Customer Reviews

Tip-Off: How the 1984 NBA Draft Changed Basketball Forever

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
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2 star:		(1)
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It's quite a privilege to be the first amazon.com reviewer to weigh in on Filip Bondy's excellent book about the 1984 NBA Draft, a seminal event in league history in which four sure-fire Hall of Famers were drafted: Hakeem Olajuwon, Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, and John Stockton. To a lesser extent, the Bondy's book also covers Sam Perkins, another class of '84 draftee whose nice career fell a bit short of Hall standards.

The best part of the story though is Bondy's inclusion of the famous pick #2: Sam Bowie. Famous for the wrong reason because MJ was pick #3. The nice part of the book is Bowie's cooperation with the author. I was very pleased to see and read of his gentle manner, his happiness in life and his "no regrets" look back to his injury-prone career. He seems unperturbed by naysayers who term his pick as "the NBA draft's biggest historic blunder." Because, as Bondy skillfully points out, this is revisionist history. This was 'before Michael was Michael.' Dean Smith kept Jordan's breakout talents well-concealed with the UNC team system. Barkley, speaking in Bowie's defense, says (in typical Barkley hyperbole) "No one but me knew how good Michael was."

Moreover, the prevailing wisdom in the NBA back in those days was that you win with a big man. And, in the draft, given the option between a good big man and a good playmaker, you always went with the big man. Portland, with its reverie of Bill Walton's glory days culminating in the 1977 Association championship, was certainly very susceptible to that thinking...especially with Dr. Jack still at the helm.

That's the reason why Bondy subtitles his book "How the 1984 NBA Draft Changed Basketball Forever." Post-Jordan, there was no longer second-thinking in going for a playmaker if there was even the slightest chance they'd turn into a Jordan. That new mindset generated a new game and rejuvenated the league (vs. the moribund 1970s) which then proceeded to put forth a brilliant product starting in 1984 and ending with the last of MJ's titles in 1998. In between, dominance shifted from Lakers/Celtics, to the Pistons and then to the Bulls (with the Rockets capitalizing on Jordan's two-year 'retirement').

If you're an NBA fan, you've got to have Filip Bondy's book. It's a fantastic read.

If you are looking for an anthology on Michael Jordan, then stop reading now. But if you are looking for a definite history on the NBA, its clubs and some of the Top 50 greatest players, this is a must. It not only provides insights into the NBA draft and how it changed the landscape of the game, but it also provides a behind the scenes look into what teams were thinking and trying to achieve. Probably the best basketball book I have ever read.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a very fast read for me. The author focuses on several of the top picks from this draft: Olajuwon, Bowie, Jordan, Barkley, Stockton, and Perkins. He spends a lot of time on each of these players and gets very in-depth, and that alone made the book a worthwhile read to me.

Also, the author talks about some of the fall out from this draft: The NBA draft lottery, salary cap changes, and the globalization of the league. I enjoyed the author's style, lots of quotes from major players at the time and reflecting on the time later. The bibliography is quite extensive. So I felt like the author pulled a lot of info from lots of different articles and books I might have read separately anyway. I felt he did a nice job sorting through the material.

Again, I really enjoyed the book. If you love the NBA and love this particular era, I think you'll enjoy the book.

Just think how the basketball landscape would have changed had the Houston Rockets traded Ralph Sampson straight up for Michael Jordan! The Bulls would have done it and were waiting for the Rockets to call but Rockets coach Bill Fitch was in love with the twin towers idea.
The Sixers had a deal in place to trade the aging Dr. J to the Clippers for Terry Cummings but didn't pull the trigger for fear of fan backlash.
Bobby Knight, the dictator that he is, had Michael Jordan in tears during the Olympic tryouts.
Charles Barkley showed up at the 1984 Olympic trials not with the goal of making the team, but rather improving his draft status.
When the tough Soviet team pulled out of the 1984 games Coach Knight cut Charles Barkley because he didn't care for his personality. But had the Soviets stayed in the Olympics Barkley wouldn't have been cut because his superb playing ability would have been needed to beat the Soviets.
Barkley gained 15 pounds within 24 hours to tip the scales at a Sixers predraft weigh in to scare them away from drafting him.
I could go on and on with all the interesting facts brought out in this book.

This book is not just about who was drafted when but more about how things fell into place. Teams with awful records playing hard at the end of the season because they had traded away their lottery pick - upsetting the teams that had traded for these picks. Teams with their lottery picks tanking it at the end of the season in order to get the highest pick possible. This tanking led to the weighted ping pong ball draft ordering system in place today.
It is amazing how many prior drafts and trades came around to help or haunt teams picking in the 1984 draft. For example, if the Rockets had drafted Clyde Drexler in 1983 instead of Rodney McCray the Blazers would have drafted Michael Jordan in 1984 while the Rockets would have had a dynamic duo of Drexler and Olajuwon.
This was an excellent book. I highly recommend it.

I'm a bit of a basketball junkie and was looking forward to reading this for a few months now. I read it in about 4 days and I'm not sure I learned anything. While some salary numbers and a few other secondary stories were interesting, there are no real revelations in this book and the editing leaves a lot to be desired, as there are numerous spelling errors and downright brain farts. At one point, as the story is talking about the Virginia Cavaliers, the author then calls them Cleveland, who are also known as the Cavaliers.

The book is basically player profiles on about six guys as they make their way through college and into the NBA, and then a little further into the future. Just about all of it can be found on Wikipedia. If you are a casual fan that is interested in modern NBA history then I'd turn to Wikipedia first. If you're still yearning for more, maybe try this out.

overall, this was a pretty decent book, especially for someone who's stopped following basketball in the past 20 years. It contains alot of biographical info on Stockton, Jordan, Olajuwon, Perkins, etc. and every once in a while, it's nice to learn that kind of stuff - maybe it should have been titled "The Awesome 1984 NBA Draft," since it introduced alot of prominent players into the league. I remember wondering why Sam Bowie was the second overall pick that year, too, and this book sheds some insight into Stu Inman's thinking and how no one expected Jordan to become the player he eventually did, due to Dean Smith's system at UNC. The book is well worth it at the price it's at now.

With the crystal clarity of hindsight, pro basketball fans have anointed the Portland Trail Blazers' drafting of gimpy-legged center Sam Bowie ahead of Michael Jordan in the 1984 draft as the biggest goof in draft history. Many folks forget that a number of other all-time NBA greats were also plucked in that draft, including Charles Barkley, Hakeem Olajuwon, and John Stockton. Bondy lays out the gory details of how the '84 draft played out and the implications that its results raised for the future of the league. We all know how Jordan, for better or worse, impacted the style of play and the marketing muscle of the league, but I found most of my attention drawn to the tale's tragic hero, Sam Bowie - a fine college player with fatefully fragile legs who never deserved the ridicule that he has received in the wake of Jordan's transcendence. A good read for both college and pro hoops fans.

I liked this book a lot, and I'll tell you why: I thought this was a wonderful story-telling sports book. And these were tales I'd never heard before -- about Charles Barkley's desperate, gustatory attempts to avoid getting drafted by the capped Sixers; about Sam Bowie's personal travails; about Michael Jordan's frustrations with Bobby Knight.

And the book posits several alternate NBA universes, which are great fun to consider -- my favorite is the notion of the Houston Rockets, with both Jordan and Hakeem Olajuwon, having traded Ralph Sampson for the third pick.

All in all, a really evocative book of an important time in basketball. I don't know if it changed the sport forever, but it certainly made for great debate and consideration.

As a long time NBA fan I bought this book looking forward to a plethora of "inside" information regarding the players, the organizations, and behind the scenes stories. Instead, what I got was a collection of stories and vignettes that have been told and re-told numerous times. This book is a nice look back at the draft and the careers of HOFers Jordan, Barkley, and Stockton, but other than the fact that Bill Fitch hated Elvin Hayes I didn't learn anything new or gain any insight.

A previous review is correct - this book is mislabeled. The book spends very little time detailing how this draft changed the NBA forever - but instead focuses on the upbringing and collegiate biographies of Olajuwon, Jordan, Perkins, Barkley, Stockton, and Bowie.

Nevertheless, I found this book to be remarkable. Reading firsthand from various GMs and Stern about the various deals that occurred and didn't occur that resulted in the draft order in 1984 was exactly what I hoped to learn. I wanted to know of the potential trades that could have occurred - resulting in Jordan on the Mavs/Rockets/Blazers/Cavs/etc. All of the inside information that fans never get to know about was presented by Bondy - in addition to the biographical information of each of the "Sweet Six" players that made the draft.

Even the biographical info on each draftee was solid information. Before reading this book I had no idea that Barkely simply saw basketball as a means to an end - a way to make money to set himself up for life - and lobbied hard not to be picked by Philadelphia b/c the franchise was over the salary cap - whereas individuals like Olajuwon and Jordan wanted to play basketball and were willing to go anywhere to make a name for themselves on the court.

Just as interesting was also the information detailing the Olympic trials and Bobby Knight. Seeing how Knight whittled away the talent to create the Olympic team and the way he managed the roster of future stars was an interesting read - as was the information regarding how Barkley/Jordan interacted and worked with Knight was a fun read.