It's How We Play the Game by Ed Stack

IT'S HOW WE PLAY THE GAME by Ed Stack is the story of the founding and growth of DICK’S Sporting Goods company. Stack begins with tales of how the company was founded in Binghamton, New York with $300 from his dad’s grandmother’s cookie jar.  Throughout, he stresses the importance of family and the impact that family members had on each other.  For example, he writes about his father’s love of sport and how he encouraged Ed to really study and analyze the game of baseball. The idea of taking care of the local community was also always important and Stack says, “[my dad] was making a difference … before I knew it was happening … my dad understood the transcendence of sports – that they can channel kids’ energies, give them focus and goals, keep them out of trouble, reshape their lives.  … He was willing to reach into his own pocket.” Stack has carried forward that legacy and frankly, shocked me with some of the statistics he cited: “In the 1999-2000 school year, 11.3 percent of public high schools in the United States did not offer interscholastic sports. By ten years later, 22 percent of public high schools – more than one in five – no longer fielded sports teams.” Of those that did, forty percent required fees from the players and their families. To raise awareness, Stack began a number of programs including the Sports Matters Initiative. This book chronicles those efforts as well as changes in the business, such as decisions to expand, and DICK’S principled relationships with landlords like Wegman’s and suppliers like Callaway. In addition, you may have read recently in The New York Times or USA Today about how DICK’S destroyed about $5 million in inventory of assault style guns in response to the shooting in Parkland, Florida. The thinking and strategy behind implementing that decision is included in this text, too. Recommended by Adam Silver, Phil Knight, Mark Kelly and others, IT'S HOW WE PLAY THE GAME is definitely worth a read, particularly in light of the shift from shareholder to stakeholder perspective amongst US businesses, as evidenced by the change in Business Roundtable’s mission statement.  

Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes

EVVIE DRAKE STARTS OVER by Linda Holmes is a fun LibraryReads selection for June.  The tale begins with a young woman who is in the process of leaving her husband when she learns he has died in a car crash.  Now, regarded by others as a grieving widow, she struggles to redefine her life and depends in large part on a platonic friendship with Andrew. He, in turn, has a childhood friend named Dean Tenney, an MLB pitcher facing a career ending case of the yips.  Looking to get away, Dean arrives in small town Maine and rents an apartment at Evvie (rhymes with Chevy) Drake’s house. Holmes describes the feeling: “that was when he had known what was next. Now, his only plans were dinner and bringing his duffel in from the truck. The part of the future that was in focus had shortened; the part that was just a wall of fog went on forever.” Fortunately, these two lonely and bruised people click and both the banter (including a hilarious story involving a baseball field cereal box race) and the emotional healing (from abuse and devastation) begins. EVVIE DRAKE STARTS OVER is a gentle story, an undemanding read about forgiving oneself and moving forward. Author Linda Holmes is a pop culture correspondent at NPR and her debut novel received starred reviews from Booklist and Kirkus.

Mascot Nation by Billings and Black

MASCOT NATION by Andrew C. Billings and Jason Edward Black will definitely be of interest to our students who are pursuing questions about the controversy over Native American representations in sports.  The authors, both university professors, utilize their expertise in broadcasting and communications to provide a reasoned, balanced approach to the subject. They cite many examples at both the professional level (Cleveland Indians, Atlanta Braves) and college one (Florida State Seminoles and the now-retired University of Illinois’ Chief Illiniwek). In fact, there is an entire chapter on the “Online Debate on the Acceptability of the Washington NFL Mascot” where Billings and Black discuss how an increasing number of journalists refused to use that name. They provide historical background, outline concerns of Native Americans, delve into specific cases, review national polling data and more, although often in an academic, jargon-laden manner (e.g., self-categorization, post colonialism).  Throughout, they are respectful of both sides of the argument, acknowledging fans’ affection for their team as well as concerns over appropriation and mis-representation.  The text concludes with a discussion of five avenues where change may be possible: line of decivility; education; economic pressure; journalistic protest; and legal challenges. Roughly fifteen percent of the book is devoted to notes and index.

The Performance Cortex by Zach Schonbrun

Interested in how Neuroscience is redefining athletic genius?  That’s the subtitle of a new book, THE PERFORMANCE CORTEX, by Zach Schonbrun and it is filled with surprising findings and profiles of those involved in this relatively new field.  Parts of this book describe the work of deCervo’s Jason and Jordan, two neuroscientists who are (in the spirit of big data’s Moneyball) experimenting with measuring and predicting the hitting ability of baseball candidates. 

This book is full of minutiae (“the typical batter will begin his swing at 19 feet”) and scientific jargon, mixed entertainingly with anecdotes (Yogi Berra saying, “How can you think and hit at the same time?”) and observations about a tradition bound sport (one where managers still “make calls to the bullpen using a landline phone”). Other chapters deal with topics like theories from Daniel Wolpert (“The Real Reason for Brains”), Johns Hopkins University's John Krakauer commenting on basketball's Stephen Curry, and numerous applications related to robotics.   

THE PERFORMANCE CORTEX is not a quick read, but I do think students interested in sports and science, especially if they are working on a Junior Theme, will benefit from having a look.