Spring 2024 Titles

When Kenny Albert was growing up, family gatherings sounded a lot like a dispatch from the first all-sports radio station. There was his father, Marv, whose voice shaped the sound of modern basketball, and there too were his uncles Al and Steve&mdash;a trio of professional play-by-play men with a listenership that spanned the country.<br /><br />It was only a matter of time before Kenny, armed with a toy tape recorder, yearned to follow in their footsteps.<br /><br />Some 3,000 broadcasts later, Kenny Albert has amassed countless stories from the world of sports and media. <em>A Mic for All Seasons</em> is his chronicle of a charmed yet unlikely journey, from a youth spent calling games in his bedroom for a fictitious audience to ten-hour bus rides with a minor-league hockey team, plus the time he worked five different sports in one chaotic, 19-day stretch.<br /><br />The only play-by-play broadcaster who currently calls all four major sports in North America, Albert details the stand-out moments from his three-decade career, including the 1994 Stanley Cup Final, Jose Bautista&#39;s bat flip in the 2015 ALCS, and the U.S. women&rsquo;s hockey Olympic gold-medal winning shootout in Pyeongchang in 2018.<br /><br />Part memoir, part behind-the-scenes look at the world of broadcast media, <em>A Mic for All Seasons</em> also features stories about life in the booth, game preparation, travel hijinks, marquee events, meetings with star athletes and coaches, and much more.

Jeff Van Gundy. Brad Stevens. Frank Vogel. Mike Budenholzer. Tom Thibodeau. Sam Presti. Leon Rose. Before you knew his name, before he drafted your favorite player, before he guided your team to a championship, he had a playing career of his own at an NCAA Division III college. He didn&rsquo;t play for fortune &ndash; the NBA was out of reach, and his school didn&rsquo;t even give athletic scholarships. He didn&rsquo;t play for fame &ndash; his games weren&rsquo;t televised, and the stands were rarely full. Whatever the motivation, he simply couldn&rsquo;t give up the game of basketball. And that didn&rsquo;t change after graduation, when it was time to pick a career path.<br /><br />For the first time in league history, NBA coaches and general managers are just as likely to have played Division III basketball as they are to have played in the NBA. While the number of former D3 players working in the NBA is higher than ever, small college alums have served in leadership positions since the league&rsquo;s founding. They shaped the NBA into what it is today, playing integral roles in the Lakers&rsquo; initial success in Los Angeles, the inception of several expansion franchises, the creation of the popular All-Star Weekend dunk contest, the globalization of the league, and more.<br /><br />Their improbable and inspiring journeys tell a bigger story &ndash; the history of small college athletics, the evolution of coaching and management in the NBA, and the hiring practices in the most competitive fields. Their alma maters were small, but their impact on the game, and the implications of their success, loom large.

<div><strong><em>Sports Illustrated</em>, the most respected voice in sports journalism, has covered Major League Baseball&nbsp;for over seven decades, documenting its heroes, villains, great characters, and iconic moments.</strong><br /><br />A wide-ranging portrait of America&#39;s pastime, this anthology features the best baseball writing from the <em>SI</em> archives by nationally renowned journalists including&nbsp;Frank Deford, Mark Kram, George Plimpton, Peter Gammons, and Tom Verducci.</div>

<div><strong>Hours of challenging wordplay and fun!</strong><br /><br />For over sixty-five&nbsp;years, millions of newspaper readers have delighted in solving the daily Jumble&reg;, which appears in hundreds of national papers and in these puzzle books.<br /><br />Each page features a series of mixed-up words coupled with a cartoon clue, and certain letters from each word are used to form the answer to the puzzle.</div>

Childhood for Evan Roberts was defined by outings to the old Shea Stadium with his father, always with a scorebook in hand.<br /><br />What began as a gameday ritual replete with misspelled player names and scrawled symbols turned into an obsession with scoring every game he watched, one which persisted as Roberts rose through the ranks at WFAN. Taken together, those scorebooks form a living, breathing Mets diary spanning 30 years of thrilling&mdash;and, at times, tortured&mdash;fandom.<br /><br /><em>My Baseball Bible</em> is an exercise in memory and nostalgia, and a meditation on the things that stick with us as sports fans. With his personal scorecards as a guide, Roberts brings to life some of the most unforgettable moments in Mets lore, offering a fresh perspective on the highs and lows of being a die-hard fan.<br /><br />Meticulously kept history mixes with personal recollections and behind-the-scenes anecdotes covering touchstone events such as Johan Santana&rsquo;s no-hitter, Robin Ventura&rsquo;s grand slam &ldquo;single&rdquo;, and the loss that Roberts has never quite gotten over.<br />&#8203;<br />By turns heartfelt and hilarious, Roberts delivers a thrilling and wholly unique journey through modern Mets history.

<strong>When Sean Zak arrived in St. Andrews, Scotland&mdash;the mecca of golf&mdash;he was determined to spend his summer in search of the game&#39;s true essence.</strong><br /><br />He found it everywhere&mdash;in the dirt, firm and proper, a sandy soil that you don&#39;t see in America. He found it in the people who inherited the game from their grandparents, who inherited it from their grandparents. He found it in the structures that prop up the game&mdash;cheap memberships and &ldquo;private courses&rdquo; that aren&rsquo;t private at all.<br /><br />At every turn he also found LIV Golf, the Saudi-backed entity which descended on the professional circuit during that summer of the 150th Open Championship. Zak&#39;s personal personal pilgrimage now offered him a front-row seat at a cultural reckoning, one which pitted the game&#39;s longstanding customs against a divisive new force.<br /><br /><em>Searching in St. Andrews</em> is the vivid chronicle of an unforgettable sojourn in the birthplace of golf, informed by sublime mornings on the Old Course playing with just four clubs, evenings spent analyzing legal documents riddled with greed, and the singular characters he encountered along the way.<br /><br />Readers will meet a 92-year-old who just learned how to putt, explore the many differences between Golf Over There and Golf Over Here, and even experience caddying on the PGA Tour, from deciphering the yardage books to keeping your player on time to drinking until sunrise after you&rsquo;ve missed the cut.<br /><br /><strong>Written with heartfelt curiosity and charm, this is an essential portrait of golf amid the crosswinds of tradition, progress, and power.</strong>

A singular, transcendent talent can change the fortunes of a hockey team instantly. Each year, NHL teams approach the draft with this knowledge, hoping that luck will be on their side and that their extensive scouting and analysis will pay off.<br /><br />In <em>On the Clock: Vancouver Canucks</em>, Daniel Wagner explores the fascinating, rollercoaster history of the Canucks at the draft, including tales of Stan Smyl, Trevor Linden, the Sedin twins, and more.<br /><br />Readers will go behind the scenes with top decision-makers as they evaluate, deliberate, and ultimately make the picks they hope will tip the fate of their franchise toward success.<br /><br /><strong>From seemingly surefire first-rounders to surprising late selections and the ones that got away, this is a must-read for Vancouver faithful and hockey fans eager for a glimpse at how teams are built.</strong>

<strong>Go behind the scenes with the Calgary Flames at the NHL draft</strong><br /><br /><style type=&#34;text/css&#34;><!--td {border: 1px solid #cccccc;}br {mso-data-placement:same-cell;}--></style>A singular, transcendent talent can change the fortunes of a hockey team instantly. Each year, NHL teams approach the draft with this knowledge, hoping that luck will be on their side and that their extensive scouting and analysis will pay off.<br /><br /><em>In On the Clock: Calgary Flames</em>, Ryan Pike explores the fascinating, rollercoaster history of the Flames at the draft, including tales of legends like Al MacInnis and Gary Suter, plus newer faces like Andrew Mangiapane.<br /><br />Readers will go behind the scenes with top decision-makers as they evaluate, deliberate, and ultimately make the picks they hope will tip the fate of their franchise toward success.<br /><br /><strong>From seemingly surefire first-rounders to surprising late selections and the ones that got away, this is a must-read for Calgary faithful and hockey fans eager for a glimpse at how teams are built.</strong>

<div><strong>The best resource for projecting future performance of minor league athletes&mdash;essential for fantasy league baseball players.</strong><br /><br />The first book of its kind to fully integrate sabermetrics and scouting, the <em>2024&nbsp;Minor League Baseball Analyst </em>provides a distinctive brand of analysis for more than 1,000 minor league baseball players. Features include scouting reports for all players, batter skills ratings, pitch repertoires, performance trends, major league equivalents, and expected major league debuts. A complete sabermetric glossary is also included. This one-of-a-kind reference is ideally suited for baseball analysts and those who play in fantasy leagues with farm systems.</div>

<p>One of the foremost authorities in fantasy baseball over the past three decades, Ron Shandler is a self-described rotoholic.&nbsp;<br /><br />In the beginning, he hoarded newspaper box scores and pored over every number at his disposal. Then came the compulsion to create his own numbers. A monthly newsletter expanded into an annual Baseball Forecaster book, which spawned a media company, websites, tournaments, and more.<br /><br />Part memoir, part madcap history, Fantasy Expert is a fascinating and wide-ranging look at the modern&nbsp;growth and development of the game that went from cottage industry to national obsession.<br /><br />In chronicling his own escalating journey from rotisserie baseball hobbyist to professional authority, Shandler tells parallel tales of the rise of fantasy sports, the expanding baseball information industry, the increasingly sophisticated technology employed to gain an edge, and the fellow rotoholics who make it all possible.&nbsp;He also delves into the impact of fantasy baseball on the sport of baseball itself.<br /><br />Written with humor, honesty, and a deep passion for baseball, this is a must-read for anyone interested in the history, progression, and future of fantasy baseball.</p>

<div><strong>For more than thirty&nbsp;years, the very best in baseball predictions and statistics.</strong><br /><br />The industry&#39;s longest-running publication for baseball analysts and fantasy leaguers, <em>Ron Shandler&#39;s Baseball Forecaster</em>, published annually since 1986, is the first book to approach prognostication by breaking performance down into its component parts. Rather than predicting batting average, for instance, this resource looks at the elements of skill that make up any given batter&#39;s ability to distinguish between balls and strikes, his propensity to make contact with the ball, and what happens when he makes contact&mdash;reverse engineering those skills back into batting average. The result is an unparalleled forecast of baseball abilities and trends for the upcoming season and beyond.</div>

<p>Every summer in Michigan&rsquo;s Upper Peninsula, Nick Baumgartner went to work pouring concrete, taking on the harsh physical conditions of the construction trade to support his professional snowboarding dreams come winter. To limit travel time while he trained for the Olympics an hour and a half away&nbsp;from&nbsp;home, he lived out of a crusty, old construction van, parked anywhere he could find a spot.<br aria-hidden=&#34;true&#34; /><br />And in 2022, after 17 years of failure&mdash;all the crashes, injuries, and personal setbacks&mdash;he won Olympic&nbsp;gold&nbsp;at 40 years old, becoming the oldest Olympic snowboard medalist in history.<br aria-hidden=&#34;true&#34; /><br />In this candid and affable memoir, Baumgartner details his journey&nbsp;from&nbsp;a one-stoplight town to the podium in Beijing. Tales of crisscrossing the globe on the racing circuit and competing in four Olympic Games sit comfortably alongside Baumgartner&rsquo;s reflections as a single parent and his affectionate portrayal of&nbsp;Iron&nbsp;River, Michigan, the community that raised him.&nbsp;<br aria-hidden=&#34;true&#34; /><br />More than just a sports story,&nbsp;<i>Gold&nbsp;from&nbsp;Iron</i>&nbsp;is a tale of massive dreams, constant sacrifice, and the lessons that can be learned racing down an ice-covered course on a carbon fiber board.&nbsp;</p>