This book was a series of essays and anecdotes about Deford’s career as a sportswriter and sports commentator. There were some interesting stories about various people including Kingsley Amis, Rodney Dangerfield, Vince McMahon, Bill Bradley and Arthur Ashe.

My issue with this book is that I downloaded it as a Kindle book. There was no proper index. It just described the Chapter number and page without a description. I skimmed through the 46 chapters of varying lengths. There were some chapters I read with interest, others that I paged through quickly.

I actually found the Jimmy The Greek chapter rather poignant. He was such a tragic figure---he was not a smart or sophisticated man and one slip of the tongue ruined not only his career but his life.

I am not a huge fan of Deford. I enjoyed his sports commentaries on TV but did not follow his writing on Sports Illustrated. ( )

I love Deford's sports writing, and have enjoyed his previous collections, but this one left me wanting more, more about his family, more about the athletes he mentions (and "mentions" is the correct term for this collection) and finally, less-less repetition, especially when he refers to sports writers of the era that came before his. This feels like a book thrown together to fulfill a contractual obligation or to top up a bank account. ( )

If you are a sports fan you might like this book. If you are a meta-sports fan, you will definitely like it. But, if you're not that into sports or the interworking of the sports writers community, you should just listen to his weekly editorials on NPR.

Because I enjoy Deford's weekly commentaries on NPR's Morning Edition, I read his book to find out more about him, only to find that with Deford, what you hear is pretty much what you get. Having done hundreds of commentaries full of short-form anecdotes, Deford has written his memoirs the same way, in a few dozen short chapters each telling a little story or following a well-defined theme. You get a lot of stories about hanging out with this athlete or that, and a lot about what it was like being a sports journalist in the 50s, 60s and 70s. What you don't get are many opinions stronger than those he shares on the air, any stories he probably hasn't told before, or much emotion of any stripe. (The death of his young daughter from cystic fibrosis is passed over in a mere mention.)

I'm good at reading between the lines, so Deford's justified outrage over racism in sports and his empathy for the particular trials that great athletes must endure for their moments of glory come through loud and clear. But I wish, as he approaches the end zone of life, he might let his guard drop a bit. ( )

Frank Deford has long been one of my favorite writers, someone whose work I search out, be them in written or spoken form. His erudite and opinionated commentaries on the state of athletics in our society has sustained me, entertained me, as well as disturbed me.

This collection of vignettes are intended to be an autobiography of sorts, they are written as if they were individual essays. Deford is opinionated, brutally honest, and comes off as a curmudgeon. I think he really enjoys the curmudgeon part, or else he wouldn't be projecting this role with such panache and joy. he takes on all comers, he talks about his start in sports journalism, his lucky breaks and he name drops like nobody's business. Many of those names take hits while many others are elevated into the Deford pantheon of all around good guys. Whether you want to believe his observations or not, the delivery is impeccable and always fascinating.

The story that Deford tells is of the evolution of the mass market sports world. It is a recounted of the sports journalism genre as it evolved through the most revolutionary and some say the least beneficent era: the era that goes from the rise of the sports press to today, the social media age. Even though Deford wasn't there at the very beginning, he was an observer through rise and possible demise of the written sports presst. Deford tells the story, or actually history extremely well and does a very elegiac accounting of the history without seeming maudlin or too sentimental.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, the essays were of the perfect length for short breaks and interesting enough for the reader to recall the thread when he or she returns to the book. ( )