T3I Book Recommendation: Dream Team

Image: Amazon.com

If you're coming to a blog p brought to you by a bunch of idiots looking for reading recommendations, well you might want to question who you turn to for literary advice.

However for the loyal readers of this blog looking for a good read to get you ready for the Olympics, check out Jack McCallum's  Dream Team.   NBA TV recently commemorated the 20th anniversary of this team's romp through Barcelona with a great two-hour documentary which if you haven't seen yet, you need to.

Writing about the NBA certainly isn't something I feel comfortable doing.  To set the stage, I'm pushing 40 years old and my current view of professional basketball is shaped by these tenets (insert a grumpy old man voice for added effect):

* The NBA peaked in terms of talent, watchability, and it's general level of being FANtastic, in the late '80s and early '90s.

* The debate over the '92 vs. '12 team doesn't exist.  The '92 team wins, every time.

* I find the current NBA product generally unwatchable.

For those fellow hoops fans who grew up with '80s basketball, this book is for you.  Jack gives a great background on the political play the led to inclusion of NBA professionals in the Olympics.  Further  drama plays out in the story of the selection process which included the passing over of Isaiah Thomas.

The most enjoyable takeaway for me was the blow by blow account of "The Greatest Game Ever Played", a split squad scrimmage featuring Michael Jordan's white team versus Magic Johnson's blue squad.  Zapruder-quality footage of the scrimmage is shown in the NBA TV documentary.  McCallum's account takes me back to the trash-talking and the heated intensity that anyone who has played the game knows so well.  That chapter in itself is worth the price alone.

Some other points of interest:

*  How close a certain Detroit Piston, other than Isaiah, was to making that team

*  How the Dream Team lost to a group of college all-stars

* The hilariousness that George Karl campaigned for the head coaching gig

Fans of '80s basketball, give this a read.  

(Another Old Man Alert) To the kids who think Lebron is better than MJ: