About this item
The bestselling author of Sprawlball, Kirk Goldsberry returns with a visual feast of a book - equal parts Book of Basketball and Shea Serrano - that uses sharp writing, his signature graphics, and cutting-edge statistical analyses to unpack how a handful of NBA superstars - MJ to Lebron to Jokic - have reshaped pro basketball and charted the course to the future of the NBA.Every few years a talent comes along that disrupts everything we think we know about how the NBA should work. Whether it's scoring, playmaking, or shooting, these are players and tactics that fundamentally challenge how the game is played and what greatness looks like on a basketball court. For a period of time, these players each become an "Atlas" for the league, carrying the weight of the NBA on their shoulders, but also providing the roadmap that points the way to the future of the sport.
About the Author
I grew up in State College, PA in the 80's and 90's before attending Penn State. After graduating, I worked as a cartographer for FEMA in D.C., and for Delorme Mapping in Yarmouth, Maine. I Ieft Maine for Santa Barbara where I studied mapping as a grad student and met my lovely wife. We have moved around from California, to Michigan, and Massachusetts, before settling down in Austin, Texas. We have 2 children and I spend most of my time either hanging out with them or mapping basketball players.AcademicI studied Geography at Penn State as an undergrad before getting a Master's and a Ph.D. from UC-Santa Barbara. I was an assistant professor at Michigan State from 2007-2011 before accepting a visiting position at Harvard in 2011. My expertise in geography is in mapping and Cartography. I love maps.BasketballIn 2012 I published my first work on basketball analytics at the MIT Sloan Conference. This paper changed my career. Following its publication, I helped create the 2012 NBA Finals Preview at the New York Times, before accepting a part-time position at Grantland, which at the time was just starting. I left Harvard and academics in 2013 and went to work at Grantland full-time, where I stayed until the site was shut down in 2015. At that time, I accepted two jobs on the "team side" - 1) as the head analyst for Team USA Basketball and 2) as the Vice President of Strategic Research for the San Antonio Spurs. I still do work at Team USA, but left the Spurs in September of 2018 to return to writing and teaching.
