A wide-ranging, personal book that addresses may different aspects of high school sports.
Debut author Roth, a former high school coach and sports administrator with decades of experience, offers amusing and enlightening remembrances, a brief history of high school athletics in the United States, and tips for coaches, parents, officials, and players.
Over the course of this work, the author, who coached a few different sports in Westchester, New York, comes across as tough but caring. He preaches discipline for athletes throughout, for example, but he also shows a clear distaste for coaches who curse out their players and embarrass them in public. Roth writes that he believes that players should be well-rounded individuals; for instance, he tells of how he once instituted a mandatory study hall for his players before practices, both to allow a girls’ team early access to the gym and to make sure his athletes were on track academically. He also effectively addresses broader issues in a clear, impartial manner. Not all schools have academic requirements for their athletes, but Roth places a high value on education, often stating that coaches should be teachers first and take interest in their students’ everyday lives. On the other hand, he points out that sometimes players don’t excel in academics, and playing a sport provides their main means of socialization. At one point, he asks parents to resist the temptation to send coaches abusive emails when they don’t think their kid is getting enough playing time; at another, he reminds players they owe their coach a commitment to the rules. Another general rule of Roth’s is that winning is important, especially at the varsity level, but it’s not the only important goal. Overall, the author is mostly successful at combining memoir, history, and self-help, finding an effective balance while often speaking of his own personal experiences. That said, however, readers with only a casual interest in high school sports may find themselves drifting in parts. Also, some of the stories here are more instructive than entertaining, such as one about a coach getting ejected from a game for swearing at an official.
A wide-ranging, personal book that addresses may different aspects of high school sports.Pub Date: Feb. 21, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5320-4083-2
Page Count: 248
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
This autobiography might almost be said to supply the roots to Wright's famous novel, Native Son.
It is a grim record, disturbing, the story of how — in one boy's life — the seeds of hate and distrust and race riots were planted. Wright was born to poverty and hardship in the deep south; his father deserted his mother, and circumstances and illness drove the little family from place to place, from degradation to degradation. And always, there was the thread of fear and hate and suspicion and discrimination — of white set against black — of black set against Jew — of intolerance. Driven to deceit, to dishonesty, ambition thwarted, motives impugned, Wright struggled against the tide, put by a tiny sum to move on, finally got to Chicago, and there — still against odds — pulled himself up, acquired some education through reading, allied himself with the Communists — only to be thrust out for non-conformity — and wrote continually. The whole tragedy of a race seems dramatized in this record; it is virtually unrelieved by any vestige of human tenderness, or humor; there are no bright spots. And yet it rings true. It is an unfinished story of a problem that has still to be met.
Perhaps this will force home unpalatable facts of a submerged minority, a problem far from being faced.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1945
ISBN: 0061130249
Page Count: 450
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1945
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