Values of the Game

As the Presidential run heats up with the start of the primary season in New Hampshire on February 2, the attention to the candidates and their issues will become even more intense.??Values of the Game is an ideal book to understand Bill Bradley, the man and the candidate.??The values that Bill speaks of so frequently during his campaign speeches are reflected in Values of the Game--responsibility, discipline, passion, selflessness and respect.

Bill Bradley, candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination for 2000, former U.S. senator from New Jersey from 1979 to 1997, and a member of two championship New York Knicks teams, returns to the scene of his first career and his first great passion, basketball.

Things have changed since Bradley's championship days, but what separates winners and losers remains very much the same: No collection of players, no matter how good, can win unless they form a team. And no team can succeed unless it shares common values, among them courage, discipline, resilience, respect, and an unmitigated passion for the game. In this highly acclaimed and bestselling book, Bill Bradley offers his vision for how the principles he developed playing basketball can be applied to everyday life, be it at the office, at home, in public life--indeed, in any situation where values matter.

In ten essays, filled with intensely personal observations and reflections, Bradley revisits the basketball court with the fire of the competitor and the eye of the writer and explores these qualities in action: the dynamics of teammates on the court and off, the individual courage to risk the last-second shot, the responsibility to teammates, coaches, and fans to stay in shape, play hard, and honor the game. Values of the Game is one man's vision for a better world, and is a lasting statement of principle and commitment from one of our country's finest leaders.

Forget for a moment the hype, the overmarketing, the exorbitant ticket prices and salaries, the bad behavior, and the greed. Instead, return to the simple basics of basketball: a court, a hoop, a ball, and a young shooter, sweating to make certain that no one is ever more prepared or confident when the game is on the line. Strip all else away, and you come to the core of the game. It's something of a sacred place for Bill Bradley, and after a decade in the NBA and three terms in the United States Senate, it's a place he revisits with real ardor and reverence in 10 gracefully illustrated essays that cohere into a marvelous reflection on essentials and values.

"The game is still full of joy and the lessons learned from it stay with you," he insists, "even though the game has changed, the old values still flow through it." The values he writes about may indeed seem antique beside the frenzied glitz of the NBA, but antiques like passion, discipline, selflessness, and responsibility continue to form the basis of character on and off the court. Of course, Bradley, with possible eyes on the White House, is writing about much more than basketball here. In some ways, this is a clear statement of his political philosophy: a country that can understand, instill, and pursue the values he's praising is a country that can work together. It's in these values that he finds the antidote to the tawdriness and partisanship that's managed to sully the level of the national debate. --Jeff Silverman