Onward to Victory: The Crises That Shaped College Sports

Rating:
Summary: Onward to Victory : The Crises That Shaped College Sports
Review: A good book on the progression of college athletics through the years. Sperber looks behind the scences in college athletics with somewhat of a true eye. The major problem with the book is the stories and references to ND. Several chapters are devoted to ND history. ND is a great school but I did not buy Onward to Victory to get a detailed history of ND.

Other than the overrun of ND stories a good not great book.

Rating:
Summary: Onward to Victory : The Crises That Shaped College Sports
Review: A good book on the progression of college athletics through the years. Sperber looks behind the scences in college athletics with somewhat of a true eye. The major problem with the book is the stories and references to ND. Several chapters are devoted to ND history. ND is a great school but I did not buy Onward to Victory to get a detailed history of ND.

Other than the overrun of ND stories a good not great book.

Rating:
Summary: Another outstanding book from Murray Sperber
Review: Murray Sperber has become one of my favorite authors. I really liked his first book, College Sports Inc., and also his second, Shake Down the Thunder. The first one focused on the problems in contemporary college sports, especially how schools lose money in it, and the second book showed the history of the phenomenon from the point of view of the only school that has actually made money in college sports, Notre Dame. Both books were very well-researched but, although Sperber is a college professor, he writes really well and always entertains and enlightens the reader.

Onward to Victory combines the best elements of Sperber's first two books--he exposes the scoundrels in college sports, particularly the NCAA, and also reveals the "true history" of the phenomenon. This book is set in the 1940s and 1950s, and again Notre Dame comes off very well--it never cheated because it could do so well and win by playing it straight. But the book is so much more--if you love stories about what crooks the sports media are and have always been, this book is for you.

At the end of this book, Sperber outlines his next one, Beer & Circus: The Impact of Bigtime College Sports on Undergraduate Education. I really look forward to that one. It's great that there is someone around like Sperber willing to puncture holes in the sanctimonious greedheads who run college sports and the media people who promote it so relentlessly.

Rating:
Summary: Onward To Substandard Writing
Review: Murray Sperber proves that a Ph.D from one of the most prestigious English departments in the United States doesn't translate into being a good writer. His research into the history of college athletics is outstanding but Sperber doesn't do enough to connect the dots. Sperber put together a collection of historical facts so disjointed that his theme doesn't always remain consistent throughout one chapter let alone a whole book.
For example, Chapter 47 is called "Magazines discover revisionism". Most people associate the word revisionism with holocaust deniers and legal scholarship that doesn't do justice to the intent of the framers. Sperber's examples include some deceptive articles but also some revolutionary articles. Putting two types of revisionism under one roof is confusing and how do deceptive articles slanted against college athletes reinforce Sperber's conclusion that the crisis in college sports evolved over several decades?

Rating:
Summary: Onward To Substandard Writing
Review: Murray Sperber proves that a Ph.D from one of the most prestigious English departments in the United States doesn't translate into being a good writer. His research into the history of college athletics is outstanding but Sperber doesn't do enough to connect the dots. Sperber put together a collection of historical facts so disjointed that his theme doesn't always remain consistent throughout one chapter let alone a whole book.
For example, Chapter 47 is called "Magazines discover revisionism". Most people associate the word revisionism with holocaust deniers and legal scholarship that doesn't do justice to the intent of the framers. Sperber's examples include some deceptive articles but also some revolutionary articles. Putting two types of revisionism under one roof is confusing and how do deceptive articles slanted against college athletes reinforce Sperber's conclusion that the crisis in college sports evolved over several decades?