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Knight: My Story

Knight: My Story

List Price: $25.95
Your Price: $17.13
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Bob Knight: My Story was a very motivation book for me!
Review: Bob Knight, "The General," was and still is the best all around coach you can possibly get. He is upfront with everything and lets you know what is going through his head. This book gives a life adventure with "The General" from his middle school years all the way to his first year at Texas Tech. Knight talks about every season from the good years to the bad years. When he had good years he talked about what he did well to help the team and when he had bad years he talked about how he could make it better for next year. In his books, Knight pretty much spills every coaching strategy and hint without worrying that other people will use his coaching techniques. With every mistake Knight made throughout his career, he came back to say what happen and what he thought about it. Sometimes he admits doing wrong and apologizes for it many years after it happened.
I thought that this book was awesome; it really showed what Knight was made of. If every coach reads this book it will make the college basketball scene a much better place to play and a more entertaining sport for fans to watch. It might even make high school basketball players go to college and not right into the NBA. He showed his love for both the fans and players in different ways throughout his book, making it such a well known and interesting book to read.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: My Story
Review: Book was a waste for me. Nothing new in it. Tedious listing of his good freinds page after page. Hard for a long time Knight and Indiana fan to take this position. My perspective may be different because I have all the Knight books and have read Hammels columns when he ws writing plus for awhile I had all the Indiana games with pre and post game coverage on my satellite. The mid 80s book, Knight, His OWn Man much better. Better written and better content.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Knight's story dry and boring
Review: Coach Bobby Knight is one of the most successful coaches in the history of basketball and he points that out in tale after tale about his various teams over his career at West Point and IU. Knight is famous for his disdain for the sports media and at one point demonstrates his disgust with a line about how most people learn how to write by the second grade, but most people (not sportswriters) then move on to other things. It's unfortunate Knight seems to have also moved on to other things than writing.
His book is dry, boring and not-well written. Three-fourths of his book deals with past teams' scores. The last quarter of the book is actually interesting with him giving his account of his final season at IU. Unfortunately, he spends too much time whining about how he's been picked on by the media. Poor Bob. He jumps around like a rabbit with a hot foot, which makes his book hard to follow, but easy to put down. I had high hopes for this book and ordered it before it was published. I was extremely disappointed in the result.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Coach Knight is a wonderful man
Review: Coach Knight talks about childohood, playing through HS and college..and then into his coaching career: West Point, Indiana, Olympics, and now Texas Tech. Talks about how he thinks of the game and who inspired him.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Interesting Stories about IU Hoops
Review: Coach Knight's book should be a pleasant read for any true IU basketball fan. In it he delivers opinions and insights regarding the players and teams he coached at Indiana (and West Point) over the years. Ninety percent of the book is a pleasant trip down memory lane with personal stories about the likes of Uwe Blab, Brian Sloan, Matt Nover, and of course, the "superstars" Isiah, Damon, Alford, Calbert, and too many more to list. And there are little tidbits that all but the most dedicated die-hard IU trivia fans would have never known, such as Jon Gruden (the NFL coach) having been an IU basketball ball boy.
The book is seriously flawed in two ways though. While some of the stories about his great celebrity friends are a fun read (the Ted Williams stories stand out) others come across as constant name dropping. Second, near the end there are about 40 pages detailing Coach Knight's view of why he was fired. (In fact, contrary to what some other reviewers have written, most of the book is not vindictive outside of this section other than an occasional barb elsewhere.) If you follow IU basketball, you certainly know all this and it's a fresh wound. His retelling here won't convince anyone on either side of the debate to switch sides. The book would have been better had he condensed that part of the story to a few pages.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Congratulations Texas Tech, you hooked a big one!
Review: Finally, we get to hear something from Coach Knight and not his critics. I found this book to be enjoyable to read and an immensely informative piece of work, about one of the most successful individuals to ever hold a basketball in his hand. He touches on everyone that has been apart of rise to the top (where he belongs). His commitment to academics and teaching basketball, to the kids that have been lucky enough to pass through the gymnasium doors, is unparallel. I found it amazing to read about the people that have crossed his path and that call him a friend. Their caliber is unmatched.
This is a man that deserves more respect than he has received over the past few years. This book explains to you why.
Knight: My Story is worth reading, sharing and reading again.

With all do respect Coach Knight; I'm glad I had an opportunity to get to know you a little better through your book. Another job incredibly done.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Full of interesting stories
Review: For all of these years we, the public, have been forced to try to understand this man through the eyes of reporters. Whether you like or agree with what he has to say, at least here it is from his own mouth. Much, much more interesting than the amateur psychoanalysis we have been provided int he past. The writing itself is also well done.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Knight Tells His Side....Without Interruptions!
Review: For anyone who was thoroughly frustrated watching Jeremy Schaap interview Bob Knight on ESPN, in which the younger Schaap interupted Knight on nearly everything Bob had to say and then had to listen to the media bash The General for being a bully, who was trying to control the interview when all he asked for was to let him finish a thought, this was thoroughly refreshing.

It was also awesome to see that Knight refused to mention his most virulent critics by name. The fact that he bashes the sporting press was wonderful, as I have very little respect for them. But you just know that the Jay Marrioti's, Mike Lupica's, Jon Saraceno's, etc. had to be seeing red when they turned to the Index and didn't see their names. Professor Murray Sperber? Nada. Dale Brown? Nope. John Feinstein? Three pages. This book was about Bobby Knight. Not about people who believe themselves to be alot more important than they really are.

The critics hated that Knight was able to turn around Texas Tech and they got some relief and some print time to badge Knight more with the success that Indiana had in the NCAA's this year in getting to the final. But long after these guys fade away (in their own minds of course), Coach Knight will still be standing and his legacy of being one of the greatest coaches of all time will still be there. I never agreed with everything Knight stood for or said, but there were plenty of his actions, deeds and principals, that I think all of us could look up to with admiration. And this book details many of them....again, without interuption.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Interesting, but unfulfilling
Review: Frankly, this book is exactly what you would expect - Bob Knight venting about the injustices against him, mixed with colorful anecdotes and basketball observations that are meant to portray him as a straightforward, wise, yet sympathetic character with loads of integrity. There are certainly some interesting stories about Knight's coaching career and his interaction with notable people in and out of basketball. It's already widely accepted that Knight is one of college basketball's elite coaches and a complex personality. But I really don't think you'll come away from this book with any great new insights. To be honest, I think Knight is overexposed (the firing, the hiring, the ESPN movie, his reconciliation with Coach K, Indiana making the Final Four this year without Knight, etc.). If you are a Bob Knight diehard, it's difficult to pass up a book that gives you the story straight from the General himself. But if you're looking for some more dirt on what went down before his firing or who Bob Knight "the man" really is, you have probably already heard the full story - the book won't enlighten you any further.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: An amazing basketball life
Review: From a basketball standpoint, Knight's career is amazing -- from playing as a reserve on a national championship team, to coaching at West Point, helping build the Indiana University program to a national power, and coaching the Olympic team, it's easy to lose sight of the fact that he's had a remarkable career.

People want to dwell on the controversies -- but let's face it, no one wants to be judged entirely by what they've done wrong. Especially in one's autobiography. He makes comments about things that he'd wished he handled differently and answers questions about controversies openly. While he may not address some incidents to some people's satisfaction and may not provide as many mea culpas to some of his critics' likings -- he doesn't ignore the issues either.

As a coach, he's probably not too different but other coaches -- but the media chooses to focus on his indiscretions. Maybe, as one fellow reviewer pointed out, he is overexposed -- but this is more the fault of restless media than any effort of Knight's to court attention. There are numerous coaches who sign players who have no business being in college and have no chance of ever graduating who are far more exploitive of college basketball than Knight could ever be, but the media chooses to pay them scant attention. Not surprisingly, Knight takes issue with a sector of the media. His objections are valid, but it's nothing that he dwells on.

In any sports autobiography, there are three key questions: does the person's career have enough length and accomplishment to cover a wide range of events and people, does the author tackle difficult subjects with a degree of evenhandedness, and can the author avoid turning the book into a long, vindictive diatribe.

Knight My Story is successful on all three counts. While he's critical of the Indiana administration for its handling of his dismissal, he never becomes vicious. It's important to consider this book relative to other books within its genre (autobiography, basketball) and not simply whether or not one thinks Knight should have told Jim Nantz whether or not he called his former players prior to the Final Four.

All autobiographies are open to interpretation. More definitive readings of history happen down the line -- should the topic be worthy of a more detailed study. For any fan of college basketball, or for anyone who's interested in taking an open-minded approach to Bob Knight, this is very worthwhile reading.


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