THE BOOK OF BASKETBALL by Bill Simmons Sure, you might need to like basketball to love this lecture--but it's a good one!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Listeners, readers, welcome to the Foxed Page, where we dive
deep into the very best books. You'll come away with
a richer understanding of the text at hand, all while
learning to read everything a little better. I'm Kimberly Ford
kimberly Ford Chisholm, one time adjunct professor at Berkeley, best
selling author, and PhD in literature. Every once in a
while on the fox Page, I have to give a

(00:26):
little prediction about how handy my PhD is going to
be in any given lecture. Today, I'm going to tell
you it might not be the thing that I'm leading
with today. We're talking about Bill Simmons's The Book of Basketball.
But just because I am not leading with a deep,
granular literary criticism, that does not mean that we are

(00:46):
not going to talk about this book as a memoir,
Because I will argue that essentially what we have here
in The Book of Basketball is very much a memoir.
Even in the last third of the book might even
be the half where he's ranking all of the players
and the teams. There's almost never a page where we
do not have Bill Simmons. This ended up being for

(01:06):
me a really important aspect of the book, because I
have to say I was expecting something that was going
to read much more encyclopedic and not quite as personable
and as chatty. There's an enormous amount of information in here,
and right from the top, I'm going to tell you
I didn't look at a single stat I mean, occasionally
I would look at how many championships they have won.

(01:27):
I am not someone who gravitates toward numbers, and this
was no exception. And actually it's really impressive that I
ended up feeling like I got a huge amount out
of this book, despite the fact that I was really
lazy about the numbers. And if my argument is that
this book is a memoir that leads to the most
important thing that I think I will say today. But
the value of the book is this. You can go

(01:49):
back and you can think of these iconic moments that
you yourself remember, and through Simmons's eyes, you can have
the entire memory re evoked. That's not a word. You
can have the entire memory evoked. And what's exceptional about
literature is that you have then someone else's vision of it,
so your understanding of the moment becomes all the more replete.
Quick note that if you're someone who is listening to

(02:10):
this as a podcast, this might be a time that
you might want to check out a YouTube channel only
because this is a lecture where I'm going to be
feathering lots of different images into the thing, and they're
going to be really good ones because they're all going
to have to do with basketball. I am someone who
grew up in a household that was not forty unless
maybe skiing. I mean, we did a lot of skiing.
When I met Bill Chishlm at the end of college,

(02:32):
many things became immediately clear to me. One of them
was the absolutely crazed fanaticism of his entire family about
the Boston Celtics. I was having fun. I really enjoyed
the whole thing, But I have to say early on
I had a conversation with my sister about the magnitude
of their devotion, and what we realized is that we
were dealing here with like the kind of like ardent

(02:54):
conviction that you might see in like a household of evangelists.
So I was very happy to get onto the Celtics train,
but it was very clear from the start that I
had some really large deficits of information, and I just
always accepted that those deficits were going to remain. There
was no way that I was going to be able
to understand how a certain game in nineteen seventy six
felt when Bill, for example, was seven years old. And

(03:17):
what I will say about this book, I was almost
just going to say that it was some sort of Bible.
But I'm not, in fact going to compare it to
a Bible, because honestly, we're going to get to the
hubris in the title and in the cover of the book,
and I'm going to hold it up for you. If
you're on the YouTube right now, you can see that
this book is already flirting with a little bit of
like biblehood in the sense that we have, you know

(03:38):
that very famous Michelangelis Sistine Chapel thing where Adam is
touching the finger of God. We have that reflected here.
It's also very clever, obviously because you've got the spinning basketball.
But I don't think I need to actually elevate this
book to the level of the Bible. But what it
did for me, as someone who was not particularly fanatic
and someone who really had some deficits, was invite me

(03:58):
in through some really deft prose, some well developed characters,
and some really well chosen details into a world that
suddenly became much more real. I don't know if anything
really exciting happened in nineteen seventy six, which there I'm
admitting one of these deficits. But if there were one
of those huge moments, this book actually allowed me a
small glimpse through the magic of words on the printed page.

(04:20):
It allowed me a much better sense of what that
moment might have felt like. But I also would recommend
a real immersion in order to relive these moments that
are always being bandied about in any sort of conversation
about basketball. One of the reasons why this book has
been so helpful is because of those conversations. If I
became a basketball fan in nineteen ninety one, each one

(04:41):
of the three children that Bill and I have were
definitely born into it in the way that he was,
And I have to say there's no better way to
become an ardent fan than seeing the whole thing through
the eyes of your child. Although I will say that
when we were young and had small children and Bill
was traveling constantly, that there always came a moment with
one of the kids who was always around kindergarten where

(05:03):
they would have that season where they finally really locked
into the team, and invariably we would come to some
playoff game and that is when they might be eliminated.
And in fact, if the team lost and was eliminated
and the basketball season came to a screeching halt, it
was shattering, and I have to say it both galvanized
my fandom but also really was a little bit annoying

(05:25):
because Bill would be gone and I would have a
seven year old or a six year old or five
year old who was completely devastated and did not believe
me when I said there's always another game, There's always
another season. I never really said, like, there'll always be
another playoff, partially because I was a bit superstitious about
the whole thing, also because I thought maybe that nuance
might be lost on my child, which actually it was

(05:46):
probably underestimating them. I'm sure that they understood, even at five,
the importance of a playoff run. So now we're going
to dive in a little more to the traditional fox
page lecture. We always begin with this question why read
this book? And in my case, this is maybe the
most specific reading assignment I have ever sat for myself.
The reason we are reading this book, and this is

(06:07):
maybe obvious to some of you, is that our family
recently became part of the ownership group of the Boston Celtics.
I had given this book to Bill in two thousand
and eight when it came out in hardback. We also
had a paperback copy, thank god, And never did it
seem more important to really dive in and understand not
only basketball, but this team. And we're going to treat

(06:27):
the memoir today exactly like any other book, in that
the lecture is going to depend on some very close reading.
If you are here at the fox page, as many
of you are, to become a better reader. And I
resist that. I don't think anyone needs to become a
better reader in any sense. But if you are here
because you want to learn to read a bit more
richly than the most important piece of advice I will

(06:49):
give you is to just slow down and always we
slow write down, and we take a look at the title.
The title of this book, when you think about it
for more than like one second, is perhaps an extension
of the hubris of the cover of this book. The
title itself is very bold. This is literally the book
of basketball. This is not a Boston Fans book of basketball.

(07:09):
This is not Bill Simmons' Book of Basketball. Because we
have the definite article. Because it is singular, the title
is claiming to be the only one. It is claiming
to be essentially the only book of basketball. I also
really enjoyed the confidence of the subtitle because we have
the Book of Basketball colon. Essentially, there's no colon on

(07:31):
the cover, but there would be if you were to
do a bibliography. We have the Book of Basketball colon
the NBA according to the Sports Guy. So if you
take one step back and think about the sports Guy,
it speaks to perhaps even more of a sense of
complete understanding not just of basketball, but of all sports
in general. So this book is promising it to encompass

(07:52):
the entire world of basketball. You know, the NBA maybe
narrows it down a tiny bit, but you know, not really.
I like a lot of confidence in my author, certainly
when we were talking about a memoir. I can also
say that the size of the book for me was
a really important backing of the claim. I love a

(08:12):
long book. There are those times when you really just
want to dig into something wrong and I have to
imagine there are a lot of you out there who
are thinking, there's no way that I actually read the
whole book. And I'm going to tell you right now
how I can prove to you that I actually read
the whole book. In my copy of the Book of Basketball,
I got to page six hundred and fifty six, which
was right when Simmons was talking about the one Lakers,

(08:34):
and suddenly, just like right in the middle of actually
it was a table of numbers, which I was not
reading very carefully, suddenly we had the bibliography. I did
go back and look at those numbers a little more carefully.
I was like, maybe somehow he's like summing up the
whole entire thing here and then we're going to jump
right to the bibliography. But I looked at the numbers
and they all seemed pretty you know, specific to the Lakers,
and I was like, wait, how is this the ending

(08:55):
of the book? So I thumbed through the bibliography and
the index and found that right off after those two appendices,
we went right back into the text. So this kind
of misprint is actually not that uncommon. But what I
will say is that I was kind of sure that
maybe this is a test. This is a test that
Bill Simmons has set for us, because if you have
a misprint like this and you meet the author, you

(09:16):
would definitely mention the fact that there was a misprint.
At least I would. I will admit that once we
got to the part where he was ranking the players,
and he was ranking the teams, I was skimming. I
was really reading up carefully on the legendary characters from
way way back in the day, from the forties, fifties,
and sixties. And then I was reading the people who
are very close to my heart, namely those guys on

(09:37):
the eight team. But this brings me to an important point.
And this is a point that I made with Anna
Karenina and got like some really serious shade for it.
I do not believe you have to finish a book.
I do not believe you have to read every page
of a book. It actually drives me insane when people
are like, oh my god, I hated that book, but
I just like had to finish. I made myself finish it.
I'm like, you know what, you should not be doing that.

(09:58):
There is way too much great stuff out there to read.
If something's not resonating with you, you should put that
thing aside and pick up something that is by that
same token. I would much rather have people read the
first part of Don Quixote and not the whole entire thing,
or you know, a couple of chapters of Anna Karenina
to revel in that amazing prose, and maybe even to
go in with the idea that they don't have to

(10:20):
finish it. Someone literally wrote in the comments that they
didn't believe I was a professor. That if I was
telling people that they didn't have to read the whole
of a text, that literally there was no way I
could be a professor, which actually made me laugh because
I never got to be a full professor. I was
an adjunct professor, and honestly not for very long. The
point is that I really did read a lot of
this giant book, and I will say that that kind

(10:42):
of hubris element that I was just discussing, in some ways,
I think the book essentially deserves its title. Okay, we're
now getting to the fun part. We're going to dive
into the text. So we like to look at the dedication.
We like to do any literary sleuthing if we need to.
This one did not require a lot of literary sleuthing.
The paperback edition here came out in twenty ten, is
dedicated to Simmons's father and his son. We then have

(11:05):
an introduction to this paperback edition. I'm going to dig
into the very first sentence here. You might be standing
in a bookstore right now. You might be leaning against
a sofa in someone's house. You might be sitting on
the john, you might be taking a bath, you might
be shopping at one of those dollars stores, sitting on
a bench, riding in a car, reading a free ebook preview.

(11:26):
So I have to say I got sucked right in.
Those of you who are longtime listeners to the Fox
Page know that I love direct address. Direct address is
simply when an author, often in the first person, will
directly address the reader, will say you reader. Obviously, I
loved the fact that we are opening with the idea
of a bookstore. I liked the casual nature when he

(11:47):
said you might be leaning against a sofa in someone's house.
Then he says you might be sitting on the john,
which I mean sure. I am certain that this book
was read by many, many a man sitting on the toilet.
Don't the term john it's like my grandparents use that word.
It just I don't know, it just has never really
sat well with me. But then he won me over
again when he said, you might be taking a bath.

(12:09):
I'm a huge proponent of reading in the bathtub. We
then get to this list of these questions that we
might be asking ourselves, and I am not going to
read through them all. What I will note is at
the bottom of this page, the very first page of
the book, we have number four, the fourth thing we
might be thinking to ourselves, and that is this, Wait,
I already bought the hardcover. Now he wants me to

(12:30):
buy the paperback greedy bastard, And remember that greedy bastard
because it's going to come back up again in a second.
And then we go on and have the rest of
his introduction. The reason why I read that last part
is because right after his introduction we have a forward
by Malcolm Gladwell. Gladwell is one of those household names.
He is someone whose book outliers. They're a bunch of books.

(12:52):
I haven't read a ton of Malcolm Wow of Malcolm Gladwell.
But the thing that I will say is that because
Malcolm Gladwell really is considered a social scientist. The presence
of Gladwell and his kind of m premature, his stamp
of approval on this book really goes a long way
in terms of giving the thing some legitimacy in my mind,

(13:12):
and really some gravitas. What I loved is that the
kind of thrust of what Gladwell is saying is that
Wilsmmons is very lucky because his job is to consume
sports and then write about sports. And what I loved
is that when we get to the end of Gladwell's forward,
the last couple words are lucky bastard. So I love

(13:33):
a good callback. I am not really sure if maybe
Gladwell read his preface and you know, had the word
bastard just kind of floating around in his brain, but
I really liked the symmetry of it. Okay, we're now
going to dive into the actual text itself. I am
kind of famous for skipping over chapter titles, and I
was about to just skip over that one and just
like dive right into the introductory paragraph. But I will

(13:56):
take a second to say that Simmons is really pretty
good at these chapter titles. This is the prologue. It
is called a four dollars ticket when we have a
four dollar ticket. Yes, it has to do with basketball,
but that it also sort of tips us off that
we're going to be talking about a bygone era, certainly,
and about a very specific moment. And here is that moment.

(14:16):
During the summer of nineteen seventy three, with Watergate unfolding
and Willie Mays redefining the phrase stick a fork in him.
My father was wavering between a new motorcycle and a
single season ticket for the Celtics. The IRS had just
given him a significant income tax refund of either two
hundred dollars the figure Dad remembers, or six hundred dollars

(14:38):
the figure my mother remembers. They both agree on one thing.
Mom threatened to leave him if he bought the motorcycle.
So I love this first paragraph. What is happening here
is subtle in some ways and incredibly engaging. We have
picked up a book that we expect to be kind
of an encyclopedia, and instead we're being invited into this
very intimate moment for of marital discord, but one that

(15:02):
is situating us really precisely. It's really well done because
we have the broader historical moment, and we have some
stakes here that are kind of high stakes. I mean,
they're not really high stakes, but a decision is being made.
This entire book rested on the fact that Bill Simmons'
father made one particular decision at one moment in time.
The other thing that's happening here, which is really important,

(15:25):
is we are seeing front and center an example of
the American dream. During my Gatsby lecture, which was slightly
more literary than this one, we did a lot of
thinking about the American dream. I am someone who really
has problems with the American dream. I'm always kind of
wondering what the Scandinavian dream is all about, because in
many ways it seems less consumerist and less individualist, and

(15:47):
more compassionate and perhaps more simple. But for better or
for worse, this is the American dream, and we are
getting a sense of it. I will also tell you,
on a more personal note, that it was very interesting
for me the fact that Bill Simmons and bil Chishm
have the same first name. There were a couple of
times where Simmons refers to himself as Billy in these
very early years, and it was an uncanny experience for me,

(16:10):
because honestly, maya husband Bill wishes he had these experiences.
Maya husband Bill. Not to make this too personal, but
his household situation was such that once a year he
got to go to the Celtics game, usually on his birthday,
and had those seats which I can't even quite I mean,
I can't imagine this, but it seems kind of crazy,
the seats where you're right behind like a pole, so

(16:32):
you have kind of an obstructed view of the whole thing.
I know, it's very clear here that Bill Simmons's father
kind of stumbled into these In this incredible bargain, we
find out in the very next paragraph that at this moment,
Bill Simmons's dad was working as a teacher at a
girls' school and putting himself through law school at night,
and also bartending. In fact, we have all of these

(16:53):
long and kind of interesting constructions in terms of sentences,
and then we have a very definitive and succinct appraisal
of the father's life, which is his life sucked. We're
not going to solve too deeply into the pros, but
I will say that one of the things that that
does his life sucked is introduced a tone in the
whole thing which is very appealing because it's very chatty

(17:15):
while also being relatively outspoken. So we have this moment
where Bill Simmons's dad is going to change the course
of young Billy's life. And then we move on to
the next page of the text and we come to
one of my favorite parts, one of my favorite aspects
of this book, which is when Bil Simmons describes these
seats as close enough to see the growing bald spot

(17:35):
on Kareem's head. Then he has a footnote. There's a
little footnote number one, and when you go down to
the bottom of the footnote, it says, that's the first
of about three hundred unprovoked shots at Kareem in this book,
just warning you Kareem was a ninny. So when I
read that, what I wanted it to say is that's
the first of about three hundred unprovoked footnotes. I am

(17:58):
a total sucker for a footnote. This is not some
sort of academic tone. The footnotes are this excellent way
to both elevate the book but also to make the
reader feel like they are on the inside. There is
nothing like a footnote. There's nothing like a footnote to
sort of flatter the person who is holding the text
into thinking that we are going deeper, we're going to

(18:19):
get sort of the true story or a more fuller understanding,
and plenty of people are going to skip them. So
for people who actually read the footnotes, they are doubly satisfying.
He's very good at footnotes. I think Gladwell mentions that,
and I would concur But what's amazing about a first
person narration like this, and one that is so personable,
one that begins in childhood that moves through adolescence, is

(18:42):
that there are lots and lots of opportunities for you
to have those uncanny moments of remembering different things that
were happening, whether they were in basketball or in popular culture,
and that is one of the reasons why this all
works so well. I will say that maybe my favorite
moment in the entire book, which this is really showing
my true colors, was the time on pages ninety six

(19:03):
and seven when Simmons equates Michael Jordan's baseball career to
the moment in Friday Night Lights when Tyra and Landry
kill Tyra's stalker. If this book the Book of Basketball
helped me understand the ardent nature of the Boston Celtics fan.
Friday Night Lights was an even more vivid and even

(19:23):
more satisfying way for me to really understand anyone's devotion
to sports. So we're going to move through a little
bit more quickly now. I'm essentially just going to tell
you some cons. There were definitely some things about this
book that we're not working particularly well for me, and
then a couple of the things that I really enjoyed
the most. I will say that this book is not
a feminist treatise. There is so much stuff where I

(19:45):
just in my marginalia I have like ew like lots
of ease and lots of w's and exclamation marks. There
is a discussion about the way I mean throughout the
discussion about the way women look about their bodies. It's
not great. Porn comes up, like probably a predictable amount
of time, but like a lot, a lot, a lot
in this book, and not in a way that I
can get behind. I am definitely someone who's like very woke,

(20:07):
and I'm certainly a feminist, and I did not like
those parts of the book. But I am also someone
who understands that a writer is writing for an audience,
and I am certainly someone who understands that. In memoir
you are often going to have things about a person
that you find maybe not like reprehensible, but the best
biography is really going to show you all of a
person and a lot of the objectification of women. In

(20:30):
this book, a lot of it. Very banntery was not
something that I loved. I also got kind of uncomfortable
at the point when, and you have to remember this
book is two thousand and eight, twenty ten, the part
where Bill Simmons mentioned his own racial identity crisis, the
time when he wanted everyone to call him Jamal. I
think a lot of people might find that charming. I
just was like a little cringed. I also really didn't

(20:51):
like it when he said that how much he loves
saying san Fran sanfram makes me want to just die. Actually, no,
Frisco makes me want to die san Fran. This is
like a close second. I just it just nails on
a chalkboard. I also these days do not love the kids.
The young people are all saying the Bay like I'm
from the Bay, as in the Bay Area, which I

(21:14):
don't know, as in Massachusetts, you know as the Bay State.
That might reb you wrong too, but I don't love
the Bay I mean, he's like, oh my god, it's
such a pain to say San Francisco, and I'm like, really,
those extra two syllables are that taxing? So that was
not my favorite part those things though, and honestly, like
the anti feminist stuff was actually pretty large, but it

(21:34):
was outweighed by the things that I really liked in
the book. One of the things that was the best
for me, and this doesn't apply to many people who
would read this book, is that I loved the way
that I learned some new vocabulary. I also had a
lot of things like demystified for me, we would have
I have in my notes here bricked home, bricked hom
a running banker, So that is something like I know

(21:55):
what a bank shot is. I know what a brick is,
although bricked home, see I don't understan and that there
are enough context clues for the most part that I
was able to figure out a lot of stuff, these
terms that just don't make much sense to me. So
I felt like I was really like learning the language
of basketball. Although literally bricked home a running banker, like
did he make that shot or not, I'm not sure. Regardless,

(22:18):
I loved the idea that when a memoirist uses a
lot of terms of art, like just like the language
of basketball, it can be very flattering for a reader.
And again, most readers probably know all of this stuff,
but if you are someone who knows all of those
terms of art, you also get a sense of the
legitimacy of the author and also like a little sense
that you're all speaking the same language, which can be

(22:40):
very compelling. I also loved seeing all of these names
written out. Obviously I would see all the last names
on the jerseys, but I had no idea like that
lift shremped d E t l e F. That is
not the way I would have I don't know I
would have thrown in a pH somewhere. I just was like,
oh my god, that's how you spelled that lift. I
loved seeing Amari's apostrophe. Did not know that Amari had

(23:02):
like an apostrophe there. I didn't know that Greg Popovich
had that extra g. There really was something about all
the names that I found totally enchanting. I also really
liked the idea that everyone says, Chris Paul, you don't
just say, Paul, which is a point that Simmons makes,
probably in a footnote, but it really resonated with me.
I loved learning about the history of the game, and

(23:22):
of course, as someone who really believes in democracy, I
loved learning about the sit down strike. I loved hearing
about all of the ways that these NBA players were
standing up for themselves and all the ways that the
NBA really sought in many ways to take care of
their players. And as I mentioned in the beginning, I
also really even liked the rankings. We got to the

(23:43):
rankings and I was like, oh gosh, this is going
to be when I'm going to kind of tune out.
I was planning on doing a lot of skimming, and
I actually did. I mean, I skipped a lot of players,
which I welcome you to do as well. But I
was really surprised that the kind of warmth and the
level of detail and the kind of compelling nature of
the prose was really found even in some of these
descriptions of the players, and a lot of them, I

(24:05):
found myself reading the sort of unpredictable ones. Obviously, I
read like Haavlichek and I read bird Bill Russell. But
I also I read the John Stockton one and the
only reason I checked that out was because of the
Kendrick Lamar song. I loved ray Allan. So Raylan has
a son who has type one diabetes. We have a
son who has type one diabetes. One of the most
magical moments at a Celtics game, our son was there

(24:27):
with Bill. Ray Allan's mom was sitting in the stands
and our son was checking his blood glucose with his
blood glucose monitor, and Ray's mom came over and just
had a moment of communion with someone who really understands
how absolutely horrific it is to have to manage type
one diabetes. I also met Raylan thanks to type one diabetes.
I used to be very involved with Breakthrough T one D,

(24:50):
which was known as JDRF back then, and they had
this children's congress where they would send the kids to Washington.
It was incredibly inspirational. But one of the highlights of
the the whole thing is that Will and I knew
that we were going to meet ray Allen. And let
me tell you, that was the first time that I
met a basketball player like up close, and I thought
I was gonna faint. You get that weird kind of like,
oh my god, wait, this is like someone from television.

(25:12):
Not to mention the fact that he was so so tall,
and still to this day I get a little lightheaded,
like a little like woozy. And that was the first
time with Raylan, so I really enjoyed reading about his history.
That was also like one of the first times when
I was really invested because all of our kids were
becoming totally fanatical and we did not miss a game.
I also read the Shack one. I read the Paul

(25:33):
Pierce one. Paul Pierce is an absolute legend in our household.
Our youngest son has one of those fat head decals
on his wall, and we actually we had our house
painted the inside of the house last summer, and the
painters were like, hey, is it cool if we take
this down? Like, can you just get another one? And
I was shook because obviously I I could not get

(25:53):
another one. That thing is like fifteen years old and
they literally had to paint around it. My other maybe
favorite moment of televised basketball I just I could not
get over this. I still can't get over it was
when Ron our test during some sort of post game.
It was like a very big game because it was
very heightened to kind of interview. The interviewer came over
and wanted to talk to him about the game, and

(26:15):
the first thing he said is like, hold on, the
first thing I have to do here is think my psychiatrist.
I am someone who is a huge proponent of being
upfront about whatever help you're getting, whatever medications you're taking.
And I just was like, oh my god, our test
just like really took one giant step forward for normalizing
any sort of psychopharmacology. But what I was going to

(26:37):
say is that this is a good time to talk
about KG. So Kevin Garnett is one of my absolute
favorite players, and what this book did in reading like
the ranking of him later in the triangle, this is
so bad. I can't remember if he's in the pantheon.
I don't know, I see. I also don't have a
great memory. You guys all know that a lot of
this information is going to be lost, But what's not

(26:59):
going to be lost the feeling that I have about
some of these people. What happened in this section about
Kevin Garnett is that Bill Simmons explained to me why
it is that I love that man so much. He
talked about him as the spiritual leader of the team.
He talked about how he brought up all those youngsters
I think. I said to my family, I'm like, I
think it was like Rondo and Avery Bradley, And then
I was like, is that even were they even on

(27:20):
the team? At the same time, they did actually confirm that.
Simmons also said something about how KG did something nice
for like beleaguered Doc Rivers. These are the kinds of
things that will stick in my mind. But the real
gift of this book is that a lot of the
ways that you feel about certain people can be even
deepened and even explained to you in a way that
I found incredibly satisfying. So the last thing and the

(27:42):
place where we will end is the emphasis that Bill
Simmons put on the Secret. I am going to say
that in some darker moments, my husband Bill has been like,
you know, if I keel over like it's you, like
it's in your lap, Which I totally laugh about that
because I'm like, I would dead. That would be a
hot potato man. I'd be handing that off to someone
lickety split. But I literally said to him the other day.

(28:05):
I was like, now I think I could do it.
I think I could do it. Bill Simmons explained to
me the secret, and now I think I could do it. Honestly,
just then, I have the impulse to not tell you
what Bill Simmons claims is the secret to successful basketball.
But that would be so mean. That would be so
mean if you had to then go figure out what
the secret was. And now I'm actually really worried that
I'm not going to get this right. What I will

(28:26):
say is that the secret was so compelling. The secret,
as you might have guessed, is that team always has
to come over players. Players have to be realistic about
who they are, they have to like their role on
the team. They have to be entirely and completely about
winning and putting their team in the best position to win.
I'm not actually someone who's that competitive, So actually I
don't think I could do this thing. But it absolutely

(28:49):
rangs so true to me, this idea that team must
come over individual, and I loved that so much of
the book was really spent in thinking through all of
the nuance of this secret. So that seems like a
pretty good place to stop. I imagine that a lot
of you are new people to the foxed page. The
Book of Basketball is not kind of our normal fair

(29:10):
if you have made it all the way to the
end of this podcast or if you are at the
end of the YouTube lecture, I want to thank you
for sticking with me and really just want to thank
you for tuning in in the first place. So whether
you're paying close attention and deepening your reading experience of
this or any other book, I will say that reading
is important. Reading is necessary. It is not indulgent. So

(29:32):
thanks so much for tuning in. Happy reading,