knowledge of professional sports, and shrewd cultural criticism, John Feinstein uncovers not just why, but how, pro sports continue to perpetuate racial inequality.

Bare Knuckle is the remarkable true tale of Bobby Gunn, the 73-0 undisputed champion of bare-knuckle boxing. Former Rolling Stone editor Stayton Bonner travels the underground for years with Gunn, shining a light on a secret circuit that’s never before been revealed. Along the way, we explore the fascinating history of this first sport in America, Gunn’s Irish Traveler community as well as his part in the improbable rise of the Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship, the first legal revival of the sport.

A young man's journey through the Philippines' most unlikely obsession: Basketball. In Pacific Rims, Rafe Bartholemew, journalist, New Yorker, and veteran baller, ventures through the Philippines to investigate the country's love of basketball. From street corners where diehards fashion hoops out of old car parts to the professional league where politicians exploit team loyalties to win elections, Pacific Rims gets the story - and gets in the game.

When a mixed martial arts (MMA) gym moves in across the street from his office, Jonathan Gottschall sees a challenge and an opportunity. Pushing 40, out of shape, and disenchanted with his job as an adjunct English professor, part of him yearns to cross the street and join up. The other part is terrified.

In 2016, amid an epidemic of police shootings of African Americans, the celebrated NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick began a series of quiet protests on the field, refusing to stand during the US national anthem. By "taking a knee", Kaepernick bravely joined a long tradition of American athletes making powerful political statements. This time, however, Kaepernick's simple act spread like wildfire throughout American society, becoming the preeminent symbol of resistance to America's persistent racial inequality.

Sports fandom isn’t what it used to be. Owners and executives increasingly count on the blind loyalty of their fans and too often act against the team’s best interest. Sports fans are left deliberating not only mismanagement but also political, health, and ethical issues. In Rethinking Fandom: How to Beat the Sports Industrial Complex at Its Own Game, sportswriter and lifelong sports fan Craig Calcaterra outlines endemic problems with what he calls the sports-industrial complex.

As Nazi Germany launched its campaign of racial terror and pushed the world toward war, three misfits banded together to challenge Hitler’s dominance at the apex of motorsport: the Grand Prix. Their quest for redemption culminated in a remarkable race that is still talked about in racing circles to this day - but which, soon after it ended, Hitler attempted to completely erase from history.

From the beginning, ’68 was a season rocked by national tragedy and sweeping change. Opening Day was postponed and later played in the shadow of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s funeral. That summer, as the pennant races were heating up, the assassination of Robert Kennedy was later followed by rioting at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. But even as tensions boiled over and violence spilled into the streets, something remarkable was happening in major league ballparks across the country. Pitchers were dominating like never before, and with records falling and shut-outs mounting, many began hailing ’68 as “The Year of the Pitcher".

The 1988 Seoul Olympics played host to what has been described by some as the dirtiest race of all time, by others as the greatest. The final of the men's 100 metres at those Olympics is certainly the most infamous in the history of athletics, and more indelibly etched into the consciousness of the sport, the Olympics, and a global audience of millions, than any other athletics event before or since.

Two hours to cover 26 miles and 385 yards. Its running's Everest, a feat once seen as impossible for the human body. Now we can glimpse the mountaintop. The sub-two-hour marathon requires an exceptional feat of speed, mental strength, and endurance. The pioneer will have to endure more, live braver, plan better, and be luckier than any who has run before. Ed Caesar takes us into the world of elite runners: the greatest marathoners on Earth.

For decades, osteopathic physician Larry Nassar built a sterling reputation as the go-to doctor for America's Olympians while treating countless others at his office on Michigan State University's campus. It was largely within the high-pressure world of competitive gymnastics that Nassar exploited young girls, sexually assaulting hundreds of them under the guise of medical treatment. In Start by Believing, John Barr and Dan Murphy confront Nassar's acts, which represent the largest sex abuse scandal to impact the sporting world.

Are you ready to join the club? If your desire is to build a stronger and well-chiseled body naturally without steroids; then this is the book for you! It will not only enable you shape the body of your dreams, but it will also empower you to stay the course. 

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.

The 25th anniversary edition of the number-one New York Times best seller and Sports Illustrated's best football book of all time, with a new afterword by the author. Return once again to the timeless account of the Permian Panthers of Odessa - the winningest high school football team in Texas history.