Sweet Spot

Sweet Spot PDF Author: David Magee
Publisher: Triumph Books
ISBN: 1633191095
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
Away from the game and the players for which it was crafted, the baseball bat is a sleek but humble creation. Yet in the hands of batters both young and old who have been stepping to the plate on diamonds around the world for more than a century, the bat is a powerful tool, capable of yielding lasting memories or making legends of a lifetime. And no bat has had more impact on baseball and the players of the game than Louisville Slugger, the tool of the trade used by millions-from the major leagues to college and youth leagues. In accordance with Louisville Slugger's 125th anniversary, the complete history of the bat, its impact on the game, and the ongoing story of Hillerich and Bradsby's family business is told in these pages. Blending firsthand stories from former and current major leaguers with details from more than 100 years of craftsmanship and contribution, this comprehensive history of baseball's bat and its impact on America's game is a must-have and must-read for anyone who has ever stood at the plate waiting on a pitch-or watched as a fan-hoping for a miracle.

Sweet Spot

Sweet Spot PDF Author: David Magee
Publisher: Triumph Books
ISBN: 1633191095
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
Away from the game and the players for which it was crafted, the baseball bat is a sleek but humble creation. Yet in the hands of batters both young and old who have been stepping to the plate on diamonds around the world for more than a century, the bat is a powerful tool, capable of yielding lasting memories or making legends of a lifetime. And no bat has had more impact on baseball and the players of the game than Louisville Slugger, the tool of the trade used by millions-from the major leagues to college and youth leagues. In accordance with Louisville Slugger's 125th anniversary, the complete history of the bat, its impact on the game, and the ongoing story of Hillerich and Bradsby's family business is told in these pages. Blending firsthand stories from former and current major leaguers with details from more than 100 years of craftsmanship and contribution, this comprehensive history of baseball's bat and its impact on America's game is a must-have and must-read for anyone who has ever stood at the plate waiting on a pitch-or watched as a fan-hoping for a miracle.

On the Sweet Spot

On the Sweet Spot PDF Author: Richard Keefe
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416584900
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 276

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Book Description
Like most moments of spiritual revelation, this one took place on a landfill in New Jersey. A young man is standing at an unprepossessing driving range, hitting balls toward a distant fence, when something unusual takes place. As he begins his swing, he has the sensation that his club is drawing itself back on its own; when it is ready, it starts downward, makes perfect contact, and the ball soars off in the right-to-left arc he'd imagined, hitting the exact fencepost he'd been aiming at from 250 yards away. He steps back and wonders if he can do it again. He feels like an observer as the swing begins itself and resolves itself after perfect contact with the waiting ball, which again smacks against the distant post. He has, for however brief a time, entered “the zone.” Everyone who plays a sport knows that fleeting, ineffable sensation of everything falling into place: The pitched baseball looks as big as a grapefruit, the basket looks as wide as a trash can, the players around you are moving in slow motion. But as Richard Keefe, the director of the sport psychology program at Duke University, looked deeper into the nature of his experience, he found profound links to the spirit, the brain, perhaps even the soul. Keefe recognized that the feeling golfers and other athletes have of “being in the zone” is basically the same as a meditative state. And as a researcher with experience in brain chemistry, he went one step further: If we can figure out what's happening in the brain at such times, he reasons, we can learn how to get into that “zone” instead of just waiting for it to happen. This is the Holy Grail of sport psychology—teaching the mind to get out of the way so the body can do the things it's capable of doing. Keefe calls it the “effortless present,” when the body is acting of its own accord while the brain has little to do but watch. All religions describe some kind of heightened awareness in their disciplines; Keefe explores whether such mystical experience is a fundamental aspect of our evolution, an integral part of what makes us human and keeps us from despair. And he brings the discussion back to the applications of such knowledge, reflecting on our ability to use these alternate planes to achieve better relationships, better lives, better moments. Keefe's true subject is extraordinary experience—being in the zone, in the realm of effortless action. On the Sweet Spotbuilds from the physical and neurological to the mystical and philosophical, then adds a crucial layer of the practical (how we can capture or recapture these wondrous states). It is a work in the proud tradition of The Sweet Spot in Time, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, and How the Mind Works.

K: A History of Baseball in Ten Pitches

K: A History of Baseball in Ten Pitches PDF Author: Tyler Kepner
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 1101970855
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From The New York Times baseball columnist, an enchanting, enthralling history of the national pastime as told through the craft of pitching, based on years of archival research and interviews with more than three hundred people from Hall of Famers to the stars of today. The baseball is an amazing plaything. We can grip it and hold it so many different ways, and even the slightest calibration can turn an ordinary pitch into a weapon to thwart the greatest hitters in the world. Each pitch has its own history, evolving through the decades as the masters pass it down to the next generation. From the earliest days of the game, when Candy Cummings dreamed up the curveball while flinging clamshells on a Brooklyn beach, pitchers have never stopped innovating. In K: A History of Baseball in Ten Pitches, Tyler Kepner traces the colorful stories and fascinating folklore behind the ten major pitches. Each chapter highlights a different pitch, from the blazing fastball to the fluttering knuckleball to the slippery spitball. Infusing every page with infectious passion for the game, Kepner brings readers inside the minds of combatants sixty feet, six inches apart. Filled with priceless insights from many of the best pitchers in baseball history--from Bob Gibson, Steve Carlton, and Nolan Ryan to Greg Maddux, Mariano Rivera, and Clayton Kershaw--K will be the definitive book on pitching and join such works as The Glory of Their Times and Moneyball as a classic of the genre.

Baseball History eBook Gift Set

Baseball History eBook Gift Set PDF Author: Jonathan Weeks
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1493017055
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 643

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Book Description
This three-in-one holiday gift set is the perfect gift for any baseball fan this season. Each with its own unique story, these books will thrill any fan of America’s favorite pastime. The set includes class tales (At the Old Ballgame: Stories From Baseball's Golden Era), scandals (Mudville Madness: Fabulous Feats, Belligerent Behavior, and Erratic Episodes on the Diamond), and a unique portrait of baseball’s early days (Death Row All Stars: A Story of Baseball, Corruption, and Murder). That’s three strikes for this set!

HSC Sports Collectibles Dallas Auction Catalog #707

HSC Sports Collectibles Dallas Auction Catalog #707 PDF Author:
Publisher: Heritage Capital Corporation
ISBN: 9781599671345
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description


Baseball

Baseball PDF Author: Geoffrey C. Ward
Publisher: Knopf
ISBN: 0679765417
Category : Baseball
Languages : en
Pages : 514

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Book Description
With more than 500 photographs -- Introduction by Roger Angell -- Essays by Thomas Boswell, Robert W. Creamer, Gerald Early, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Bill James, David Lamb, Daniel Okrent, John Thorn, George E Will -- And featuring an interview with Buck O'Neil

Discover Your Sweet Spot

Discover Your Sweet Spot PDF Author: Scott M. Fay
Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
ISBN: 1614485933
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 154

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Book Description
Learn to design, build, and maintain an effective and fulfilling life with this unique guide from the innovative entrepreneur, speaker, and author. To create an effective space, landscapers must design, build, and maintain that space. To create an effective life, we must do the same with ourselves. In this unique and insightful guide to crafting a better life, author Scott M. Fay uses a landscaping metaphor and an approachable, conversational style to reveal the seven steps that enabled him to find his own Sweet Spot of personal and professional success. These same steps helped Fay acquire fourteen distressed businesses and turn them into profitable environments for leadership and commerce. They prepared him to forge a partnership with the No. 1 leadership guru in the world and create the world’s fastest-growing speaking, coaching, and training team. It primed him to start several other ventures, projects, and initiatives related to his core strengths. And finally, it enabled him to create a robust life with a variety of opportunities. If this can work for Scott—a guy who wears jeans and boots and drives a pickup truck—then it can work for you too. In fact, it can work for any individual or organization serious about creating a growth environment. Discover Your Sweet Spot and discover the life you’ve always wanted.

Bloomer Girls

Bloomer Girls PDF Author: Debra A Shattuck
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 025209879X
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 437

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Book Description
Disapproving scolds. Sexist condescension. Odd theories about the effect of exercise on reproductive organs. Though baseball began as a gender-neutral sport, girls and women of the nineteenth century faced many obstacles on their way to the diamond. Yet all-female nines took the field everywhere. Debra A. Shattuck pulls from newspaper accounts and hard-to-find club archives to reconstruct a forgotten era in baseball history. Her fascinating social history tracks women players who organized baseball clubs for their own enjoyment and even found roster spots on men's teams. Entrepreneurs, meanwhile, packaged women's teams as entertainment, organizing leagues and barnstorming tours. If the women faced financial exploitation and indignities like playing against men in women's clothing, they and countless ballplayers like them nonetheless staked a claim to the nascent national pastime. Shattuck explores how the determination to take their turn at bat thrust female players into narratives of the women's rights movement and transformed perceptions of women's physical and mental capacity. Vivid and eye-opening, Bloomer Girls is a first-of-its-kind portrait of America, its women, and its game.

The Sweet Spot

The Sweet Spot PDF Author: Stephanie Evanovich
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0062234838
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 195

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Book Description
A sizzling story of everyone’s favorite couple from amazing Stephanie Evanovich’s New York Times bestseller Big Girl Panties: hunky professional baseball player Chase Walker and his sassy wife Amanda. When pro baseball player Chase Walker first meets Amanda at her restaurant, it’s love at first sight. While Amanda can’t help noticing the superstar with the Greek-god-build, he doesn’t have a chance of getting to first—or any other—base with her. A successful entrepreneur who’s built her business from scratch, Amanda doesn’t need a Prince Charming to sweep her off her feet. And a curvy girl who likes to cook and eat isn’t interested in being around the catty, stick-thin herd of females chasing Chase and his teammates. But Chase isn’t about to strike out. A man who isn’t interested in playing the field, he’s a monogamist who wants an independent woman like Amanda. His hopes rally when she discovers that squeaky-clean Chase has a few sexy and very secret pre-game rituals that turn the smart, headstrong businesswoman on—and into his number one fan. Then a tabloid discovers the truth and turns their spanking good fun into a late- night punchline. Is Amanda ready to let loose and swing for the fences? Or will the pressure of Chase’s stardom force them to call it quits?

The Baseball Film

The Baseball Film PDF Author: Aaron Baker
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
ISBN: 0813596904
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 140

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Book Description
Baseball has long been viewed as the Great American Pastime, so it is no surprise that the sport has inspired many Hollywood films and television series. But how do these works depict the game, its players, fans, and place in American society? This study offers an extensive look at nearly one hundred years of baseball-themed movies, documentaries, and TV shows. Film and sports scholar Aaron Baker examines works like A League of their Own (1992) and Sugar (2008), which dramatize the underrepresented contributions of female and immigrant players, alongside classic baseball movies like The Natural that are full of nostalgia for a time when native-born white men could use the game to achieve the American dream. He further explores how biopics have both mythologized and demystified such legendary figures as Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jackie Robinson and Fernando Valenzuela. The Baseball Film charts the variety of ways that Hollywood presents the game as integral to American life, whether showing little league as a site of parent-child bonding or depicting fans’ lifelong love affairs with their home teams. Covering everything from Bull Durham (1988) to The Bad News Bears (1976), this book offers an essential look at one of the most cinematic of all sports.