Review of "Hardball Retrospective"

If there is one thing that every baseball fan loves, it is statistics. The statistics that have been used to measure the worth of a player, however, has changed over the years.  With the recent growth of more advanced statistics, the question of how teams and players have done across era is now easier to determine. This book by Derek Bain does an excellent job of doing just that.  Here is my review of "Hardball Retrospective" (Note the cover - my favorite baseball player of all time, Rod Carew!)

Title/Author:

“Hardball Retrospective: Evaluating Scouting and Development Outcomes for the Modern-Era Franchises” by Derek Bain

Tags:

Baseball, history, draft, statistics

Publish date:

January 25, 2015

Length:

442 pages

Rating: 

4 ½ of 5 stars (Excellent)

Review:

Speculation about player trades and movement via free agency is always a popular topic of conversation between baseball fans. Often they wonder how their favorite teams would have done had they not traded away this player or if they had signed that one instead of letting him leave as a free agent. 

This book by Derek Bain will help answer that question. He takes all thirty current major league franchises and using advanced statistical analysis, he ranks each team by evaluating players with their original teams.  He then takes these revised rosters and determines their standings each season from 1901 to the present.  It makes for fascinating comparisons between the “original” team of a certain year or era and the “actual” team.

This may sound complicated, but once a reader actually studies the charts and analysis of his or her team, it will begin to make sense.  It took me a little while to catch on while reading about the Athletics, for example, but once I remembered that this analysis was done using players who originally signed with the Athletics, not the actual rosters for that season, then it began to make sense.

The statistical analysis uses primarily the advanced statistics of Wins Above Replacement (WAR) and Win-Shares for each player. This isn’t to say that the traditional statistics that many baseball fans are familiar with such as batting average, earned run average and runs batted in are not used. They are cited frequently in the narrative for each team. However, they are not the final determination for the rankings of each team – again, it is primarily WAR and Win-Shares.

One does not have to be familiar with these statistics to get the total value of the book.  As long as a reader can follow the charts and narrative sections for the teams, then he or she will get the intended value of the book. I do not consider myself to be fluent or knowledgeable on WAR or Win Shares, but it was a lot of fun to see how my favorite team, the Minnesota Twins, did with their “original” players over the years, including their time as the Washington Senators.  This book is recommended for any baseball fan who is interested to see how his or her team fared in finding talented players throughout the last century.

I wish to thank Mr. Bain for providing a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review. 

Book Format Read

E-book (PDF)

Buying links:

http://www.amazon.com/Hardball-Retrospective-Evaluating-Development-Modern-Era/dp/150879099X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1453255988&sr=8-1&keywords=derek+bain

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/hardball-retrospective-derek-bain/1121112489?ean=9781508790990

Review of "Boys Among Men"

Since I have been on a basketball kick lately with both watching more basketball games and wanting to read more books on the sport, I thought I would give this book to be published in March a try when the ARC became available for review. Having read Jonathan Abrams previously and enjoying his work, I was certainly interested. This was one of the best books I have read on the game, and it covered a controversial topic with balance and much information.  Here is my review of his "Boys Among Men." 

Title/Author:

“Boys Among Men: How the Prep-to-Pro Generation Redefined the NBA and Sparked a Basketball Revolution” by Jonathan Abrams

Tags:

Basketball, professional, draft, youth

Publish date:

March 15, 2016

Length:

336 pages

Rating: 

5 of 5 stars (outstanding)

Review:

In 1995, the Minnesota Timberwolves shook up the culture of the NBA by selecting Kevin Garnett with the fifth pick of the draft.  The reason that this was highly unusual was that Garnett never played a second of college basketball – he was drafted straight out of high school. While Garnett was not the first player to have ever gone from high school to the pros, he was the first of a new generation of players that would make the transition. This generation of players and what it did to the game is the subject of this outstanding book by Jonathan Abrams.

Drawing from interviews from hundreds of sources, including players, coaches, executives and many other people involved in the development or lives of these teenagers, Abrams paints a balanced picture of what this trend has done to both the game and the young players who either made the transition or attempted to do so and fell short of their dreams.

When this topic is discussed on sports channels or talk shows, the two extremes are usually given as why this trend is either good or bad.  Those who claim it helps the game and provides a means for young African-American men to escape poverty point to the very successful careers of Garnett, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and Dwight Howard.  The naysayers will state that these players are exceptions and more of them are doomed to be forgotten with no basketball career, no education and no hope like Leon Smith, Lenny Cooke, and Ndudi Ebi.

While these are the two extreme ends of the argument, there is a lot of middle ground to cover and that what sets this book apart.  It isn’t just about the superstars mentioned above who went from high school to the pros.  The book also portrays players who carved out decent professional careers even after the hype showered upon them made them seem like they fell short.  Players like Kwame Brown, Tyson Chandler and Sebastian Telfair fit this category.  Abrams not only tells of their stories and struggles to adapt to the professional basketball lifestyle – he explains how their decisions and successes and failure affect many other people and the game itself.

Not only are the players’ stories told, but insight from people like former NBA commissioner David Stern, under whose watch this transformation took place, add a sense of balance and completeness to the discussion of the book’s subject. The exasperation of coaches who see that one of these young players don’t have the type of skills and ability to play in the NBA yet was illustrated time and time again. The legality of challenging this rule and the eventual development of a rule making the minimum age to enter the draft at 19 was also discussed from every possible angle. Every possible piece of information that could be used to prove or disprove that allowing high school players to play professionally is covered.

This book is highly recommended for any basketball fan, player or coach. It reads almost like a thriller with many characters involved and has twists and turns that will make the reader decide for himself or herself if this new generation and chapter in professional basketball is good for the game and players.

I wish to thank Crown Publishing for providing an advance review copy of the book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Book Format Read:

E-book (Kindle)

Buying links (for pre-order at time of review):

http://www.amazon.com/Boys-Among-Men-Prep---Pro-ebook/dp/B0104EOJ0S/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1450055779&sr=1-1&keywords=boys+among+men

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/boys-among-men-jonathan-abrams/1122186922?ean=9780804139250

Review of "On the Clock"

Even though I am currently going through my bi-annual bout of bronchitis, it does mean I can catch up on some reading.  It gave me a chance to pick up this book on the NFL draft and it was not only interesting, it was a quick read and one that I enjoyed.  Here is my review of "On the Clock."

Title/Author:

“On the Clock: The Story of the NFL Draft” by Barry Wilner and Ken Rappoport

Tags:

Football (American), professional, draft

Published:

April 1, 2015

Length:

220 pages

Stars: 

4 of 5 stars (Very Good)

Review:

For some professional football fans, the day when all 32 pro teams hold the annual draft of college players is just as big a day as Super Bowl Sunday. The television ratings for the draft are higher than basketball and hockey playoff games on that day. The action is really non-existent – just men talking about the players interrupted by walks to the podium so a player just chosen can shake hands with the commissioner and show off his new team’s jersey.

So why is this event so popular?  The answer to this and other questions about the NFL draft is revealed in this entertaining book by Barry Wilner and Ken Rappaport. The book starts off with drama at the 2014 draft – who is going to select Johnny Manzeil?  What are the Cleveland Browns doing with these trades?   Not only did the authors take the reader inside this draft, they presented the comings and goings in a manner that would make the reader think he or she is reading about a reality TV show.  Which, later in the book, is a reason given for the huge popularity of the draft.

The book also gives the history of the draft, which was the brainchild of Bert Bell before he became commissioner of the NFL. There are stories about the best draft choices, the worst, and how some men used the draft to their advantage to build winning football teams.  As a reader, I enjoyed most of these stories. I felt that too much of the history section was devoted to the history of the Bell family that had little to do with the draft.  It is like when reading a fictional book that starts off exciting, gets a little boring in the middle, but later gets even better.

I make that comparison for this book because my favorite section was when the writers describe how the draft went from simply something to put on the air in the early days of ESPN to the glamorous, dramatic TV show it is today.  I also liked the short biographies on four men who are considered to be the best in analyzing the draft and the players taken:  Mike Mayock, Mel Kiper, Gil Brandt and Joel Buchsbaum – the “Gurus” as the chapter states. 

The only drawback to the book in my opinion is the best and worst picks for each team. Not because I disagree with many of them – any list of “best” or “worst” will be debated – but because I thought that there wasn’t enough reasons given why the authors believed this was so.  Take the San Diego Chargers – okay, it’s easy to see why Ryan Leaf was the worst player they ever selected, but give me more of a reason why Dan Fouts is the best other than he is in the Hall of Fame.  He is not the only player for the Chargers who has made it. 

Overall, this was a decent book with interesting and entertaining stories on some of the more famous players selected and the event itself.  Football fans will enjoy reading this book which is very good at the beginning and toward the end, with some softness in the middle.

I wish to thank NetGalley and Taylor Trade Publishing for an advance review copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Pace of the book:

This is a quick read as it took me less than two hours to finish the book.  The stories and reporting are all written in small segments, which made reading it quickly even easier.

Do I recommend?

Readers who are football fans will enjoy this book and those who are among the many who cheer just as loudly for a draft pick by their favorite team as a touchdown will especially enjoy this.

Book Format Read:

Ebook (Kindle)

Buying Links:

http://www.amazon.com/Clock-Story-NFL-Draft/dp/163076101X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1427476326&sr=1-1&keywords=on+the+clock

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/on-the-clock-barry-wilner/1120624319?ean=9781630761011