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84th out of 427 books
—
350 voters
Loose Balls: The Short, Wild Life of the American Basketball Association
by
Terry Pluto
What do Julius Erving, Larry Brown, Moses Malone, Bob Costas, the Indiana Pacers, the San Antonio Spurs, and the Slam Dunk contest have in common? They all got their professional start in the American Basketball Association.
The NBA may have won the financial battle, but the ABA won the artistic war. With its stress on wide-open individual play, the adoption of the three-po
...morePaperback, 448 pages
Published
December 15th 1991
by Fireside Books
(first published 1990)
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Amazing anecdotes about dunks, fights, and lunatics from the league whose style now dominates the NBA. Disrespected and underpaid, not to mention unfilmed, the players of this era exist now only in tall tales of bizarre incidents. Did a player really say about a flight that landed five minutes before it took off due to time zones, "I ain't getting on no time machine"? Did an angry guard really throw a show at someone on a breakaway? Well, they did, at least according to the coaches and players.
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One of the funniest books ever written about professional sports. Buy at all costs if you love the game of basketball.
The ABA was the generator for many of the NBA rules, regulations and even the star players of the 1970s. The three point shot was used in the ABA first. Dr. J played for the New York Nets and the Virginia Squires before making the move over to the 76ers. Some great stories here about oddballs like Marvin "Bad News" Barnes and Bob Netolicky.
Great book about an innovative league d...more
The ABA was the generator for many of the NBA rules, regulations and even the star players of the 1970s. The three point shot was used in the ABA first. Dr. J played for the New York Nets and the Virginia Squires before making the move over to the 76ers. Some great stories here about oddballs like Marvin "Bad News" Barnes and Bob Netolicky.
Great book about an innovative league d...more
Apr 06, 2010
Dave
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
someone really interested in a history of basketball in America
EXCELLENT book and an essential read for anyone interested in the game of basketball. Loose Balls tells the story of the nine-year of the American Basketball Association from the late 60's-mid 70s that was created as a competitor to the National Basketball Association, which is of course still around today and thriving. At first the ABA was a gimmick league with no respect, but with time some notoriety was gained with the signings of big names like Artis Gilmore, Moses Malone, David Thompson and...more
This was as fun a book to read as the ABA action was to watch. I was fortunate to live close to an ABA franchise...Denver (Rockets-Nuggets) and so I was able to see some of the action. I always felt I could watch forever, I couldn't get enough! I LOVED the ABA and couldn't stand all the old stuffy nba with their brown ball. Watching that ABA ball was a blast. Hearing Julius Erving tell how he loved it was great to hear. This book was awesome...as was the American Basketball Association itself!
This book is an oral history of the ABA. There are a lot of wild stories in that made me laugh out loud. If you've seen the Will Ferrell movie, Semi-Pro, you probably thought it was too ridiculous to be true. Well, it wasn't. It might have been too tame (except for the bear wrestling). There was some crazy stuff going on. From players being sold, to players getting in fights, millions of dollars in lawsuits, to the Dolgoff plan (contracts were announced at a certain amount, but often times a hug...more
A good book for a basketball fan, especially one interested in some quirky history of the game (certainly avoid if you're not interested in hoops). Simply stated, this is about the characters, teams and personalities of the ABA, told in the social context of the late-60s/early-70s. Lots of fun - just don't take it too seriously.
I took off stars because of some readability issues. The author did an overwhelming amount of research for this book, interviewing many people associated with the ABA. So...more
I took off stars because of some readability issues. The author did an overwhelming amount of research for this book, interviewing many people associated with the ABA. So...more
This oral history of the wild, wacky ABA is a delight from start to finish. The league with the red, white and blue ball, massive Afros and 3-point line (long before the NBA) sure had some characters (and good basketball). For every massively talented Julius Erving, there was a violent, ass-kicking John Williamson. Bob Costas is among the significant contributors to this book, and his observations from his early broadcasting days are classic.
An oral history of the wild and crazy ABA. One of the best sports books I have read. It's interesting to see how much the ABA influenced the pro game we have today. It's entertaining, informative, and funny. The pictures alone are almost worth buying the book - afros and wild clothes from the 70's. Some great stories- like how the ABA almost landed Lew Alcindor (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar).
My different style than "The Book of Basketball". In this the author collected anecdotes from people who participated in the ABA to provide a profile of the ABA. The author's voice was pretty much non-existent, you could tell he had a reporter background. "The Book of Basketball" has a very strong author voice, and I think is less readable because of it. If you like basketball, I definitely recommend this book. The ABA was crazy.
This was an entertaining and interesting history of the ABA with some great stories and background descriptions of various players and teams. Going into it, I was skeptical of the oral history format of the book, but it worked well. For my tastes, it was a little long and would have been more interesting if it were about 100 pages shorter. But, this is still probably the most lively sports history book I have read. I recommend it.
Terry Pluto clearly can't write at all, as he does nothing but list an interviewee's name and regurgitate. It's not necessarily organized in any sort of chronological order and has little cohesion as a result, but it is virtually the only document about a renegade league that changed the face of sports and is a must-read for sports fans as a result.
Lots of entertaining stories, but too many unentertaining stories as well, I'd give this 2.5 starts if half stars were aloud.
This book was way too long, and in the preface Pluto said he originally wrote over 1000 pages, i just can't imagine how awful that would ahve been.
This book was way too long, and in the preface Pluto said he originally wrote over 1000 pages, i just can't imagine how awful that would ahve been.
Fascinating. I grew up after the merger, but live in Utah, the ABA's Stars had played -- longtime Jazz announcer Hot Rod Hundley also was an ABA veteran. So I always had a mild curiosity into the ABA -- this book was as fun as it was informative.
Funny, informative, and a light read. (The anecdotes seem like Bill Veeck stories at times.) A continuation of the trend for me to like reading about basketball more than watching it.
In 1968 I attended a Minnesota Muskies game at Met Center in Bloomington and was hooked on the red white and blue ball, which I bought later in college. The stories are great and the names pleasant memories, especially Julius Erving.
Incredible stories from the most anarchic period in pro basketball history. The Bad News Barnes stories alone make this a must read for any basketball fan.
So far this is quite good. I have a NBA tape I used to watch all the time that featured about 5 minutes of ABA footage (most of that being Dr. J) and that was probably the most interesting part of the video. Erving, Rick Barry, and Connie Hawkins are fascinating characters in this documentary style book.
About 95% of the book is direct quotes, assembled in a linear fashion and tells the wild, makeshift stories that originated in the league's 9 years.
It's all here- the hyped press, bare bones man...more
About 95% of the book is direct quotes, assembled in a linear fashion and tells the wild, makeshift stories that originated in the league's 9 years.
It's all here- the hyped press, bare bones man...more
You owe it to yourself to read this if you're a basketball fan. Amazing anecdotes that capture the sport as well as the era.
I loved this book as a kid. A strange, hilarious and doomed look at a very human venture. 15 years later I still remember a lot of the stories and lessons from this book.
this was a fun read. it really picked up after Dr. J arrived. guess the league itself did too.
Story about the decade long run of the ABA....super interesting!
Oct 17, 2008
Kelly
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Any sports fan or avid reader of history/humor
Recommended to Kelly by:
Jon/Bill Simmons
Written with solely from first-person accounts, this book is one of the only chronicles of the defunct ABA (American Basketball Association). It is the basketball version of the anthology that tells the history of SNL - it is written in entirely the same format.
Even if you aren't a big basketball fan, it's really more of a story of a bunch of guys who wanted to put together something special and all the bonehead things they do in the process. But, they did make a significant impact on the cultur...more
Even if you aren't a big basketball fan, it's really more of a story of a bunch of guys who wanted to put together something special and all the bonehead things they do in the process. But, they did make a significant impact on the cultur...more
Very simply, the funniest sports book I have ever read.
Loose Balls is the best sports book as well as the best oral history that I've ever read. A tragicomic masterpiece about a flawed, beautiful league that lost millions of dollars but in the process created modern basketball.
Fascinating read, but I am a sucker for oral histories and books about old sports leagues/teams/seasons.
Understand that my 5 is from a basketball stathead and lover of sports history. This is a must read for so many reasons. The ABA had such a big influence on modern basketball, it's not even funny. A lot of modern day "advanced stats" were both founded and understood by people in the ABA. And beyond those two parts, this book is just damned fascinating. So much incredible sports drama happened in the ABA that I had no idea about. Must read.
A very interesting book detailing the upstart ABA. It is amazing at how many innovations, all-stars, and teams came from the ABA to the NBA. Additionally, the work discusses the Kentucky Colonels and the origination of the ABA policy of drafting underclassman. It is an oral history and set up with periodic prose interspersed with quotes
May 24, 2011
Doug
added it
A fun read about the ABA. It was done in an interesting style: nothing but quotations from the players and other participants in the league, but the author organized them in such a way as to make for a coherent narrative.
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Terry Pluto is a sports columnist for the Plain Dealer. He has twice been honored by the Associated Press Sports Editors as the nations top sports columnist for medium-sized newspapers. He is a nine-time winner of the Ohio Sports Writer of the Year award and has received more than 50 state and local writing awards. In 2005 he was inducted into the Cleveland Journalism Hall of Fame. He is the autho...more
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