Top Ten Best Selling Sports Books by Genre: Baseball, Football, Basketball, Soccer, Tennis, Running, Boxing, Golf, Horse Racing
Baseball
- “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game” by Michael Lewis
- “Ball Four” by Jim Bouton
- “The Boys of Summer” by Roger Kahn
- “Shoeless Joe” by W.P. Kinsella
- “The Natural” by Bernard Malamud
- “Eight Men Out” by Eliot Asinof
- “The Glory of Their Times” by Lawrence S. Ritter
- “The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron” by Howard Bryant
- “Men at Work: The Craft of Baseball” by George F. Will
- “Wait Till Next Year” by Doris Kearns Goodwin
Football (American)
- “Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream” by H.G. Bissinger
- “The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game” by Michael Lewis
- “Instant Replay: The Green Bay Diary of Jerry Kramer” by Jerry Kramer and Dick Schaap
- “When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi” by David Maraniss
- “America’s Game: The Epic Story of How Pro Football Captured a Nation” by Michael MacCambridge
- “A Few Seconds of Panic” by Stefan Fatsis
- “North Dallas Forty” by Peter Gent
- “Paper Lion” by George Plimpton
- “Paterno” by Joe Posnanski
- “You Can’t Make This Up” by Al Michaels and L. Jon Wertheim
Basketball
- “The Jordan Rules” by Sam Smith
- “When the Game Was Ours” by Larry Bird, Earvin Johnson, and Jackie MacMullan
- “Playing for Keeps: Michael Jordan and the World He Made” by David Halberstam
- “Eleven Rings: The Soul of Success” by Phil Jackson
- “The Breaks of the Game” by David Halberstam
- “Sacred Hoops: Spiritual Lessons of a Hardwood Warrior” by Phil Jackson
- “Loose Balls: The Short, Wild Life of the American Basketball Association” by Terry Pluto
- “Life on the Run” by Bill Bradley
- “My Losing Season” by Pat Conroy
- “Heaven Is a Playground” by Rick Telander
Soccer
- “Fever Pitch” by Nick Hornby
- “The Ball is Round: A Global History of Soccer” by David Goldblatt
- “Soccernomics” by Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski
- “Among the Thugs” by Bill Buford
- “How Soccer Explains the World” by Franklin Foer
- “The Damned Utd” by David Peace
- “Inverting the Pyramid: The History of Soccer Tactics” by Jonathan Wilson
- “Futebol: The Brazilian Way of Life” by Alex Bellos
- “The Miracle of Castel di Sangro” by Joe McGinniss
- “Brilliant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football” by David Winner
Tennis
- “Open: An Autobiography” by Andre Agassi
- “Levels of the Game” by John McPhee
- “Rafa: My Story” by Rafael Nadal and John Carlin
- “A Handful of Summers” by Gordon Forbes
- “Strokes of Genius: Federer, Nadal, and the Greatest Match Ever Played” by Jon Wertheim
- “You Cannot Be Serious” by John McEnroe
- “The Inner Game of Tennis” by W. Timothy Gallwey
- “String Theory: David Foster Wallace on Tennis” by David Foster Wallace
- “Game, Set, Match: Billie Jean King and the Revolution in Women’s Sports” by Susan Ware
- “Winning Ugly: Mental Warfare in Tennis” by Brad Gilbert and Steve Jamison
Running
- “Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen” by Christopher McDougall
- “Once a Runner” by John L. Parker Jr.
- “What I Talk About When I Talk About Running” by Haruki Murakami
- “Ultramarathon Man: Confessions of an All-Night Runner” by Dean Karnazes
- “The Perfect Mile” by Neal Bascomb
- “Running with the Kenyans: Passion, Adventure, and the Secrets of the Fastest People on Earth” by Adharanand Finn
- “Eat & Run” by Scott Jurek
- “Run or Die” by Kilian Jornet
- “Running with the Buffaloes” by Chris Lear
- “Deerfoot: Athletics’ Noble Savage” by Robert W. Henderson
Boxing
- “King of the World: Muhammad Ali and the Rise of an American Hero” by David Remnick
- “Cinderella Man: James J. Braddock, Max Baer, and the Greatest Upset in Boxing History” by Jeremy Schaap
- “The Fight” by Norman Mailer
- “Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson” by Geoffrey C. Ward
- “In This Corner…!: Forty-two World Champions Tell Their Stories” by Peter Heller
- “Shadow Box” by George Plimpton
- “Hands of Stone: The Life and Legend of Roberto Duran” by Christian Giudice
- “Only in America: The Life and Crimes of Don King” by Jack Newfield
- “The Sweet Science” by A.J. Liebling
- “A Flame of Pure Fire: Jack Dempsey and the Roaring ’20s” by Roger Kahn
Golf
- “A Good Walk Spoiled: Days and Nights on the PGA Tour” by John Feinstein
- “Ben Hogan’s Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf” by Ben Hogan
- “Golf is Not a Game of Perfect” by Dr. Bob Rotella
- “The Big Miss: My Years Coaching Tiger Woods” by Hank Haney
- “Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book: Lessons and Teachings from a Lifetime in Golf” by Harvey Penick
- “Arnie: The Life of Arnold Palmer” by Tom Callahan
- “The Match: The Day the Game of Golf Changed Forever” by Mark Frost
- “A Course Called Ireland: A Long Walk in Search of a Country, a Pint, and the Next Tee” by Tom Coyne
- “Dream Golf: The Making of Bandon Dunes” by Stephen Goodwin
- “The Masters: Golf, Money, and Power in Augusta, Georgia” by Curt Sampson
Horse Racing
- “Seabiscuit: An American Legend” by Laura Hillenbrand
- “Ruffian: Burning from the Start” by Jane Schwartz
- “Man o’ War: A Legend Like Lightning” by Dorothy Ours
- “Secretariat: The Making of a Champion” by William Nack
- “My Racing Heart: The Passionate World of Thoroughbreds and the Track” by Nan Mooney
- “The Greatest Gambling Story Ever Told” by Mark Paul
- “War Admiral: Thoroughbred Legends” by Edward L. Bowen
- “The Horse God Built: The Untold Story of Secretariat, the World’s Greatest Racehorse” by Lawrence Scanlan
- “Wild Ride: The Rise and Tragic Fall of Calumet Farm Inc., America’s Premier Racing Dynasty” by Ann Hagedorn Auerbach
- “D. Wayne: The High-Rolling and Fast Times of America’s Premier Horse Trainer” by Carlo DeVito
Miscellaneous
- “The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics” by Daniel James Brown
- “Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster” by Jon Krakauer
- “Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life” by William Finnegan
- “The Art of Fielding” by Chad Harbach
- “The Last Amateurs: Playing for Glory and Honor in Division I College Basketball” by John Feinstein
- “The Legend of Bagger Vance: A Novel of Golf and the Game of Life” by Steven Pressfield
- “The Soul of a Butterfly: Reflections on Life’s Journey” by Muhammad Ali and Hana Yasmeen Ali
- “Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors” by Piers Paul Read
- “Solo: A Memoir of Hope” by Hope Solo
- “The Secret Race: Inside the Hidden World of the Tour de France” by Tyler Hamilton and Daniel Coyle
Know some top athletic performances? Seeing some great teams in action?
We can use your help, and it’s simple. Witness some great performances? Hear about top athletes and top teams in our area?
Athlete of the Week and Team of the Week:
**********************************************
Pancakes or Waffles! We feature top area athletes with our world-renowned feature. Send us your nominations for who you’d like us to interview HERE
College Athlete Roundup! We want to recognize student-athletes from the area who are competing at the college level. Send us information on college athletes from the area with our simple form HERE
Where are they Now? We feature athletes and difference makers from the past, standouts in sports who excelled over the years and have moved on. Know of a former athlete, coach, or difference maker who we should feature? Know of a former standout competitor whose journey beyond central Wisconsin sports is one we should share? Send us information on athletes and difference makers of the past with our simple form HERE
Baked or Fried! We also feature difference makers throughout central Wisconsin: coaches, booster club leaders, administration, volunteers, you name it. Send us your nominations for who you’d like us to interview HERE