by Frank DeFord
Atlantic Monthly Press
HardcoverFrom the publisher's website:
Frank Deford is one of the most beloved sports commentators in America. A contributing writer to Sports Illustrated for more than fifty years, he is also a longtime correspondent on Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel.
These days, Deford is perhaps best known for his weekly commentaries on NPR’s Morning Edition. Beginning in 1980, Deford has recorded over two thousand commentaries, and in this collection he brings together the very best, creating a charming, insightful, and wide-ranging look at athletes and the world of sports.
In I’d Know That Voice Anywhere, Deford discusses everything from sex scandals and steroids to Americans’ perennial nostalgia for Joe DiMaggio and why, in a culture dominated by celebrity, sports is the only discipline on earth where popularity and excellence thrive in tandem. He considers the similarities between Babe Ruth and Winnie the Pooh, why football reminds him of Venice, and how the Olympics are like Groundhog Day—or like an independent movie filled with foreign actors you’ve never heard of. He considers the prevalence of cheating in the classroom among student-athletes and why academic whistle-blowers are castigated as tattletales, pens a one-size-fits-all sports movie script, and even delivers Super Bowl coverage in the style of Shakespeare. A rollicking sampler of one of NPR’s most popular segments, I’d Know That Voice Anywhere is perfect for sports enthusiasts—as well as sports skeptics—and a must-read for any Frank Deford fan.
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