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Sports Geek
Sports revolve around two things: narrative and numbers. You need the narrative, otherwise why would anyone care? Rivalries, emotions, and sports legends all require it. But you also need numbers. Without them, there is no way to know who has won; numbers tell you which team is top of the table, or who is the world champion.
Sports Geek offers a tour through sports debates and ideas that is both narrative and numerical. Teams in all sports use data to create extraordinary analyses of how their players perform, to assess tactics and to get an edge over arch rivals; but fans of a sport are rarely presented with challenging and informative data that would help them to further understand it.
In Sports Geek Rob Minto brings together an encyclopedic knowledge and love of sports, a rigorous understanding of statistics, and access to cutting edge quantitative analysis and difficult-to-uncover data. He is also a storyteller. Though written with an expert's knowledge, there's nothing academic about Sports Geek; it is packed with captivating anecdotes--success stories and failures, anomalies and surprises--that show why the numbers are so important.
Covering almost every imaginable sport, Sports Geek has international appeal; it embraces our global enthusiasm for competitive sports. Accessible, colorful, and filled with fascinating infographics, Sports Geek will arm sports fans with the information they need to have the edge in any debate.
Sports Geek offers a tour through sports debates and ideas that is both narrative and numerical. Teams in all sports use data to create extraordinary analyses of how their players perform, to assess tactics and to get an edge over arch rivals; but fans of a sport are rarely presented with challenging and informative data that would help them to further understand it.
In Sports Geek Rob Minto brings together an encyclopedic knowledge and love of sports, a rigorous understanding of statistics, and access to cutting edge quantitative analysis and difficult-to-uncover data. He is also a storyteller. Though written with an expert's knowledge, there's nothing academic about Sports Geek; it is packed with captivating anecdotes--success stories and failures, anomalies and surprises--that show why the numbers are so important.
Covering almost every imaginable sport, Sports Geek has international appeal; it embraces our global enthusiasm for competitive sports. Accessible, colorful, and filled with fascinating infographics, Sports Geek will arm sports fans with the information they need to have the edge in any debate.
- GenresNonfiction
192 pages, Hardcover
Published October 20, 2016
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 13, 2016
Received as a GoodReads giveaway. A different kind of sports trivia book. Statistical analysis, charts and text on a wide variety of sports and issues. The text is very readable and entertaining, and there's something to appeal to just about any sports buff, but the folks who'll most appreciate this book are sports fans who also love statistics. I admire the analytical approach, but with such a wide range of coverage, some of the sports (cricket, netball, snooker) and questions just didn't grab me. I did notice one thing that has already changed since the book was published: the "stand-out failure" team in baseball was listed as - the Chicago Cubs.
January 1, 2017
Love the book and the idea. Some fascinating myths presented.
There are a couple of spelling and grammar mistakes, which make it feel like it has been rushed out for a deadline.
There are a couple of spelling and grammar mistakes, which make it feel like it has been rushed out for a deadline.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews