Jumat, 07 Januari 2011

Pride goeth before a fall

American Icon Clemens Steroids Americas

American Icon Clemens Steroids Americas

American Icon is a terrific piece of team investigative journalism on the steroid (codeword: "B-12") era in professional sports and the sad demise of the reputation of pitcher Roger Clemens. Whether or not Clemens perjured himself before Congress, he emerges in this fast-paced indictment as a liar, a womanizer, and a bully travelling in the guise of a Cy Young Award winning hurler. Clemens appears to have used steroids and HGH on numerous occasions, resulting in his middle-age bulked-up comeback on the mound. This fine book paints a sad picture of how the desire to win at all costs and to be a sports hero forever collided with the relentless process of aging, poignant in the case of a fatherless boy who grew up in the Texas culture of sports, body building, and then steroid trafficking. A bit long and repetitive, yes, we know the story from the sports pages, but a fabulous investigation of an American sports tragedy. Buy it, read it and weep.

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8 komentar:

  1. American Icon is a compelling read, and I'm not even a baseball fan. The authors have taken thousands of pages of court documents, emails, their own notes, etc., and created a piece of non-fiction that reads like a thriller. Every page is laden with facts, and their writing brings the characters to life. It's easy to see how and why performance-enhancing drugs have polluted not just baseball but other big-money sports as well. Kudos to the authors for pulling this work together and making it highly readable.

    BalasHapus
  2. With the same precision and power that Clemens delivered his pitches - albeit enhanced at times, it turns out - these writers serve up a phenomenal amount of information and indisputable evidence in this must-read book. They do so, however, without the juice... just the hard facts and good clean writing. Get it. Get into it.

    BalasHapus
  3. It's hard to overestimate the devastation you feel when your childhood idol is destroyed methodically by a team of journalists who combine the careful reporting of Seymour Hersh with the narrative zeal of Buzz Bissinger. I don't know whether to resent the authors or admire them, but all I can say to anyone interested in baseball, steroids, or the ever-evolving idea of American Hubris is: read this book.

    BalasHapus
  4. American Icon is a terrific piece of team investigative journalism on the steroid (codeword: "B-12") era in professional sports and the sad demise of the reputation of pitcher Roger Clemens. Whether or not Clemens perjured himself before Congress, he emerges in this fast-paced indictment as a liar, a womanizer, and a bully travelling in the guise of a Cy Young Award winning hurler. Clemens appears to have used steroids and HGH on numerous occasions, resulting in his middle-age bulked-up comeback on the mound. This fine book paints a sad picture of how the desire to win at all costs and to be a sports hero forever collided with the relentless process of aging, poignant in the case of a fatherless boy who grew up in the Texas culture of sports, body building, and then steroid trafficking. A bit long and repetitive, yes, we know the story from the sports pages, but a fabulous investigation of an American sports tragedy. Buy it, read it and weep.

    BalasHapus
  5. This is a splendid piece of work. The portrait of Clemens that emerges is itself captivating: the writers offer a detailed, patient, wonderfully human account of how the very things that made the man so indisputably great on the hill - willfulness, absolute indomitability - led to his spectacular public undoing. But what is to me even more gripping in the book is the legal and procedural story it unfolds, about precisely how steroids came to be the object of so much political and legal scrutiny in the first place. It's a story that spans more than a decade, criss-crosses the country, is filled astounding intricacy and intrigue, and features a series of vibrant, wonderfully-drawn characters. If you want to the richest backstory, not just on Clemens, but on the history and ongoing place of steroids in baseball, you must get hold of this book.

    BalasHapus
  6. A great book! follow the fall of one of greatest pitchers in baseball history. A man that believed in the power of his own myth so much the he felt untouchable. The authors go amazing job pulling at fraying edges of Clemens story unraveling the facade to show , the real story behind Roger Clemens. At some points it turns almost comical "the Rocket" reminds me of the black knight form Monty Python and the Holy Grail. refusing to admit his arms were cut off. It is said the light is the best antiseptic, lest hope this book is the beacon that sheds light into all the dark corners of baseball's steroid filled underworld.
    Chuck G. (New Jersey)

    BalasHapus
  7. To conclude that Roger Clemens took steroids and then lied about it does not take the combined talents of the Daily News' Investigative Team long. But the fascinating part of this book--why I kept reading the whole way through--is how exigently they connect the dots, using small details and lengthy court filings to slowly piece together a damning report. Lively writing makes this read like an easy feature magazine article, but the research is evident on each page.

    BalasHapus