Excellent Baseball Trivia Book

Baseball Facts for Kids: Learn About the Greatest Players, Winning Strategies, and Tales of Courage and Mental Toughness in the Game by ALF WRIGHT
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Baseball is perhaps the most popular game after football across the USA. Most kids start playing baseball right from childhood and collecting baseball cards is also a very popular hobby among middle and high schoolers. A deep knowledge of baseball trivia and facts is an asset for kids in this age and adult fans of the game.
I recently came across the book Baseball Facts for Kids by Alf Wright, a 100-page volume which details the achievements of the greatest players, winning strategies of different teams, and some amazing stories of courage and endurance. A lifelong educator and children’s book author Wright’s belief strongly relies on fun for learning. His books combine facts, with reality and humor stories, his goal is to spark curiosity, keep kids engaged and help them see the world in new ways.
Baseball facts for Kids is similarly fun, and interesting in its own way. The introduction is all about the game and its history in brief. “Americans have been playing baseball for years, and its popularity hasn’t slowed down,” explains Wright right at the beginning, emphasizing that baseball is not just a game but an ‘American Tradition’ and spans generations. This book details important details about the game, rules, positions, and how runs are scored. Baseball legends including Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and Willie Mays are featured among the heroes of the sport.
More than just profiles of these heroes, their secrets to success on and off the baseball diamond is detailed in this volume. The book also provides valuable tips on improving your game, getting the right gear, and preparing for success. My personal favorite chapter of this book is the one titled ‘How to stay strong and never give up.’ In this chapter Wright explains the personality traits that get built when playing baseball. “Sports don’t just improve your health and strengthen your body. They also make you a better person,” declares Wright in this chapter while mentioning the traits that make baseball players great. This chapter explains how baseball builds the players personality by inculcating vital qualities such as ambition, confidence, commitment, passion, team work, patience, among others.
I believe this book will be highly beneficial to baseball lovers and others alike. It is a treasure trove of knowledge of the sport and a very useful self-development, motivational book.

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Stories to guide, motivate, and provide insights

Inspiring Baseball GOATs Stories: Amazing Facts and Trivia Questions: The Complete Baseball Gift Book for Kids and Teens, with Life Lessons and Mental Toughness, Courage, & Confidence by Cody Hansen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Stories to guide, motivate, and provide insights

Stories of sporting legends tend to provide inspiration, thrill, and insights to readers, especially younger impressionable minds tend to reap greater benefit from these tales. Baseball is a very popular sport in continental America, and it is almost the rite of passage of every young boy and girl to play ball in high school and/ or college. Then of course there are talented baseball players who turn pro and make a career out of the sport.
Cody Hansen’s Inspiring Baseball GOATs Stories: Amazing Facts and Trivia Questions - The Complete Baseball Gift Book for Kids and Teens, with Life Lessons and Mental Toughness, Courage, & Confidence is a 124-page two-part volume that chronicles this amazing sport and its greatest legends in detail. Starting off with a brief introduction in which Hansen explains the historical significance of Baseball to America. “Baseball has grown to be one of the most popular games on the planet,” gushes Hansen. Giving a brief historical account of the game he continues, “During the Great Depression, baseball served as a common source of hope and distraction for families all over the country. During the Civil Rights Movement, it became a stage upon which the country could grapple with some of its most deep-seated prejudices.”
Each chapter in this book is dedicated to the story of a great baseball legend including Babe Ruth, Jackie Robinson, Lou Gehrig, among others. I do wish the editor/ author had done a better job in organizing the stories in this book. Part one has 11 chapter, each chronicling one famous baseball player; part two details the several famous teams including Boston Red Sox, Chicago Cubs, Cy Youngs, and many more.
The last section, invariably my favorite part of this book details the different challenges faced by the game itself such as advent of artificial turf, indoor stadia, and contains several unlikely stories of baseball legends. Overall this book is a great read for baseball lovers but it can also prove interesting and inspiring to everyone.

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Life lessons from life stories of football GOATs

Inspiring Football Goats Stories: Amazing Facts and Trivia Questions The Complete Football Gift Book for Kids and Teens with Life Lessons and Mental Toughness, Courage and Confidence by Logan Hayes
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Life lessons from life stories of football GOATs
It would not be an overstatement to say that Football is not just a sport in the US, it is part of the national pop culture, part of most people's childhood and youthful memories. Fall and winter seasons don’t pass without people engrossed in following football games of their favorite teams. Teenagers, and college kids are particularly interested in this sport and several dream of playing professionally sometime in their future. “For many Americans all over the country, it’s a way of life,” writes the author in the introduction.
Logan Hayes, a comprehensive 132-page information-rich volume titled Inspiring Football GOATs Stories: Amazing Facts and Trivia Questions. Presented as the complete football gift book for kids and teens, this book is full of facts, stories, trivia, and history of the greatest football legends. A book that provides subtle insights and stories peppered with life lessons on building mental toughness, fortitude, courage, and confidence.
I picked this up to gift it to my nephew, an avid football fan and he was thrilled to read the stories of Joe Montana, Jerry Rice, Josh Allen, Kurt Warner, and a whole bunch of other football legends. My hope is that he will learn some life lessons such as the importance of discipline, consistency, strength, perseverance, etc. The unique feature of this book is that readers tend to imbibe these lessons without even having to try, the stories instill them as they continue reading the life and times of different football players.
I particularly liked the section titled “Incredible Records that Still Stand” in which Hayes details some of the greatest football moments featuring achievements that are yet to be surmounted. Such as the Jerry Rice’s receiving records over his long career spanning two decades. At 40, Rice played for the Raiders and managed to catch 92 passes for 1,211 yards. Did not this incredible feat of Rice.
This book serves as an instant knowledgebase of football trivia, inspirational stories, and life lessons. I’d say a must read for all football fans, not just teenagers and kids, even adults can come away with a few lessons.

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Movie Review: The Waterboy

Cover of The Waterboy [Blu-ray]

Most of Adam Sandler movies I have watched have a different storyline and depict some excellent acting by the leading star. The movie is also centered around one or two characters. This is no exception. Sandler plays the role of a mama's boy, Bobby working as a waterboy for a college football team. He has a bad stammer and is constantly bullied and made fun of by everyone.
At age 31 he still lives with his mother, has never been to a restaurant or dated a girl. He has no interest in college or studying. Once during a practice one of the hunky players spits into the water which makes Sandler angry but he suppresses it. The coach sees this and tells him to stand up for himself. Sandler moves with such force that it surprises everyone on the field and makes the coach plead and beg him to play football.
Of course mama is not happy about Sandler going to college or playing football. Because deep within her mind she is afraid that he is going to abandon her like his father did years ago. She has a tight grip on him which is the reason for his suppression and lack of social skills.
Coach encourages Bobby to give up his role as waterboy and start playing without his mother's knowledge. Bobby concurs and starts playing which turns the fortunes of MudDogs and earns fame and notoriety to Bobby. Meanwhile Bobby runs into an old friend, the girl of his dreams, and takes her home, Mama doesn't like her.
How Bobby manages to obtain his mother's approval to study, play football and marry his romance interest comprises the rest of the movie replete with laughter, gags and fun. It is available on Youtbe free so go ahead and enjoy the movie.

Movie Review: Tooth Fairy

For lack of nothing else to do on Friday evening we decided to go to a movie at the dollar theater in Plano. The intent was to watch a Jackie Chan movie, but there was none playing at a night show. So we decided to watch The Tooth Fairy instead. This is a fairly entertaining kids movie... apart from a few minutes of fantastic ice skating and a some comedy frames there is nothing much worth watching in this movie.

The story traces the life of an aging ice hockey star who is named the tooth fairy because he knocks out teeth of his opponents. His girlfriend has two kids, the daughter just loses one of her teeth and the mother tells the story of tooth fairy. The protagonist tries to tell her the truth in a rude manner to the chagrin of the mother. The son doesn't like this guy because he is rude, and sarcastic.

The story moves on to fairyland when the player gets called to do some community service and then after some seriously boring drama and some funny scenes the movie ends with a soulful transformation of the protagonist. I definitely wouldn't pay the regular theater ticket to watch this movie....

Movie Review: Goal! The Dream Begins

Great Theme, but awful screenplay
Director: Danny Cannon
Cast: Kuno Becker, Stephen Dillane, Alessandro Nivola and others

I checked out this movie from the public library thinking it would be a great action-packed soccer movie. Was I disappointed? Boy this movie was such a let down. The soccer/ football theme could have been handled so well but the director has chosen to make it a damp squib. No wonder this 2005 movie never made it to the headlines.

The story is about Santiago Munez, a young man passionate about playing soccer/ football. He has illegally immigrated to US from Mexico and is playing along with street boys in Los Angeles. He is spotted by a Glen (Stephen Dillane), a former big-league football player himself. Glen accosts Munez and asks him if he would be interested in playing pro-soccer. Quite naturally Munez is excited and invites him to another match on Saturday. Glen tries his best to get a talent scout to come to the match but fails. Then he gets in touch with the owner of the Newcastle team in England and convinces him to give Munez a trail.

Munez saves all his meager earnings in a bid to buy passage to London. Meanwhile his father is totally against him playing soccer, he wants his son to work hard and make a living. When his savings are just about becoming enough to enable him to travel to England, his father confiscates the money and buys a truck. Munez is shattered, meanwhile his grandmother somehow manages money and buys his ticket and tells him to go. There is some drama about how his mother had walked out on the family on arriving in US from Mexico. Some family drama etc.\

Santiago arrives in England and tries to play. He is not successful in the initial attempts. Glen fights with the team managers and coach and gets him a one month trail. Then there are other players/ coaches who continue to stand by him to ensure a place in the team.



What strikes me as a viewer is that there is not much of football shown in the movie. There is more popular support for Munez rather than talent. Instead of showing his talent with the ball the director shows how people influence to ensure he keeps his position in the team.

I remember Paulo Coelho's quote in The Alchemist: "When you want something with complete passion, the whole universe conspires to help you achieve the goal". This is not the exact quote but something like that. Comparing it to this movie, Munez badly wants to the a pro-soccer player, the whole universe, a passing acquaintance, his grandma, his friends in the team all conspire to get him into the team.

I think the director could have done a much better job with the theme rather than wasting away the chance to make a great movie.