The Breaks of the Game (Mass Market Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The Breaks of the Game is sports reporting at its finest--basketball's equivalent to Roger Kahn's The Boys of Summer. Join David Halberstam on his yearlong journey with the 1979 Portland Trail Blazers and witness professional basketball from the inside, where front-office egos, big-money contracts, and the colorful personalities of coaches and players collide, and winners and losers emerge. This insightful account is evidence of how much basketball has--and hasn't--changed since 1979, before the money really started rolling in.

Product Description

"Among the best books ever written on professional basketball." The Philadelphia Inquirer

David Halberstam, best-selling author of THE FIFTIES and THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST, turns his keen reporter's eye on the sport of basketball -- the players and the coaches, the long road trips, what happens on court, in front of television cameras, and off-court, where no eyes have followed -- until now.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 362 pages
• Publisher: Ballantine Books (February 12, 1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345296257
• ISBN-13: 978-0345296252
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #209,770 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars More than a Sports book,a chronicle of Life in the spotlight, August 16, 2001

By	NDBx "NDBx" (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews

David Halberstam takes us here in to the life of a sports franchise, the lives of it's players and of the environment surrounding them in the late seventies world of sport, following the merger of the two basketball league. The exposion of television coverage and of a team in the aftermath of a championship.

Halberstam is more than fair in his depiction of all the personalities involved with and on the periphery of the team. His exhaustive research is in evidence. The players are not shown to be charming charismatic larger than life heroes but human beings with stories of their own, interesting ones at that. Mr. Halberstam successfully conveys how the personalities all combined to make up this team.

The thing about this book is that Mr. Halberstam always presents a new take even on well covered topics. He makes you consider what you may not have considered otherwise.

Interestingly this book covers the team in something of a decline not the championship year. That in itself gives a unique view at the end of this book you have an idea of not only why they won but of the difficulty of repeating as champions, of the tenuous relationships formed between players, the slights, the friendships, the business of sports and those behind.

Vivid and rich with color and power. This book doesn't disappoint. Everyone from the rather unique owner to the 12th man. From preseason to playoff. An excellent read.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best basketball book I've ever read, May 18, 2009

By	B. Heldt - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Breaks of the Game (Paperback)

The Breaks of the Game is a great sports book.

The difference between good books on sports and great books on sports is that the great books aren't really about sports. Ok, ok, that's not quite fair. The Breaks of the Game expertly chronicles the 79-80 Trailblazers and captures the ebbs and flows of an NBA season: the injuries, the mastery of the coach, the skill of the players, the relief of NBA victory and the very real (for Jack Ramsey, especially) pain of defeat. This is a book very much about sports and its heroes.

But, more than that, The Breaks of the Game is about the growing pains of the NBA as it entered its golden age--the age of Magic and Bird--and the way those pains were felt. What makes this book so incredible is the way that Halberstam blends objective observation with his keen knowledge of the game, its history, and his great capacity to see the humanity in everyone. When all of his considerable skills are dedicated to painting a portrait of Maurice Lucas, for instance, the player becomes the man, vibrantly portrayed and filled with conflicting instincts and emotions. Halberstam deftly works into his analysis of the players, the team, and the league as a whole the seminal aspects of money, respect, and race. The ideas and observations fueling the book are fantastic, and Halberstam's subtle, lyrical prose makes them all the more powerful. Ultimately, this is a book about people: who they are, why they play, what they need, how they interact.

In short, this is the best book on basketball--and one of the best books, period--that I've ever read. It is thorough, fiercely intelligent, and captures a moment in time when the NBA was in flux between the white, poor league it was and the black, rich league it has become.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Account of the Politics and Forces of the NBA, April 3, 1999

By A Customer

This book delves into the personal lives of the NBA players (at least the NBA players in 1978). Halberstam expresses a great ability to decipher and put on paper the racial tension and often awkward interaction between white and black athletes of that day. He also holds an uncanny ability of clearly stating the emotions and interests of all the players on that Portland Trailblazers team.