Masters of the Game: A Conversational History of the NBA in 75 Legendary Players

Masters of the Game: A Conversational History of the NBA in 75 Legendary Players by Sam Smith and Phil Jackson 

This book discusses the 75 best basketball players with a back and forth between writer Sam Smith and coach Phil Jackson. The stories discuss the key players as well as tangents related to them. Some of the "not quite the great" make appearances as well as the key players. Some players won multiple championships, while others were great without a championship. The two have seen many of the players in person and have some interesting commentary. Smith had started watching the Nicks as a young kid in New York and spent a long career as a sports writer. Jackson had experience as player coach and executive. They both have intimate knowledge of the came with plenty of first and second hand  commentary.

Hoop Atlas: Mapping the Remarkable Transformation of the Modern NBA

Hoop Atlas: Mapping the Remarkable Transformation of the Modern NBA by Kirk Goldsberry

Who is the greatest basketball player? Rather than look at stats, we can look at how they have influenced the NBA. Michael Jordan received many individual awards. He also significantly altered the course of the NBA. Stephen Curry was on the vanguard of similar changes. Shooting and ball handling became more important. The three pointer grew in importance. Great players are excellent at what they do and are emulated by many others. This book looks at the evolution of the NBA by focussing on many of the key greats that have lead the change. The NBA went from being dominated by big centers to being dominated by outside shooters. Today things are coming back with big men with shooting and ball handling skills getting their day. The author doesn't proclaim any of the players the greatest, but does show how each of many greats are important by their stats and future influence.

Sacred Hoops: Spiritual Lessons Of A Hardwood Warrior

Sacred Hoops: Spiritual Lessons Of A Hardwood Warrior by Phil Jackson and Hugh Delehanty

Phil Jackson explores the spiritual dimension of his basketball career. He was raised as a child of Presbyterian ministers. However, he never experienced speaking in tongues and felt that he had not filled the jump in the spiritual journey. He later was attracted to Zen and meditation. He still maintianed some of the key Christian teacheings of love with his Zen practice. He used this as part of his early basketball career. His NBA playing career gradually shifted to coaching. When he was coaching the bulls he worked to balance the extreme talent of Michael Jordan with the needs of a team. There were times that players had important life experiences that needed to be addressed. (Such as the death of Scottie Pippen's father.) The book is abridged and ends in the middle of the Bulls run. Much of it is repeated in his later book spanning his entire NBA career. 

Eleven Rings: The Soul of Success

Eleven Rings: The Soul of Success by Phil Jackson and Hugh Delehanty

This is books is primarily a linear narrative of the life of Phil Jackson. He grew up in the upper midwest in a religious family (both parents were preachers). He took to basketball and eventually made it to the NBA to play for the Nicks. He was never a super star, but was a role player. He earned two championships as a player (though he was out injured for a season where he got it.) At the time, life in the NBA was not glamourous or well-paying. Some of the college students had better experiences. He was drawn towards coaching. He had various experiences (including in Puerto Rico.) He eventually was an assistant for the Bulls. They had Michael Jordan and some potential. Management decided he was best to get them over the cusp. They fired the coach and made him head coach. After some challenges, he was able to put together 2 three-peat championships with the bulls. Part of it involved helping the team to be more balanced rather than dishing everything to Jordan. He took time off, then took the Lakers job. There he won three championships with Kobe and Shaq. Again, he needed to work to get them to be team players. After some down years, he was able to win two more with Kobe. He stayed on for another season after the last championship where they failed to win. In between the championships he also had some bad years. The pain of defeat helped encourage him and his teams to play for more victories. He also talks about some of the meditation and other non-basketball work he did. In his time, he worked with some of the best players and got the best out of them. The combination of players and coach seemed to work well.

The Crossover

The Crossover by Kwame Alexander

Two twin boys love basketball. Their dad was a pro basketball player, but his career was cut short due to injuries. He did not want to see a doctor because his father died when he went to the hospital. One of the twin boys gets a girlfriend. This causes some jealousy at the hands of the other which he took out on the basketball court by hitting him with a bad pass. This caused him to be suspended. After a period of atonement, he started to get in a better position with his family. He was playing a game with his dad.  Alas, dad was having health problems and refused to see a doctor.  Dad collapsed and was finally rushed to the hospital. The boy was able to play a big basketball game, but dad passed away. It is a quick moving basketball book that ends with a teerjerker.

Dragon Hoops

Dragon Hoops by Gene Luen Yang

The author has always been a bit nerdy and preferred to focus on his comics. He never saw the fascination that other people had with sports, but he couldn't resist the enthusiasm that people had. He decided to talk with coach. He discovered that he was as relatable guy and was once a gangly teenager. The team is great and has made it to the state championship game many times, but has never won. He became smitten by the basketball team. He decides to write his book on their season.

The book goes through the basketball season and ties in school and basketball history. He tries to go in depth with many of the players. The histories are fairly positive, with the players feeling friendly and well-grounded. The team is mostly black, with a future NBA player. However, there are also other players, including a white "redneck", a Punjabi and Chinese student. They endure some racial taunts, but rub it off. The book mostly covers the on-court struggles of the team, together with the challenges of the author and his life. There are even notes at the end of the graphic novel. Some players are great and anticipate future experience playing basketball, while others are looking more at the "student" part of it. It ends as a nice happy sports-story ending.

The Sense of Wonder

At first, I thought I was listening to a sports non-fiction work. It really sounded like Jeremy Lin. However, the name and other details (such as his ethnicity) were not quite right. The author has used the general framework of "Linsanity" to tell the story of the Korean-American experience. The basketball story is intertwined with the story of another character who is working on bringing Korean dramas to a wider audience. There are relationships involved and struggles with identities (especially when it goes through an adoption and "rediscovery" of the ancestral tongue. At times the story is told within the context of a Korean drama with its appropriate rules.

Economic Impact of Butler in the final four

Yahoo! has an article about how much money Indy will lose by having Butler. Some sports economists say Indianpolis' gross final four income will reduced by a quarter because hometown Butler is playing. However, in another article it states that Butler only has 660 student tickets.

In other words, very few of those people attending the game are guaranteed to be local.

A look at the other teams:

• Michigan State - 4.5 hours away
  
• West Virginia - 6 hours away
  
• Duke - 10 hours away
  

All are close enough to be a possible road trip, but far enough away to probably require an overnight stay. The students at these schools could easily decide on a spontaneous trip to the final four - even if they don't have tickets. This would add to the additional local revenue.

Also, the fact that Butler is a small school means that their impact will be less than if UCLA made it to the Final four in L.A. Even if every Butler student attended the game, they wouldn't come close to filling half the stadium.

Students, however, tend to be poor and often priced out of the tickets. The well-healed alumni would be the main source of school-specific ticket purchases. From the Butler Post graduate survey, about 45% of graduates had a first job in the Indianapolis metro area. That leaves more than half the alumni in other areas. For these alums, a trip to a local final four may lead to more money spent. They may take in a game, then spend some time taking in the campus and reminiscing on the other sites of town.

A good local population supporting the home team can also benefit the town. An upbeat, happening sports scene could leave a positive vibe on the visitors and encourage more spending and even repeat visits.

Many of the out of town visitors already had tickets long before the teams were announced. They are unlikely to change their plans because a local team came along. A big chunk of local residents would also probably snap up tickets regardless of the teams. Now, you'll just have local Butler fans instead of local Kansas fans buying the tickets.

March madness

March madness is here. A whole bunch of basketball games, where the underdog theoretically has a chance. Though only theoretically. Right now, the only 'underdog' remaining is low-seeded Arizona, who happens to be in the tournament for its 25th consecutive year. We got wonderful games like Connecticut vs. Chatanooga. UConn could have gone home after the first half - and still would have won.

Meanwhile in the NIT, there are actually some exciting games. St. Mary's vs. Davidson. Even first round games like #1 seeded Creighton vs. #8 Bowling Green were competitive.
San Diego State and Davidson both seem to be coming alive now, and would probably be doing well against anybody.

Now that the NCAA has ownership of the NIT, why not combine both tourneys? You could still seed the top 8 teams in each region as they are now. But then combine seeds 9-16 with '17-24' from the current NIT pool. In the new 'first round', the 9-24 schools will play each other, with the 1-8 seeds getting a first round bye. These games could feed in to the similar place in the bracket. Thus Number 9 will play number 10 in the first round, with the winner playing #8 in the second round. #11 will play #12, with the winner playing #7. This way we get an exciting first round where anybody could win. Teams that do go on a hot streak in the post-season will get a chance to continue it. Even a lowly 24 seed still has a reasonable chance of getting at least one post-season victory. And the 'play-in' teams will not longer be excluded from brackets.

And for teams that don't make the tournament, there will still be the CBI.