Sports Books Of the Year

FROM SI

Hockey's Greatest

by Sports Illustrated

SI's hockey experts rank the 10 best of everything in a coffee table collection that captures, in classic stories and iconic photographs, the spirit of the toughest game on ice.

The Audacity of Hoop

by Alex Wolff

SI senior writer Alex Wolff examines the life, leadership and presidency of Barack Obama through the lens of the sport he loves.

The Secret Game

by Scott Ellsworth

A retelling of the inspiring story of the first integrated basketball game, Game, by a former Smithsonian historian, details the showdown between an all-black team from North Carolina and a group of Duke medical students who played in an empty gym in Durham, N.C., on a Sunday morning in 1944. The meeting not only shaped the sport, it helped change a nation.

A Better Goodbye

by John Schulian

This gem of L.A. noir fiction builds to a deadly showdown between good guy Nick Pafko, a former boxer haunted by the man he killed in the ring, and sleek thug Onus DuPree Jr.

Barbarian Days

by William Finnegan

This memoir is equal parts adventure travelogue and enchanting meditation on surfing and its rich and complicated culture.

The Best Team Money Can Buy

by Molly Knight

In her thorough account of the remaking of the Dodgers from 2013 to '14, Knight unfolds a revealing behind-the-scenes tale of one of MLB's most storied franchises.

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