In The Old Ball Game, Frank Deford, NPR sports commentator and Sports Illustrated journalist retells the story of an unusual friendship between two towering figures in baseball history. At the turn of the twentieth century, Christy Mathewson was one of baseball's first superstars. Over six feet tall, clean cut, and college educated, he didn't pitch on the Sabbath and rarely spoke an ill word about anyone. He also had one of the most devastating arms in all of baseball. New York Giants manager John McGraw, by contrast, was ferocious. The pugnacious tough guy was already a star infielder who, with the Baltimore Orioles, helped develop a new, scrappy style of baseball, with plays like the hit-and-run, the Baltimore chop, and the squeeze play. When McGraw joined the Giants in 1902, the Giants were coming off their worst season ever. Yet within three years, Mathewson clinched New York City's first World Series for McGraw's team by throwing three straight shutouts in only six days, an incredible feat that is invariably called the greatest World Series performance ever. Because of their wonderful odd-couple association, baseball had its first superstar, the Giants ascended into legend, and baseball as a national pastime bloomed.

This program includes excerpts read by the author. One of Atlas & Boots' Top 10 Adventure Travel Books of 2021A dramatic account of the deadly earthquake on Everest--and a return to reach the summit. On April 25, 2015, Jim Davidson was climbing Mount Everest when a 7.8 magnitude earthquake released avalanches all around him and his team, destroying their only escape route and trapping them at nearly 20,000 feet. It was the largest earthquake in Nepal in eighty-one years and killed about 8,900 people. That day also became the deadliest in the history of Everest, with eighteen people losing their lives on the mountain. After spending two unsettling days stranded on Everest, Davidson's team was rescued by helicopter. The experience left him shaken, and despite his thirty-three years of climbing and serving as an expedition leader, he wasn't sure that he would ever go back. But in the face of risk and uncertainty, he returned in 2017 and finally achieved his dream of reaching the summit. Suspenseful and engrossing, The Next Everest portrays the experience of living through the biggest disaster to ever hit the mountain. Davidson's background in geology and environmental science makes him uniquely qualified to explain how this natural disaster unfolded and why the seismic threats lurking beneath Nepal are even greater today. But this story is not about "conquering" the world's highest peak. Instead, it reveals how embracing change, challenge, and uncertainty prepares anyone to face their "next Everest" in life. A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin's Press "Among all outdoor pursuits, climbing mountains offers the purest, most direct challenge. Jim Davidson weaves his experiences with avalanches, crevasse falls, earthquakes, altitude, frostbite, and other Himalayan hazards into an exciting, sometimes somber introspective narrative, describing not just how he survives climbing the highest mountains in the world, but more importantly, why he must go again and again."--Roman Dial, author of The Adventurer's Son

“Did you see the big fight this weekend?” The question used to be about boxing matches, when the giants of the fight world were Mike Tyson and Roy Jones. Now fans are leaving the sweet science in droves for the combat sport of the future: mixed martial arts (MMA).

MMA has drawn millions on cable and network television, as well as out-performed professional wrestling and boxing on pay-per-view. Fans are attracted to the sport, but unlike boxing (where strategy and technique are limited to using both your left and right hands), an MMA fight can be surprisingly complicated.

The MMA Encyclopedia puts the fighters, the facts, and the fundamentals of the world’s fastest growing sport at your fingertips as the definitive reference guide to mixed martial arts. The encyclopedia will break the MMA language barrier for those who don’t know a wristlock from a wristwatch, while at the same time offering perspective and analysis that will entertain the hardcore fan who already has the basics down pat. With three appendices that detail the results of every MMA fight in history, this the ultimate reference book for the ultimate sport.

Dysentery, drunken soldiers, and corrupt officials provide the background for Neil Peart's physical and spiritual cycling journey through West Africa. The prolific drummer for the rock band Rush travels through African villages, both large and small, and relates his story through photographs, journal entries, and tales of adventure, while simultaneously addressing issues such as differences in culture, psychology, and labels. Literary and artistic sidekicks such as Aristotle, Dante, and Van Gogh join Peart and his cycling companions, reminding the reader that this is not just another travel bo.

Part biography, part memoir, and all catharsis Jim Harrison grew up on the prairies, played Junior in Saskatchewan, and pro with the Bruins, Leafs, Hawks, and Oilers. Three years before a former teammate equaled the mark, Harrison set one of the most enduring and seemingly unbreakable records in professional hockey with three goals and seven helpers on January 30, 1973. And almost nobody remembers. This is Harrison's story: the games he played, the agent who stole from him, the woman he mourned, the fights he fought, and the friends he made ' and lost ' including Bobby Orr and Darryl Sittler. It's about the injuries he suffered, the pedophiles who preyed on him and other young players, and a Players Association that, he says, 'wants me to die.' But The Lost 10 Point Night is also a response to Stephen Brunt's Searching for Bobby Orr and Gretzky's Tears ' a book as much about Harrison as it is about author David Ward, a 50-year-old guy who went in search of his childhood hero.

This book takes listeners alongside ultramarathoner Ed Ayres as he prepares for, runs, and finishes the JFK fifty-mile race at a then record-breaking time for his age division--sixty and older. But for Ayres, this race was about more than just running, and the book also encompasses his musings and epiphanies along the way about possibilities for human achievement and the creation of a sustainable civilization.

In The Little Book of Putting, P.G.A. teaching professional T.J. Tomasi offers great advice about putting. His putting lessons coupled with detailed line drawings makes this book an essential companion for any golfer looking to improve their stroke.

Shortlisted, Toronto Book AwardsOn May 2, 1967, Montreal and Toronto faced each other in a battle for hockey supremacy. This was only the fifth time the teams had ever played each other in the Stanley Cup finals. Toronto led the series 3-2. But this wasn't simply a game. From the moment Foster Hewitt announced "Hello Canada and hockey fans in the United States," the game became a turning point in sports history. That night, the Leafs would win the Cup. The next season, the National Hockey League would expand to twelve teams. Players would form an association to begin collective bargaining. Hockey would become big business. The NHL of the "Original Six" would be a thing of the past. It was The Last Hockey Game. Placing us in the announcers' booth, in the seats of excited fans, and in the skates of the players, Bruce McDougall scores with a spectacular account of every facet of that final fateful match. As we meet players such as Gump Worsley, Tim Horton, Terry Sawchuk, and Eddie Shack, as well as coaches, owners, and fans, The Last Hockey Game becomes more than a story of a game. It also becomes an elegy, a lament for an age when, for all its many problems, the game was played for the love of it.

A Big Easy legend returns to the limelight

New Orleans was once one of the hottest cities for pro wrestling because of one man — Sylvester Ritter, better known as the Junkyard Dog. JYD became a legend in the Big Easy, drawing huge crowds to the Superdome, a feat no other wrestler ever came close to. In 1980, he managed to break one of the final colour barriers in the sport by becoming the first black wrestler to be made the undisputed top star of his promotion.

This biography aims to restore JYD to his deserved place in the history books by looking at his famous feuds, the business backstories, and the life of the man outside the ring. The King of New Orleans recounts the story of how an area known for racial injustice became the home of wrestling’s most adored African–American idol. A remarkable tale of a man still remembered on the streets of New Orleans and in the hearts of pro wrestling fans.