Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Story and Details, But no new facts
Review: David Halbeerstam does an excellent job in this book to portray Michael Jordan as the star that he is. He uses many different places and times in MJ's life to show his greatest accomplishments and his victories and defeats including the time he was cut from his high school basketball team. The only thing wrong or not as I expected was after a while all the book was is listing his accomplishments and everything we knew already like his MVP in all of the NBA finals he played in. Overall though it was excellent book that really prooved how good Michael Jordan is.
Rating: 
Summary: out of bounds
Review: I didn't like the comments about Rodaman and Ron Harper. Good anecdotes, but failed to score on the rebound.
Rating: 
Summary: incredible! absolutly incredible
Review: The story about The Dream Team, and Michael's Team v. Magic's team was fantastic. It is a major inspiration
Rating: 
Summary: Great start, good reporting, but we don't learn anything new
Review: In "Playing For Keeps," David Halberstam tries to shed light on the character of Michael Jordan. On balance, he fails. Somewhere in the middle, the book becomes a descriptive laundry list of Michael Jordan's accomplishments. Any attempt to analyze Michael Jordan the person or his domination of American culture disappears. Mr. Halberstam succeeds though in examining the early part of Jordan's life. His family was strikingly middle class in outlook. His father, James Jordan, was a retired Air Force mechanic and then later a mechanic at General Electric. His mother wanted to see all of her children excel--not just succeed. Yet, in all the reporting about Michael's relationship with his father, we learn little about Mrs. Jordan. It is never clear whether theirs was a good marriage and what effect their relationship had on young Michael Jordan. Halberstam, at times, gets good tidbits of information. First, Michael learned to play with his tongue sticking out as a child. He imitated his father who would work on machines with his tongue sticking out. Second, had Larry Jordan, Michael's older brother, grown past 5'9" he would be an NBA star too. Their sibling rivalry was intense and, at times, brutal. With Larry, Halberstam allows us to see flashes of a future, intensely competitive, Michael Jordan. The most critical and significant contribution Halberstam makes is explaining Jordan's rise to greatness. Yes, he was cut from his high school basketball team because he was considered too short for the varsity. That was his last professional setback besides a year playing minor league baseball. That same year, however, the junior varsity team drew larger crowds than the varsity. By his senior year, few knew about Jordan on the national stage. In the cozy basketball world of North Carolina, however, Jordan's potential was recognized by "the powers that be." He was a scout's dream. Slowly but surely invitations to one prestigious basketball camp after another arrived. After a camp at the University of North Carolina, Dean Smith and his lackeys worked feverishly to keep Jordan hidden. They did not want other scouts discovering him. What Dean Smith did for Michael Jordan was remarkable. He never let Jordan's potential greatness get to his head. Even before Jordan's freshman season started, Sports Illustrated wanted to profile the team. Smith, believing that Jordan had done nothing to deserve the cover, deliberately kept him off. We can safely assume that's the last time Michael Jordan was kept off a magazine cover involuntarily. But the basketball program at North Carolina perhaps most contributed to Jordan's greatness as a person and a player. Jordan was eminently coachable, he had a work ethic unlike any other Smith had ever seen, and he had extraordinary athletic talent and a natural feel for the game of basketball. Halberstam presents Jordan's finest and, at times, most unseemly quality--his intense desire and innate need to win. Not only is this evident on the basketball court, but later in his business dealings too. North Carolina basketball focused on the team. Each player knew his place. As a freshman, Michael Jordan was one of only a handful of freshman to ever start. But Smith made sure Michael knew his place. Michael was responsible for lugging the film projector from game to game. Most importantly, Dean Smith made Michael Jordan realize that he was a spoke in a wheel and that the team itself was the hub. As Halberstam points out, it was that team concept that diminished some of the better players' skills and elevated others who were not so great. It is Michael Jordan's indomitable will and compulsion to win that trumps all and Halberstam's greatest insight into MJ, the person. His will to win makes it quite clear why, in the words of Chicago author Scott Turrow, "That Michael Jordan is better at basketball than anybody is at anything else." It is clear why those last second shots against Georgetown, Cleveland, and Utah went in. Luck, as Mr. Halberstam writes, was never part of the equation. Aside from that, the most interesting observations are offered by beat reporters who covered basketball over the years. In the past, Halberstam has written perceptive and moving books on race. But, in "Playing for Keeps" we never get a sense of how MJ dealt with the issue of race or if it was ever an obstacle. Twenty years ago (even today for that matter), a Black male never could have endorsed mainstream American products like McDonald's, Coke, Gatorade, and Nike. The only thing we learn on this subject is that business, for Michael Jordan, comes before anything else. When Senate candidate Harvey Gnatt asks for his endorsement, Michael Jordan declines. "Republicans wear sneakers too," he replies. Fair enough. But is that one incident or a pattern? How has his experience shaped his outlook on racial issues? For someone interested in organizations, the book is interesting, but not compelling. For a fan interested in the inside workings of the NBA and a basketball team, the book is well-reported. For those looking for Michael Jordan's larger cultural significance, his rise along with the rise of the NBA, cable television, and the new labor economics of sports is well documented (although, Henry Louis Gates, a Harvard sociologist, does even better in a much shorter piece that appeared last year in The New Yorker). But for those searching for the man behind that mask, Halberstam's book surely disappoints. What he does brilliantly in "The Amateurs," he fails to replicate here. Michael Jordan has conquered basketball and the business world. He may be making, however, his greatest move yet. While seeming to reveal something about himself to a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, he reveals nothing at all. Not even Halberstam can match MJ's crossover dribble. Halberstam is caught flatfooted, watching Jordan sky above him and his arms extended in a textbook-perfect follow through. The ball is sailing towards the hoop in a fine geometric arc. In a noisy arena or the quiet of an empty gym, he too hears the sound all too often heard by Jordan's opponents. The sound of defeat.
Rating:
Summary: outstanding
Review: This is an enjoyable book. Mr. Halberstam uses MJ as the centerpoint around which he portrays America today. Sports, media, race and labor relations are written about in an enlightening way. There are brilliant partial portraits of the people in MJ's life- Basketball Commissioner David Stern, Spike Lee and the people from Nike, Bull GM Jerry Krause, the coaching staff at North Carolina, Phil Jackson and many more. There are many 'I wish I was there moments,' like the pre-Barcelona Olympic tune up game in Monte Carlo-MJ's team versus Magic Johnson's team- perhaps the greatest basketball game ever. There's a scene before the 1998 playoffs where the Bulls have a team meeting where players just express how they feel about their time on the team. It's a wonderful book, as good as any of Halberstam's books and he's written many excellent books.
Rating: 
Summary: Too much prose for a straight forward basketball bio
Review: Though well versed and literate, I felt David Halberstam should leave out lofty prose for more direct basketball commentary.
Rating:
Summary: Halberstam Shoots and Scores
Review: I've avoided previous biographical accounts of Michael Jordan for the fact that few credible and unbiased (to the extent it's possible!) authors have devoted their creative energies to capturing the true Jordan mystique and its wide-ranging effects. I'm glad I waited for Halberstam's. The Pulitzer-Prize Winner provides not only a rich, investigative, and intriguing account of the greatest team sports player in history, but a hearty analysis of the numerous influences upon and caused by His Airness. Halberstam accomplishes the rare and sumptuous feat of blending both variety and depth to draw the reader into what is essentially a story of characters: Phil Jackson, Dean Smith, Jerrys Reinsdorf and Krause, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman, David Falk, and David Stern - all integral components of the author's well-woven tale. Interestingly, there is almost a sadness, if not a cynical tone, to the words Halberstam is admiringly careful in choosing to convey the Pyrrhic nature of Jordan's quest. A message to the reader here seems to be that while we late-20th centurions will count ourselves blessed to have witnessed such greatness, the costs might be even greater - the potentially pre-mature re-retirement of Jordan, damaged fan, player, and management relations (occuring in nearly all professional sports, for that matter), astronomical salaries and waning commitment, especially from new players, and for me as a Chicagolander, the dismantling of the Bulls, and the years ahead of sub-par Bulls teams. Ultimately, though, soaring above it all, is Michael Jordan, and Halberstam certainly reinforces that, as Scottie Pippen indicated at the Bulls' farewell dinner (per Halberstam's sources), 'Michael is the man who has made all of this possible'. At times Halberstam writes like a sports reporter recounting the events of a game, at other times he is a beat writer who knows the insights as to why things happen, or even still he writes as king of prose, a novelist with the natural ability to make the reader a part of the story. Even if someone had not heard of one Michael Jordan and picked up this book for a read, he or she would certainly appreciate the accomplishments of this man and how he earned them. "Playing for Keeps" is artistically special; I'm left thankful not only for the protagonist who fought the good fight, but also for the author who wrote the good write, if you will. High fives for MJ and DH, masters of their crafts.
Rating:
Summary: A fascinating look at Sports and the greatest athlete ever
Review: David Halberstam, a great writer, has brought to life the story of the greatest athlete of all time, Michael Jordan. From Michael's youth, when he used to compete against his brother Larry, to being cut from his high school team, through the regimentation of Dean Smith and the University of North Carolina, Mr. Halberstam goes deep into the life of Michael Jordan and helps explain how this amazing individual brought professional basketball to what it is today. A fascinating account of all aspects of sport, it is timely reading now that the lockout has ended and the NBA tries to figure out which of its wunderkinds will be the next Air Jordan. I recommend any parent with a child, boy or girl, should read this book and underline the highlites to impress upon their children of the necessity of hard work, perserverance and just being a nice guy. Thank you Michael. We will miss you.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful book somehow misses Jordan's soul
Review: Being from Chicago, I've waited for a book like this. Sadly, I've read every book there is on Jordan. There have been a few good moments here and there, but most have been highly forgettable paperbacks (Just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about: the syrupy hack Bob Green, of all people, has written TWO books on Jordan. Yet, I read both of them. I don't care; Jordan is so truly unique, such a dominant figure, that I've wanted to know as much as I could about the guy).This book gives wonderful insight into Jordan. However, the book is much more about the entire panoramic story behind and around Jordan. The book centers on Jordan, but it is also about the NBA in general, the dominant teams over the last 20 year, the emergence of cable TV and the entertainment culture, as well as, the fundamental change between players from the time Jordan came into the league and now. It is truly the big picture, and it amazes me how easily Halbestam weaves the whole thing together. If there's one thing I wish this book had, it's even more insight into the brilliant Phil Jackson. And, even though the entire book is about Jordan, it's still lacking in some way about the man's core. It's hard to put my finger on what's missing. Maybe if Jordan had consented to be interviewed - maybe then we'd undertand more. Here's my favorite Jordan story from the book - I wish there were more. For some reason this one seems to get at the almost maniacal, pathological way that MJ thinks. And it makes sense; Jordan is so incredibly competitive, and pushes himself so hard, there must be something out of whack in there. The story is about the deciding game 6 of the NBA Championship series against Phoenix. Halberstam pionts out that Jordan took special pleasure in playing Phoenix because he got to go against Dan (Thunder Dan) Majerle. It wasn't anything Majerle had done, it was about the Bulls GM Jerry Krause. Jordan hated Krause. Krause loved Dan Majerle and used to go on and on about how great he thought he was. Jordan, therefore, always took his game up a notch when playing Majerle. A Phoenix assistant, unfamiliar with the dynamic between Jordan and Krause, felt that Jordan attacked Majerle in such a way on the court that there must have been some vendetta there that transcended the game. After the Bulls won the game 6, and therefore the Championship, in very dramatic fashion, Jordan raced to the basket to get the ball. He held it above his head, and his teammates, many who knew that Jordan was contemplating leaving the game, thought he might say something poignant. Instead, Jordan yelled out, "Thunder Dan Marjerle A**." Now that tells you something. It is a very good book.
Rating:
Summary: An informative and enlightening look at a very public man
Review: Michael Jordan is the most famous American in the world, yet David Halberstam's book still manages to tell me things I never knew about him. His competition with his older, and shorter brother. Where the trademark "tongue through the teeth" look came from. The way he used negative comments of others to motivate him to improve his game. That's just for starters. It's an addictive and entertaining read - and a must-have for Jordan and Halberstam fans alike.
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