To The Hoop: The Seasons Of A Basketball Life - Hardcover

Berkow, Ira

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0465084958 ISBN 13: 9780465084951

Publisher: Basic Books, 1997

Synopsis

A sportswriter describes the role of basketball in his own life, discussing his love for the game, his life as a pickup basketball player, and some of the legendary players and coaches he has known

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Reviews

Using as a backdrop his lifelong devotion to playing basketball, Berkow, a respected New York Times sportswriter, shares his perspectives on life, death, sickness, health, and, of course, the quest for the perfect drive to the hoop. A schoolboy hoops standout while growing up in the Chicago area, Berkow realized that his talent for the game could never match his love for it and ended up by doing the next best thing: working as a sports journalist. Now 56 years old, Berkow still manages to hold his own in pickup games with players of all ages and levels of experience on the courts near his Manhattan home. These games, most often played against strangers or casual roundball acquaintances, allow him, he has discovered, to connect with basketball and with others in a way that covering contests for the sports pages could not. While playing basketball provided Berkow with a much-desired link to others and to his younger self, a knee injury sustained while playing, and the death from leukemia of his younger brother, Steven, forced him to confront, or at least rationalize, his own mortality. Describing the loss of his brother, Berkow movingly articulates his sorrow and frustration about ``how much more my brother and I could have shared--and would have shared, if he had survived this.'' When describing his relationship to the game (and the fear of losing his abilities before he loses his will,) however, Berkow shows a considerably less tender side: He absorbs and dishes out bumps and loosened teeth, and occasionally resorts to talking trash, as in his battle of wits and words with the former New York governor, Mario Cuomo, with whom a proposed one-on-one match never materialized. Touching, inspiring, funny, and never self-indulgent, this is a sporting memoir that will connect with readers on many levels. ($35,000 ad/promo; author tour; radio satellite tour) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Berkow, a columnist for the New York Times, is 56 and has been playing basketball since he was stricken by the hoop bug in high school on Chicago's West Side. You might think it's a narcissistic indulgence for a man who played only one year of college ball to write a basketball autobiography, but you would be wrong. There is more passion for the game conveyed here than in a dozen autobiographies by well-known sports stars. Berkow relates playing one-on-one with former Knick great Walt Frazier and talking hoops with another who refuses to hang 'em up, Mario Cuomo, as well as recounting the lessons learned in a thousand pickup games around the country. Any grown man who participates in recreational sports has pondered questions such as Am I childish? Irresponsible? If I'm injured, can I still work? and has often "retired" based on the answers. There's no glory, no money, and more than a few aching joints for aging weekend warriors. But there are also rewards. They stay in touch with a childish playfulness, and they interact with others in an arena in which the game--not the result--is the reward. And as their skills erode and adjustments are made, they are forced to confront the aging process honestly, with humor and grace. A fine book by a fine writer and a wise man. Wes Lukowsky

Edition details

• Publisher: Basic Books
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0465084958
• ISBN 13: 9780465084951
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304