Sporty Saturdays (2)

IT'S FOOTBALL TIME!!!

I love football season and I am so pumped that it is starting today... College Game Day is on ESPN right now and in honor of that I am going to give you some football books. My boys at school love Matt Christopher books. Christopher has written many books on many types of sports and will more than likely be featured here again! You can visit his site here for all kinds of cool stuff! Today's featured book is...

The Great Quarterback Switch
Matt Christopher

Can Michael and Tom read each other's minds?

Michael and Tom Curtis are identical twins who share a love of football. Unfortunately, because of a tragic accident, Michael must watch from the sidelines as his brother calls the plays on the football field. During one game Michael concentrates very hard on a play he thinks could help the team, and Tom calls the exact play a split second later! Is it coincidence, or can the boys communicate through ESP! The boys try a daring experiment in which they push their telepathic powers to the limit...and suddenly, impossibly, Michael is running the ball for a spectacular touchdown!


And, ironically enough, I got a book in this week from Thomas Nelson Publishers to review and it is none other than Eli Gold's newest book.

From Peanuts to the Pressbox

In this behind-the-scenes look at sports broadcasting Eli Gold tells how a kid from Brooklyn, New York, went from selling peanuts at Madison Square Garden to one of the most recognizable voices in all of radio sports broadcasting.

From Peanuts to the Pressbox is an intimate walk down memory lane, reliving some of the greatest moments in Alabama sports (basketball and football) and NASCAR.Gold also shares stories from his early days with Yankees broadcaster Mel Allen and Red Barber and other broadcasting greats, such as Bob Costas, Tom Hammond, Verne Lundquist, Kevin Harlan, Ron Franklin, and Mike Tirico.

Eli Gold, of course, is the radio voice of The Alabama Crimson Tide and will be hard at work today as the Tide play Virginia Tech!! Keep a look out for my review for this one as well!

Happy football everyone!

Sporty Saturday (1)

On Saturday's I am going to feature books that are all about sports! We are pretty big sports fans in our house and I know that many of my students and others are as well!!

I am going to start this off with a goldie oldie!! I read this book when I was in middle school and made sure that it was in my classroom library when I started teaching. It is by the legendary author Walter Dean Meyers who has so many books out there I can't even begin to list them!

The Outside Shot by Walter Dean Meyers is about a boy name Lonnie Jackson who leaves Harlem to take a basketball scholarship at a midwestern college. Lonnie has a lot riding on him because he knows that he has to work hard, keep his head on straight, and keep his record clean. He knows that this is his only chance of making it to the pros one day. Lonnie thinks that he is pretty smart when it comes to most things in life since he grew up in Harlem, but nothing could prepare him for the new pressures that he faces at his college so far from home. He now has tough classes, college ball (which is much different than high school ball), and temptations from local gamblers to fix some of the games. Lonnie has to learn a whole new set of rules for this chapter in his life. Along with learning the new rules and consequences of college, Lonnie has to learn the rules of Sherry, who is very determined to become a track star. Lonnie only has one year to prove that he can make it in the high stakes world of college ball in preparation for the pros. This is his outside shot at a future he so desperately wants.

Again, this is a goldie oldie but it is such a good read. It was published in 1986 and the message that it conveys through the story is still applicable today.

Find out more about Walter Dean Meyers and his books here.