The Jump: Sebastian Telfair and the High-Stakes Business of High School Ball [Hardcover]

Ian O'Connor (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 13, 2005

On NBA draft night, June 24, 2004, high school senior Sebastian Telfair awaited his future inside a suite at the Trump International Hotel. One of the most hyped high school players of all time, with a $20 million Adidas deal in hand, Sebastian found himself in the same position as NBA superstars like Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, both of whom shot to stardom without playing a day of college ball. THE JUMP offers an inside view of Sebastian's journey-a rags-to-riches story of a kid from the Coney Island projects who succeeds in leaving behind the chaos, violence and economic hardship at home for a multi-million dollar life of professional ball and product endorsement. Drawing on exclusive interviews with friends, family, coaches, recruiters, agents and players, USA Today columnist Ian O'Connor offers an intimate portrait of the promising young player's senior year at Lincoln High School and explores the changing nature of basketball in America today.

Sebastian Telfair exemplifies a new dynamic emerging in basketball-young, talented teenagers who skip college on the way to NBA fortune and fame. But what is this trend doing to the sport? And do the adults who have hitched their hopes on Sebastian's rising star have the young player's best interests in mind? THE JUMP dives head first into today's high-stakes, anything-goes basketball culture, examining the sneaker companies intent on securing charismatic and mediagenic players to hawk their wares; college boosters willing to break NCAA rules by offering cash incentives to lure promising players to their schools; high school administrators securing big appearance fees from promoters; agents wooing players and their families-and walking the thin line dictating amateur status rules for high school and college ball.

O'Connor also delves into the dream that the NBA holds for so many families-a child drafted into the pros offers a first class ticket out of the projects. A colorful cast of characters featured in THE JUMP includes the faces shaping the sport today: Rick Pitino, head coach of the University of Louisville, who recruits Sebastian with the hope of delivering his team to an NCAA championship only to see his dreams dashed by Sebastian's decision to enter the NBA draft; Andy Miller, the agent who vies to sign up Sebastian despite Erica and Otis Telfair's reservations; Stephon Marbury, star of the New York Knicks, who sees Sebastian more as a rival than a cousin (THE JUMP delivers exclusive details on the fracture in the Marbury and Telfair relationship, including interviews with the point guards and relatives on the subject of the family feud); Sonny Vacaro, at different times the face of Nike, Adidas, and Reebok, who uses sneaker company cash to entice coaches and young players; Jay-Z, rapper and owner of Telfair's summer-league team.

Under O'Connor's penetrating scrutiny, Sebastian Telfair becomes the prism through which the circus of modern basketball is explored. Can he succeed, or will he flame out-too young, too small, too unprepared? And what is this new trend in basketball doing to the athletes, to college basketball programs, to the quality of play in the NBA and to society at large? As Dave Kindred of The Sporting News states, “THE JUMP is a 21st-century thrill ride into the shadows and bright lights of a basketball culture that breaks hearts and makes superstars.”

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Anyone who pays attention to pro basketball knows that many of the NBA's best players skipped college and entered the professional ranks directly from high school. Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant, and LeBron James, all six feet six inches tall or taller, are the best of the high-school phenoms. As a high-school senior, Sebastian Telfair considered himself that group's equal on the court. At an even six feet, though, he was not their equal in size, and if he were to make the jump directly to the professional ranks, he would become the smallest player to have done so. O'Connor, a columnist for USA Today, meticulously chronicles Telfair's senior year at Brooklyn's Lincoln High. It's not pretty. All variety of people wanted to hitch a ride on Telfair's star, including college coaches, shoe companies, agents, neighbors, and NBA executives. Telfair's Brooklyn neighborhood is riddled with gang shootings and drugs. On one side of his street lurks a life with virtually no hope; on the other, riches and fame beckon. Telfair made the jump. He was picked in the NBA draft by the Portland Trailblazers, with whom he signed a multimillion-dollar contract. This is a story of a harrowing journey without an ending. Telfair emerges as a likable young man whose millions, at this point, guarantee him only that others will continue to take advantage of him. This will be the most discussed book of the NBA season. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"No journalist in America gets to the heart and soul of sports culture stories like Ian O'Connor." -- Bill Plaschke, Los Angeles Times

“One phenom (Ian O'Connor) writing about another (Sebastian Telfair). You want to know why hoops is no longer about the hoop? Read this book. You want to know how America lost the patent on the very game Americans invented? Read this book. You want to accompany one of America's premier sports columnists on a journey into the dark belly of one of its premier games, as seen through the jaded eyes of one of its premier players? Take this trip.” -Bill Plaschke, Los Angeles Times, ESPN's “Around the Horn”

“Hoop Dreams takes a wild ride on the Coney Island Cyclone as Ian O'Connor dives headfirst into the world of big-time high school basketball and emerges with a searing and beautifully written tale. No sports book digs deeper into its subject. THE JUMP stands tall as the definitive work on the preps-to-pros phenomenon that has dramatically altered the culture of the sport.” -Harvey Araton, The New York Times, coauthor of Money Players: Days and Nights Inside the New NBA

"A must-read for anyone who cares about basketball, about sports, or about young athletes trying to come of age." -- John Feinstein, The Washington Post, author of A Season on the Brink and Let Me Tell You a Story: A Lifetime in the Game

"Anyone looking for evidence of how the culture of sports has changed (for better and for worse) will find it in Ian O'Connor's engrossing account of Sebastian Telfair's young life." -- Bob Costas, NBC Sports, HBO

*Starred Review* Anyone who pays attention to pro basketball knows that many of the NBA's best players skipped college and entered the professional ranks directly from high school. Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant, and LeBron James, all six feet six inches tall or taller, are the best of the high-school phenoms. As a high-school senior, Sebastian Telfair considered himself that group's equal on the court. At an even six feet, though, he was not their equal in size, and if he were to make the jump directly to the professional ranks, he would become the smallest player to have done so. O'Connor, a columnist for USA Today, meticulously chronicles Telfair's senior year at Brooklyn's Lincoln High. It's not pretty. All variety of people wanted to hitch a ride on Telfair's star, including college coaches, shoe companies, agents, neighbors, and NBA executives. Telfair's Brooklyn neighborhood is riddled with gang shootings and drugs. On one side of his street lurks a life with virtually no hope; on the other, riches and fame beckon. Telfair made the jump. He was picked in the NBA draft by the Portland Trailblazers, with whom he signed a multimillion-dollar contract. This is a story of a harrowing journey without an ending. Telfair emerges as a likable young man whose millions, at this point, guarantee him only that others will continue to take advantage of him. This will be the most discussed book of the NBA season. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Sebastian Telfair was a secondary-school basketball phenom whom experts rightly predicted would be the next student to jump from public school to the National Basketball Association, following in the footsteps of NBA superstars such as Kobe Bryant and Le Bron James. Here, USA Today columnist O'Connor chronicles Telfair's senior year at New York City's Lincoln High in 2003–04. O'Connor utilizes a variety of voices to compile this book, having interviewed family members, friends, coaches, agents, and recruiters. Considering that Telfair hails from the Brooklyn projects, an area notorious for drugs and violence, his accomplishments are remarkable. His abilities secured him a $20 million endorsement deal with Adidas; in fact, he was a millionaire before graduating from Lincoln High. A good read that basketball enthusiasts will enjoy.—Larry R. Little, Penticton P.L., B.C.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Rodale Books; First edition. edition (January 13, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1594861072
• ISBN-13: 978-1594861079
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,536,663 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Ian O'Connor is a nationally acclaimed columnist and author of "The Captain: The Journey of Derek Jeter," which the Library Journal called "excellent" and the "most complete account" of Jeter's iconic career with the New York Yankees.

O'Connor is also the author of The New York Times' bestseller "Arnie & Jack: Palmer, Nicklaus, and Golf's Greatest Rivalry," a columnist with ESPNNewYork.com, and a radio host on 1050 ESPN in New York.

Three times O'Connor has been named the No. 1 columnist in America in his circulation category by the Associated Press Sports Editors, and seven times he has placed among the top five nationally. O'Connor's work has earned dozens of national and regional awards, including the Society of Professional Journalists' prestigious Sigma Delta Chi Award at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

O'Connor has won contests conducted by the Golf Writers Association of America, the National Association of Black Journalists, the Basketball Writers Association of America, and the Football Writers Association of America.

O'Connor has been a columnist for The New York Daily News, USA Today, Foxsports.com, The Journal News and The Record, and has written for The New York Times and Star-Ledger.

A 1986 graduate of Marist College, O'Connor is a frequent guest on national ESPN TV programs. He lives in New Jersey with his wife and son.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Business of Basketball Will Never Be the Same, August 6, 2005

By 

Trevor Seigler (South Carolina) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Jump: Sebastian Telfair and the High-Stakes Business of High School Ball (Hardcover)

In "The Jump", Ian O'Connor takes the case of Sebastian Telfair (a talented if undersized NYC point guard) to document the wholesale marketing of basketball as merely an outlet for businessmen and agents to exploit the very stars they need. Telfair himself is an intense but likable young athelete who comes across as more than just the sum of his shoe company endorsements and shady high school coach's dealings. And O'Connor masterfully describes the various elements that make basketball what it is today, on the high-school level.

Sebastian (or "Bassy") Telfair is the product of an inner-city enviroment that promises little to many of his peers. Nonetheless, he is blessed with an unnatural ability to command the ball and also interact with his teammates in an unselfish style that seperates him from the ball-hogging "gangstas" that dominate the NBA. In Telfair, O'Connor finds a unique case study for his look at the way money can corrupt even the best atheletes. Telfair is smarter than most, able to avoid the pitfalls of financial entanglements while still a "amateur" status. But he has his own problems off the court.

Telfair's father Otis, a Vietnam vet, was a nonentity during his son's formative years due to a prison conviction. His older brother Sylvester, also in and out of trouble with the law, figured prominently in concerns over Sebastian's ability to land with a team in the 2004 draft. And the neighborhood he grew up in on Coney Island is one of the worst in the country.

Through it all, Telfair has his talent and his backers to keep him from becoming another statistic. As documented in "The Jump", Telfair is the local celebrity, and he is able to navigate through the tension of inner-city life because he has the chance to make it out.

Telfair is surrounded by all sorts of hangers-on who want to ride him to glory: Ziggy Scaginano(sic), the former coach who first pinpointed Sebastian for greatness; Tiny Morton, Bassy's high school coach who falls under investigation for his participation in various tournaments for cash; Sonny Vaccaro, the former Adiddas and ReeBok chief who first courts Telfair then trys to undermine him allegedly; Stephon Marbury, Telfair's famous (and in the Telfair household, infamous) cousin; Rick Pitino, the college coach who banked on Telfair attending school instead; and a host of executives from NBA teams and sneaker companies, all with their eyes on the prize that is the Next Big Thing. And in their eyes, that Next Big Thing is a point guard named Sebastian Telfair.

It would be fair to say that I'm not a huge basketball fan; I enjoy the game, but know little about it. In "The Jump", I think it's fair to say even a non-NBA fan would find something worthy to read. Whether it's Telfair's own struggles to transcend his enviroment without losing his soul, or the various goings-on that conspire to make his jump to the pros all that more difficult, O'Connor never loses sight of the narrative flow that makes this compelling story even more interesting.

Modern sports has become a big-time business, and in "The Jump" Ian O'Connor documents how one player manages to keep his head above the water of endorsements, shady friends and agents, and the pressures of a typical high-school athelete magnified under the national spotlight. Sebastian Telfair may turn out to be the Next Big Thing, or the Next Big Flop. But you won't forget him when you finish the long and winding road to his jump.

14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best sports books I have ever read, February 10, 2005

By 

A basketball fan (New Hampshire) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Jump: Sebastian Telfair and the High-Stakes Business of High School Ball (Hardcover)

... it is an amazing portrayal of the life of a young basketball star in America. The Georgia Tech allegation is just one small part of a story that captures the enormous pressures that are heaped on young athletic talent in America today.

While interesting, the buzz centering around Georgia Tech is such a minor part of the book. George Burdell should order his own copy of The Jump on Amazon and read about the sneaker companies' influence on young athletes, overtures by agents that could impact a players amateur standing, and the amazing story of Telfair himself--an exceptionally talented young player with remarkable poise and charisma who, through hard work, perseverance and amazing talent, overcame the hardship and violence of life in the projects to achieve his dream of playing for the NBA. The real story of the book is captured in this quote from Telfair, "I mean, every player is taking something out there. Everybody. . . . Kids out there are starving. We're starving. We'ver got nothing, nad people are making all this money off of us. Maybe I want to buy my mother something for Christmas. She told me, 'They make all this money. They sell all these pictures of you, and nobody gives anything to our family.' When I was younger, I used to have to borrow sneakers to play ball, but nobody cares. Nobody knows what's going on in our household. They just make their money and move on.'"

For the record, O'Connor writes that Telfair never confirmed that he was referring to GA Tech when he told the story about the booster offering money. Telfair's brother and best friend identified the school as Tech. O'Connor writes, "Of course, someone could have made a $250,000 offer--and an empty one at that--without having any connection to Georgia Tech or its basketball program. Whether the alleged offer to Telfair was real or a hoax, this much was clear: [Telfair] was forever in position to reject business propositions that could have landed him in trouble. The crux of the Tech story is that Telfair was a kid facing enormous pressure and temptations.

Buy this book and read this book. It is one of the best sports books I've ever read.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is Big Time Sports, March 1, 2005

By 

John Matlock "Gunny" (Winnemucca, NV) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Jump: Sebastian Telfair and the High-Stakes Business of High School Ball (Hardcover)

The news reports give the brief versions of a promising high school student who skipps college to play with the pros. But here are the day to day details of a young man all of a sudden being put into play almost as a commodity.

When amazing amounts of money are involved, amazing things happen. The colleges that would like to have the player hopefully lead them to championships, the agents, the shoe companies seeking yet another name to hang on their wall all begin to work their own special interests.

To a young man from the projects, this has to be bewildering. Whose advice to follow? What is the best solution? What about college? What about the millions of dollars being offered? At 5' 11", is he too small, or is he good enough to make up for the small size?

This is the day by day, decision by decision, event by event story of one young man as he starts his NBA career. It's a story very few will experience first hand, and it's almost unbelievable.