Customer Reviews

The Story Behind the Glory: Winning Quotes from Sports Greats on the Game of Life

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Behind every great sportsman is a system of values: hard work, self-improvement, service to his community. Those values help drive an athlete (or a coach, or even a sportswriter) to greatness, and the distillation of those values are reflected in a person's outlook, and in his words.

Bill Cairo has assembled the famous quotations from eleven sports greats, athletes who excelled at everything from golf, football, and baseball to coaching, teaching, and jotting purple poetry about the ups and downs of teams and their fortunes on the field of play. But this is not simply a book of quotations; if it were, Cairo coul have written the chapters about Yogi Berra and Mohammed Ali and called it a day. SportsWise also conveys the biographies of the sports figures included on its "Top Ten"-style listing, allowing the reader a fuller understanding of what the book's subtitle calls "The Story Behind the Glory."

Cairo clearly understands the different sporting disciplines he's writing about, but the reader needn't be a pro himself to enjoy SportsWise. In order to be thrilled and moved by this book, all you need to do is turn the pages and read.

So many modern proverbs muttered in common speech come from the world of sports. But what are their origins, and what do they really mean? "The Story Behind the Glory: Winning Quotes from Sports Greats on the Game of Life" is a look at the history of various sports greats, their quotes, and how their wisdom is applied to what's really important - life. Doubling as book of wisdom and a book of trivia, sports fanatics of all walks will find something to love, making "The Story Behind the Glory: Winning Quotes from Sports Greats on the Game of Life" highly recommended for community library sports collections.

What a great book! Many of the quotes are familiar, but Cairo has given us the background. He included many of my heroes: Lombardi, Grantland Rice, John Wooden, Yogi, Jackie, and Hank.
I will use this book often for my speaking practice.
David DeFord

I've always found quotes to be like little drops of sunshine to help brighten your day. They're just little morsels that make you stop what ever is going on and inspire you to move forward. Couple that with my love of sports and I really looked forward to reading THE STORY BEHIND THE GLORY: WINNING QUOTES FROM SPORTS GREATS ON THE GAME OF LIFE by Bill Cairo.

What I found was a unique reading experience. Most quote books are just that, page after page of quotes with a touch of commentary here and there, but Cairo's book truly is the story behind the story. We get much more than the actual quotes from ten sports legends. We get the context leading up to the quotes. The narrative flows very nicely and seems to tie each quote together in such a way as to present a brief biography of each career that is chronicled here.

Cairo has a unique way of drawing interest into each individual, even if you are not a fan of that particular sport. I say this because of his depiction of former hockey coach, Fred Shero and former tennis star, Arthur Ashe. I've never personally been a fan of either hockey or tennis, and quite frankly, could not have even told you who Fred Shero was (I thought he was a jockey) but I found their profiles to be just as engaging as any of the other figures depicted.

Sports lovers and business people alike will appreciate this work and draw inspiration from its' stories. Jackie Robinson's gravestone reads, "A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives," and each of these icons impacted countless lives. Let them impact yours.

I would also like to say a word about the quality of the book itself. The book is self published and one thing I find quite annoying is the lack of editing in self-published books. I did not find one single editing mistake in this entire book. Kudos to Mr. Cairo for going the extra mile. The book also contains an indepth Bibliography and what is possibly the best index I have ever seen in a self-published book.