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Dražen Petrovic was born on October 22, 1964, in Šibenik, Croatia. Learning basketball at an early age from his older brother, Aleksandar, Dražen was a natural. He began his professional career at the age of fifteen, playing for the national team, where he began his rise through the European circuit. Known as a skilled shooter, it was not unusual for him to score 40, 50, even 60 points during a single game. While playing for Yugoslavia in the Olympics, Dražen and his team finished with the bronze medal in the 1984 Summer Olympic Games and the silver in the ’88 Games. He later won silver in the ’92 Olympics while playing for Croatia. In 1986, Dražen was drafted in the third round (60th overall) by the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers. Deciding to play a few more years in Europe, he did not come to the US until the beginning of the 1989–1990 season. Dražen, along with a handful of other players, were part of the first groups of Europeans to break into the NBA, paving the way for future stars. After struggling with playing time in Portland, Dražen was traded to the New Jersey Nets in 1991. He would become a premier player and was considered one of the finest shooters in the NBA, averaging over 20 points a game in his two full seasons with the Nets. He was both a hero in the US as well as at home in Croatia, where his success had become a beacon of hope for his beleaguered countrymen who were enduring war in what is now the former Yugoslavia. In the summer of 1993, after his best season in the NBA, Dražen traveled to Poland to help his country qualify for the upcoming FIBA European Basketball Championship. Deciding against flying with his team back to Croatia, he instead chose to drive there with his girlfriend. On June 7, 1993, only a few months before his twenty-ninth birthday, Dražen Petrovic died in a traffic collision in Denkendorf, Germany. Thousands attended the funeral in his hometown, and the New Jersey Nets retired his number 3. Even though his career was cut short, his passion, determination, and spirit continue to influence not only his home country, but international basketball as a whole. Skyhorse Publishing, along with our Arcade, Good Books, Sports Publishing, and Yucca imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of biographies, autobiographies, and memoirs. Our list includes biographies on well-known historical figures like Benjamin Franklin, Nelson Mandela, and Alexander Graham Bell, as well as villains from history, such as Heinrich Himmler, John Wayne Gacy, and O. J. Simpson. We have also published survivor stories of World War II, memoirs about overcoming adversity, first-hand tales of adventure, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.
Bringing together dozens of leading scholars from across the world to address topics from pinball to the latest in virtual reality, The Oxford Handbook of Video Game Music and Sound is the most comprehensive and multifaceted single-volume source in the rapidly expanding field of game audio research.
Uncover the rich and complex history of basketball in Europe with "A Short History of Basketball in Europe." This book traces the sport’s journey from its early introduction in the early 20th century to its position as one of the continent’s most popular and competitive sports. Explore how basketball has evolved across Europe’s diverse nations, each contributing to the sport’s growth and unique character. Read about legendary players, coaches, and teams that have left an indelible mark on European basketball. Learn about the dominance of the former Yugoslavian teams, the rise of clubs like Real Madrid, and the influence of European leagues on the NBA. Discover the impact of players like Dirk Nowitzki, Pau Gasol, and Giannis Antetokounmpo. Through meticulous research and vivid storytelling, "A Short History of Basketball in Europe" highlights the sport’s cultural significance and its role in fostering unity and competition across borders. This book is an essential read for basketball enthusiasts, historians, and anyone interested in the dynamic interplay of sports and society in Europe.
For most of its existence, the National Basketball Association was a league filled with (almost) all American-born players. Players from overseas were looked at as less-skilled and not worth the risk. Americans playing overseas were looked at as those who couldn’t cut it in the NBA, now playing in, essentially, the minor leagues of basketball. But that’s no longer the case. Today, a full one-third of those in the league were born overseas. Out are the days of foreign-born players from unknown countries sitting at the end of the bench. Now, they’re the face of the franchise. A lottery draft pick. They are carrying the game into the new millennium. So the question remains: what brought about this change? How did the skillsets of players born overseas become comparable to those in the states? In The (Inter) National Basketball Association, author Joel Gunderson explores how the international game has become so integral to the growth of the NBA. It’s not, as former commissioner David Stern described at the 1985 NBA Draft, “America’s Game.” No longer does Team USA expect to steamroll through the Olympics. With stars such as Giannis Antetokounmpo (Greece), Luka Doncic (Slovenia), Joel Embiid (Cameroon), Kristaps Porzingis (Latvia), and many more, the game of basketball has become a universal language. With almost forty different countries represented in the National Basketball Association today, the evolution of the sport has transcended across international waters. Teams no longer shy away from players born abroad, but instead welcome them with open arms. And for those who come over, not knowing the language, unfamiliar with the American lifestyle, they are now arriving with fluency in the most important language: basketball.
A sense of impending doom surrounded the New Jersey Nets. No matter how well things were going for the perennial underdogs, something would go wrong sooner or later--injuries, bad trades, inner conflicts. But if the Nets were never a stable organization, it made following them as entertaining as it was painful. The team's 2012 move to Brooklyn was supposed to make a clean break with their past. That past was in fact rich and eventful, filled with heroes, often unfairly vilified or underappreciated. Shedding new light on the careers of such figures as Julius Erving, Buck Williams, Sam Bowie, Derrick Coleman, Stephon Marbury, Jason Kidd and Vince Carter, this book celebrates a team of strong-willed individuals whose best efforts always ended in heartbreak.
Six years after Michael Jordan won his last NBA championship, American basketball hit rock bottom. The perception of NBA players reached an all-time low. Team USA lost three times, disgracing the nation at the 2004 Olympics. With great historical sweep, bringing in the voices of all-time greats like Jordan, Bill Russell, Julius Erving and Jerry West, the book will show how American basketball bottomed out. It will chart the path of Jerry Colangelo, a great sportsman who set out to change the stained image of USA Basketball. And with great insight and fresh detail, it will show how two of the best players in history – Kobe Bryant and LeBron James – spun their own tails of redemption in while winning gold medals.
Massy was big, over 8’2”, and still growing, the biggest man in pro basketball. No one thought it possible a man that big could move – could run and jump and shoot and rebound. But, before his first year was out, he became a legend, as well as a threat to the game. No one likes a giant; no one roots for Goliath. Cursed by irate fans, elbowed and punched by competing players, he is universally despised. What drives him on? What is in his past that drives him to continue dragging himself up and down the court when he would rather be playing the piano? What about the father that won’t stay off the bottle? And the little girl with the flute? As the season nears its ultimate close, the fury and tension mount. No one can stop the big man even though he doesn’t have all the moves and shots. No one and nothing. Beating the backboards, pounding slam-dunks so hard the rim shakes, pulling down rebounds a yard above the rim, blocking shots from ten feet away. He is a one-man wrecking crew, seemingly oblivious to the fact that the fans hate him, the opposing team hates him, and the officials hate him. Massy obliterates the opposition almost single-handedly. But the more shots he blocks, the greater the national hysteria. The book surges on to a screaming apocalyptic ending as unexpected as it is inevitable. If opposing players can’t stop him there are other means available. An original and fast-breaking sports novel that makes a strong and provocative comment on our entire society.
With its technical limitations, modern basketball has developed radically to a physical game. A revolution of basketball fundamental skills is needed, and now it is feasible with a break-through techniqueThree-Finger Zen, Universal Ball-Handling Mechanism. In 2010, after five-year dedicated research and praxis, Xiaoxing Chen discovered Three- Finger-Zen (3fz), a nature mechanism of human hand and arm for handling the basketball. It benefits every participant of the sport, and has technical capabilities to revolutionize basketball for a perfect game. Chen built his theories and praxes of how basketball should work in 3fz with its unique features: Integrates all basketball offense skills as one simple mechanism. Enables unchallengeable shooting with exceptional accuracy. Improves players athletic abilities and prevent passive injuries. Enhances physical and mental development of children. Sparks logic and artistic intelligence in youths and adults. Promotes physical and mental health of the general public. Distinctive from conventional basketball skills, 3fz applies the last three fingersmiddle finger, ring finger and pinkyto handle and control the ball. In this method, the ring finger plays a command-and-control role in the ball-handling processes of dribbling, passing, and shooting. The technique is easy to learn when you understand the 3fz mechanism and follow the training instructions. In this book, Chen reveals the steps to 3fz basketball revolution and teaches you how to be the best basketball player you can be.
Abe and his friend Sol are out for a walk together in a part of town they haven't been in before. Passing a Christian church, they notice a curious sign in front that says "$1,000 to anyone who will convert." "I wonder what that's about," says Abe. "I think I'll go in and have a look. I'll be back in a minute; just wait for me." Sol sits on the sidewalk bench and waits patiently for nearly half an hour. Finally, Abe reappears. "Well," asks Sol, "what are they up to? Who are they trying to convert? Why do they care? Did you get the $1,000?" Indignantly Abe replies, "Money. That's all you people care about." Ted Cohen thinks that's not a bad joke. But he also doesn't think it's an easy joke. For a listener or reader to laugh at Abe's conversion, a complicated set of conditions must be met. First, a listener has to recognize that Abe and Sol are Jewish names. Second, that listener has to be familiar with the widespread idea that Jews are more interested in money than anything else. And finally, the listener needs to know this information in advance of the joke, and without anyone telling him or her. Jokes, in short, are complicated transactions in which communities are forged, intimacy is offered, and otherwise offensive stereotypes and cliches lose their sting—at least sometimes. Jokes is a book of jokes and a book about them. Cohen loves a good laugh, but as a philosopher, he is also interested in how jokes work, why they work, and when they don't. The delight at the end of a joke is the result of a complex set of conditions and processes, and Cohen takes us through these conditions in a philosophical exploration of humor. He considers questions of audience, selection of joke topics, the ethnic character of jokes, and their morality, all with plenty of examples that will make you either chuckle or wince. Jokes: more humorous than other philosophy books, more philosophical than other humor books. "Befitting its subject, this study of jokes is . . . light, funny, and thought-provoking. . . . [T]he method fits the material, allowing the author to pepper the book with a diversity of jokes without flattening their humor as a steamroller theory might. Such a book is only as good as its jokes, and most of his are good. . . . [E]ntertainment and ideas in one gossamer package."—Kirkus Reviews "One of the many triumphs of Ted Cohen's Jokes-apart from the not incidental fact that the jokes are so good that he doesn't bother to compete with them-is that it never tries to sound more profound than the jokes it tells. . . . [H]e makes you feel he is doing an unusual kind of philosophy. As though he has managed to turn J. L. Austin into one of the Marx Brothers. . . . Reading Jokes makes you feel that being genial is the most profound thing we ever do-which is something jokes also make us feel-and that doing philosophy is as natural as being amused."—Adam Phillips, London Review of Books "[A] lucid and jargon-free study of the remarkable fact that we divert each other with stories meant to make us laugh. . . . An illuminating study, replete with killer jokes."—Kevin McCardle, The Herald (Glasgow) "Cohen is an ardent joke-maker, keen to offer us a glimpse of how jokes are crafted and to have us dwell rather longer on their effects."—Barry C. Smith, Times Literary Supplement "Because Ted Cohen loves jokes, we come to appreciate them more, and perhaps think further about the quality of good humor and the appropriateness of laughter in our lives."—Steve Carlson, Christian Science Monitor