Hit up TarheelDaily, or scroll on down to the article. After you check it out, email me if you want to discuss my opinions. This fall, I will also appear on WXYC FM 89.3 Chapel Hill for Sunday Night SportsRap, Sundays 9-10PM and my weekly music show, which can be heard at www.wxyc.org.. Enjoy the article.....BD

Summer Reading 2004 .

Bret Dougherty checked in with legendary sportswriter and author David Halberstam in New York City this week. With that meeting as inspiration, Bret presents his picks for 'required summer reading' to kick off your Memorial Day Weekend. Enjoy the list...

May 28, 2004

On Wednesday, I jumped on the two wheels and pedaled up to 59th St. in New York City for a book reading at the Time Warner Center of "The Teammates" by David Halberstam.

After Halberstam's reading, I talked a little while with the man who could arguably be called the greatest sportswriter of the last forty years. During our conversation, I brought up a couple of stories that he told about Carolina basketball from his phenomenal book, 'Playing For Keeps', which chronicles the rise and fall of Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls-- ( yes, this book is the end-all and be-all on the story of Mike, so keep reading...)

My discussion with Halberstam made me think about a list that I not only have posted on my website, but also to one of the most avid basketball email groups in the country, "HeelHoops", which is detailed in a great book called 'More Than Just a Game,' written by fellow UNC Athletics writer Thad Williamson...Believe me, if you're on the list, you're down like Cannonball Adderley's "In-Crowd"...

So, with Memorial Day Weekend as the official kickoff weekend of the summer, I thought I would share my book list with everybody to give some reading suggestions for beach, lakehouse, cabin, or cafe use over the next few months. After you're done with these reads, be sure to email your book reports or opinions to me at: bretd@email.unc.edu.

Also, if you want to check out more of my visit with Halberstam, I invite you to visit my blog, "The IronDog Chronicles." Until then, here's my 'starting five'...

5) 'PICKUP ARTISTS; STREET BASKETBALL IN AMERICA' by Lars Anderson and Chad Millman

This one is a true underground read. You can feel the blacktop heat coming through the bottom of your "Chucks" on this one. This book brings it upcourt from the Cousys and the McGuires to Joe Hammond of the Rucker League, and then brings it back over to the Lloyd Daniels-Booger Smith era of playground hoops. After that bucket, the book kicks it out like a Perkins outlet pass to the rise of Nike and Sonny Vaccarro, and the NYC powerhouse AAU programs of the Riverside Hawks (Carolina Alums: Smith, Doherty, Reese, Sullivan, Stack) and the Bronx Gauchos.

Great stories on basketball legends in Chicago and LA...(If you're in LA, drop John Staggers name around Venice Beach and sit back and listen). This book is not only a solid read on how basketball influences our urban cities and culture, but it is also touches on what "ball" means to society in the streets of America.

4) "A COACH'S LIFE", by Dean Smith

If I hadn't put this one in the starting five, most of the readers here at TarheelDaily, would probably hang me in effigy. If you haven't read this yet, I'm going to yell "Get a Job!!" at you like Mookie on that hot Brooklyn summer day fifteen years ago...

C'mon, if you're a Carolina fan, this is an easy one to knock down. If you have read it, you can't tell me that Coach Smith didn't take his memoirs to the next level with the additional chapter in the paperback issue that explains his side on the whole 2000 fiasco.

Smith's detailed descriptions of his relationships with UNC chancellors, players, teammates, and fellow coaches are all here. Personally, I would have liked a little more juice and more stories about Frank McGuire, but hey, that's my Irish Catholic basketball mind talking. Honestly, when I throw this one in the top five, my love of Carolina has a big influence on this pick.

( If I were to replace "A Coach's Life", I might insert Halberstam's "Breaks of the Game" or "Foul, The Connie Hawkins Story" by David Wolf. If you've already read Coach Smith's book, you could choose one of those two as your 6th Man. If not, go with "A Coach's Life"...it's time, you joined the club. )

3) LIFE ON THE RUN, by Bill Bradley

I picked this one up while traveling the West, and I could not put it down...this is an awesome diary read about life on the road in the NBA with the '73 Championship Knicks. Bradley has a great mind. It's just a damn shame that he doesn't speak well in public-- he's truly a good human being...

This book should be a required reading for either an NBA rookie before he sees his first paycheck, or for a college sociology course. Bradley brings out a lot of his opinions on race relations in the States during the early 70's. The depictions of his airport bar discussions with colorful characters such as "Clyde", Jerry Lucas, Phil Jackson, "The Pearl", and DeBusschere are priceless...Now that Knick team was a team...

By the way, Bradley's book is one of former Carolina basketball player and Morehead scholar Will Johnson's favorites as well...(Will we ever see that Morehead/basketball player combo ever again at Carolina?)...If you're a big traveler, hit this up. You'll relate to the old-school way these guys moved about the country and interacted. It shows how basketball can work as a tool to bring EVERYONE together.

2) PLAYING FOR KEEPS, by David Halberstam

If you have even a bit of Carolina blue in your blood, this is it..."D up on it". This book is the definitive account of the "BLACK CAT" a.k.a. Mike, MJ, Michael, Money, Jumpman...Aw hell,...after reading this, every time a 'SportsCentury' special or a 'Come Fly with Me' video flickers on, you will be able to focus solely on the highlights because you'll know the whole real deal...Man, I hate the "Two Jerrys"!!

And if you are an official Carolina Basketball School alum, this book is sure to bring back some great memories. You'll smile when you read about how Coach Smith pulled Mike to the Hill. Halberstam really nails some great interviews in the book. There's a great story from Coach Williams on the "Jordan Stove", which you'll be able to tell at any cocktail or tailgate party over and over...For all of you 80's alums out there, you have to jump on this fun read.

1). HEAVEN IS A PLAYGROUND, by Rick Telander

For me, any favorite book list will always begin and end with this title. I'll never forget the day I copped this book at the age of twelve. I let a friend borrow it for his ride up to HarlemWeek a couple of years later, and I never saw it again...That one hurt...

Some people had Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, I had Fly Williams and Albert King. This book hit me so hard that I scribbled Fly all over my notebooks and school lockers for years to come...

Basketball in Brooklyn during the Summer of 74...Telander gives you seat on a park bench to view what goes down in Foster Park and in Brooklyn playground life in the mid-70s. During the same summer, Telander also wrote several articles in 'Sports Illustrated' about Tiny Archibald and other players returning to New York from college and pro basketball. After reading this one, you'll realize that the bad and beautiful things about basketball haven't changed so much in thirty years.

During my senior year I spotted Telander at a UNC-Georgia Tech game at the "SAC/Smith Center" standing at a mid-court seat with Jerry "Fat-@$$" Krause. I approached them at halftime, and "Fat @$$" rolled his eyes with a "go eat &%$#" look...He must have pegged me as another student about to give him a tip to draft George Lynch, or I was about to bust out a potential deal on how he could package Will Perdue and Stacey King for Tim Kempton and a boiled hot dog...

But I went straight up to Telander, and I told him how much his book opened my eyes to another world outside of North Carolina. While "Fat @$$" crossed his arms and kept poking his five chins into the conversation, Telander talked with me a bit, and oddly enough, took down my Chapel Hill address because he wanted to send me something. I then left both of them alone at the half, and went back to my seat.

Three days later I received a package that contained a copy of the book inscribed: "Bret....For the Love of Hoops" -- Rick Telander.

Enjoy your Summer Reads and Support Independent Booksellers,

BD

Bret Dougherty is a UNC-Chapel Hill alum and current graduate student at UNC-Chapel Hill. Bret will be residing in New York City until August, and he will be away from his role as host of WXYC FM 89.3 SportsRap this summer. Check out his times in NYC and his Lower Manhattan sights at his blog "The IronDog Chronicles", which can be reached from his website www.unc.edu/~bretd. Feel free to contact him at bret.dougherty@onebox.com.

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