Renowned NFL analysts' tips to make football more accessible, colorful, and compelling than ever before More and more football fans are watching the NFL each week, but many of them don't know exactly what they should be watching. What does the offense's formation tell you about the play that's about to be run? When a quarterback throws a pass toward the sideline and the wide receiver cuts inside, which player is to blame? Why does a defensive end look like a Hall of Famer one week and a candidate for the practice squad the next? These questions and more are addressed in Take Your Eye Off the Ball 2.0, a book that takes readers deep inside the perpetual chess match between offense and defense. This book provides clear and simple explanations to the intricacies and nuances that affect the outcomes of every NFL game. This updated edition contains recent innovations from the 2015 NFL season.
"Keep your eye on the ball!" may be good advice--but it is impossible to do. The batter can track the ball until it is about five feet in front of the plate, but then he falls behind because the ball is moving too fast. In Keep Your Eye on the Ball, Robert G. Watts and A. Terry Bahill--engineers by vocation, baseball fans by avocation--have devised a series of experiments that put some of baseball's most cherished myths to the test. By applying physics, psychology, physiology, and other scientific principles to baseball, the authors have resolved, once and for all, some of the controversial issues that have intrigued fans for decades, including: * Do curveballs really curve? Do fastballs rise? * How do knuckleballs and spitballs work? * What exactly happens when the ball hits the bat? * Does corking the bat really help a hitter? * Are aluminum bats more dangerous than wooden bats? * Can certain physiological factors help predict success for a hitter? * Why are more home runs being hit than ever before? * Are today's players better than yesterday's? Completely revised and updated to include recent statistics, new research, and additional historical commentary, Keep Your Eye on the Ball is a highly informative and entertaining guide to the science of baseball that all fans of the game--regardless of scientific background--will enjoy.
"Considered the bible of scouting techniques" according to the Los Angeles Times, Football Scouting Methods explains the basic scouting strategies and insights of author Steve Belichick. He was widely viewed as the ablest football scout of his time and coached at the U.S. Naval Academy for 33 years; his son is New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick, a three-time Super Bowl winner. When Steve Belichick died in November 2005, the New York Times headline cited him as "Coach Who Wrote the Book on Scouting," and quoted Houston Texans General Manager Charley Casserly calling Football Scouting Methods "the best book on scouting he had ever read." Joe Bellino, Navy's Heisman Trophy winner in 1960, told the Times that Steve Belichick "was a genius. On Monday nights, he would give us his scouting reports, and even though we were playing powerhouses, I always felt we were prepared because he found a way for us to win." In recent years Football Scouting Methods has been one of the top ten most sought out-of-print books; used copies have been quite scarce. This reissue edition makes the original 1962 text available once again in exact facsimile. The book covers how to scout opponents, recognize defenses, analyze offenses, discover "tip-offs" that reveal the opponent's plays, compose a useful report, self-scout, and conduct postgame analysis. "Steve Belichick taught many younger men how to scout and how to watch film and how to prepare their teams for the next week's game," David Halberstam noted in the Washington Post, and his best student was his own son Bill Belichick, "one of whose greatest skills as a coach to this day remains his ability to analyze other teams, figuring out both their strengths and their vulnerabilities, and shrewdly deciding how to take away from them that which they most want to do." When CBS asked Bill Belichick to name his favorite book, he replied "Well, I've got to go with my dad's. Football Scouting Methods. I'd have to go with that."
If necessity has been the mother of invention throughout the history of professional football, it could also be said that desperation is the father. Rare are the football innovations that have occurred without an owner, general manager, coach, or player up against the wall and reaching for a way to succeed anyway. In this meticulously researched, lively book, Bleacher Report lead NFL scout Doug Farrar traces the schematic history of the pro game through these "if this/then that" moments—paradigm shifts in the game from 1920 through the present. More than just a book about schemes and strategies, The Genius of Desperation: The Schematic Innovations that Made the Modern NFL also tells the stories of the game's most prominent innovators, the adversities they endured, and the ways in which they learned to exceed their own expectations on the path to true greatness. Everyone from George Halas to Greasy Neale, Paul Brown to Sid Gillman, Bill Walsh to Chip Kelly is featured, as well as many more. The Genius of Desperation is a narrative arc through the history of the game as it's never been told before.
NFL coaching legend Bill Walsh offers his unique blueprint and conceptual insights for coaches at all levels of play. Among the topics covered in this comprehensive 560-page, hardcover book are: Understanding the role of head coach; Strategies and tactics for dealing with a highly competitive adversary; Designing a winning game plan; Organising the staff; The importance of being able to focus and concentrate; Evaluating players; Game-day responsibilities; And much, much more.
Make workplace conflict resolution a game that EVERYBODY wins! Recent studies show that typical managers devote more than a quarter of their time to resolving coworker disputes. The Big Book of Conflict-Resolution Games offers a wealth of activities and exercises for groups of any size that let you manage your business (instead of managing personalities). Part of the acclaimed, bestselling Big Books series, this guide offers step-by-step directions and customizable tools that empower you to heal rifts arising from ineffective communication, cultural/personality clashes, and other specific problem areas—before they affect your organization's bottom line. Let The Big Book of Conflict-Resolution Games help you to: Build trust Foster morale Improve processes Overcome diversity issues And more Dozens of physical and verbal activities help create a safe environment for teams to explore several common forms of conflict—and their resolution. Inexpensive, easy-to-implement, and proved effective at Fortune 500 corporations and mom-and-pop businesses alike, the exercises in The Big Book of Conflict-Resolution Games delivers everything you need to make your workplace more efficient, effective, and engaged.
Are you ready for some football? New stadiums have been built, new stars have been born, and records have been broken since the last edition of Football For Dummies. This new edition is the fan's ultimate, up-to-date guide to all things pigskin. Perfect for new and veteran fans of the sport alike, it covers everything you need to be the most knowledgeable spectator in the stadium. With deep explanations of every position, analysis of offense and defense, and detailed strategies for play, football legend Howie Long and established analyst John Czarnecki present the nuts and bolts of football for fans of all ages and experiences. Tackle football basics and enjoy America’s favorite sport Grasp the rules and regulations, positions, plays, and penalties Appreciate the different aspects of the game at the professional and college levels Learn about the latest NFL stadium technologies Football For Dummies has something to offer fans of all ages, from peewees to the pros and everything between.
Masterfully blending thought provoking analysis with engrossing storytelling, The Art of Smart Football examines football's most innovative and enduring strategies and ideas, through the lens of the sport's best coaches and players. The Art of Smart Football is an eye-opening, fascinating and accessible contribution to our understanding of America's favorite sport. The Art of Smart Football features analysis of football's top strategists and schemes, including: Pete Carroll's aggressive defense Chip Kelly's spread offense and new-school methods The roots of Bill Belichick's defensive genius Gus Malzahn's up-tempo offense The strategies Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, and Aaron Rodgers use to shred defenses Art Briles and Baylor's wide open attack Nick Saban's defensive evolution The book also includes explorations of the newest trends in football, including "packaged plays" that combine runs and passes into one play, "pattern match" defenses that blend man-to-man and zone pass coverages, how defenses are responding to the spread offense, and much more. Praise for The Art of Smart Football: "The Art of Smart Football made me a smarter football writer . . . Football, as presented by these coaches and by Brown, is such an imaginative game. It's a great read: Go buy it." -- Peter King, The MMQB/Sports Illustrated "A must read if you are a football junkie." -- Trent Dilfer, ESPN/13-year NFL Veteran Quarterback "The best analysis in the game today." -- Rolling Stone "Awesome stuff. I recommend The Art of Smart Football to any coach or fan." -- Matt Bowen, ESPN Columnist/NFL Veteran "When Chris B. Brown releases a book, you should buy it." -- Bill Barnwell, Grantland/ESPN "A deep dive into football. Highly recommended." -- Field Yates, ESPN "The Art of Smart Football is a perfect read for anyone looking to take their knowledge of the game up a notch." -- ElevenWarriors.com
