Passion Plays
How Religion Shaped Sports in North America (A Ferris and Ferris Book)
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Narrated by:
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Randall Balmer
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By:
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Randall Balmer
About this listen
Randall Balmer was a late convert to sports talk radio, but he quickly became addicted, just like millions of other devoted American sports fans. As a historian of religion, the more he listened, Balmer couldn't help but wonder how the fervor he heard related to religious practice. Houses of worship once railed against Sabbath-busting sports events, but today most willingly accommodate Super Bowl Sunday. On the other hand, basketball's inventor, James Naismith, was an ardent follower of Muscular Christianity and believed the game would help develop religious character. But today those religious roots are largely forgotten.
Here one of our most insightful writers on American religion trains his focus on that other great passion—team sports—to reveal their surprising connections. From baseball to basketball and football to ice hockey, Balmer explores the origins and histories of big-time sports from the late nineteenth century to the present, with entertaining anecdotes and fresh insights into their ties to religious life. Referring to Notre Dame football, the Catholic Sun called its fandom "a kind of sacramental." Legions of sports fans listening to Passion Plays will recognize exactly what that means.
©2022 Randall Balmer (P)2022 The University of North Carolina PressListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
“This entertaining history examines the religious and cultural roots of baseball, basketball, football, and hockey...The illuminating insights into how sports reflect the historical periods and communities in which they developed will change how fans see the games. This one is a winner.”—Publishers Weekly
"An engaging look at the historical conditions surrounding America's secular, on-field religions."—Kirkus Reviews
"Compelling and absorbing...a lively introduction to the historical origins of the sports that we watch and play, while also inviting deeper reflection into the relationship between our religious practices, our sporting devotions, and the social worlds that we share with others...Balmer's posture is one of wonder and curiosity as he revels in the potential implications of his findings. It's that journeying spirit and the strength of Balmer's clear and accessible writing that make this book shine."—Christianity Today
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Story
Against the backdrop of one of the most tumultuous periods in recent American history, as riots and demonstrations spread across the nation, the Tigers of poor, segregated East High School in Columbus, Ohio, did something no team from one school had ever done before: They won the state basketball and baseball championships in the same year. They defeated bigger, richer, whiter teams across the state and along the way brought blacks and whites together, eased a painful racial divide throughout the state, and overcame extraordinary obstacles on their road to success.
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Flashback to the Late 1960s
- By Toni Bowes on 09-05-19
By: Wil Haygood
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The Captain Class
- The Hidden Force That Creates the World's Greatest Teams
- By: Sam Walker
- Narrated by: Keith Szarabajka
- Length: 9 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Several years ago, Sam Walker set out to answer one of the most hotly debated questions in sports: What are the greatest teams of all time? He devised a formula, then applied it to thousands of teams from leagues all over the world, from the NBA to the English Premier League to Olympic field hockey. When he was done, he had a list of the 16 most dominant teams in history. At that point he became obsessed with another, more complicated question: What did these freak teams have in common?
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Dates and names
- By Hunter on 11-28-21
By: Sam Walker
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A Nice Little Place on the North Side
- Wrigley Field at One Hundred
- By: George Will
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 5 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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In A Nice Little Place on the North Side, leading columnist George Will returns to baseball with a deeply personal look at his hapless Chicago Cubs and their often beatified home, Wrigley Field, as it enters its second century. Baseball, Will argues, is full of metaphors for life, religion, and happiness, and Wrigley is considered one of its sacred spaces. But what is its true, hyperbole-free history?
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It's EEE-lia, not Ah-LEE-ah
- By Shawcago on 04-25-16
By: George Will
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The Heritage
- Black Athletes, a Divided America, and the Politics of Patriotism
- By: Howard Bryant
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Today, sports arenas have been transformed into staging grounds for American patriotism and the hero worship of law enforcement. Teams wear camouflage jerseys to honor those who serve; police officers throw out first pitches; soldiers surprise their families with homecomings at halftime. Sports and politics are decidedly entwined. But as journalist Howard Bryant reveals, this has always been more complicated for black athletes, who from the start were committing a political act simply by being on the field.
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I guess there’s a reason why this one was so heavily discounted. One sided not really worth listening to.
- By Dwight Henning on 07-17-24
By: Howard Bryant
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The Game: Harvard, Yale, and America in 1968
- By: George Howe Colt
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 10 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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On November 23, 1968, near the end of a turbulent and memorable year, there was a football game that would also prove turbulent and memorable: the season-ending clash between Harvard and Yale. Both teams entered undefeated and, technically at least, came out undefeated. The final score was 29-29. To some of the players on the field, it was a triumph; to others a tragedy. George Howe Colt’s The Game is the story of that iconic American year, as seen through the young men who lived it and were changed by it.
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More than a game
- By Hebern on 11-05-18
By: George Howe Colt
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The Perfect Pass
- American Genius and the Reinvention of Football
- By: S. C. Gwynne
- Narrated by: Santino Fontana
- Length: 8 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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New York Times best-selling, award-winning historian S. C. Gwynne tells the incredible story of how Hal Mumme and Mike Leach - two unknown coaches who revolutionized American football in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s - changed the way the game is played at every level, from high school to the NFL. Hal Mumme is one of a handful of authentic offensive geniuses in the history of American football. In 2015 ESPN Magazine, the nation's leading sports magazine, called him the single most influential football coach in the last quarter century.
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The Perfect Pass
- By Little Pecan on 09-29-16
By: S. C. Gwynne
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Scribe
- My Life in Sports
- By: Bob Ryan
- Narrated by: Bob Ryan
- Length: 11 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Ever since he joined the sports department of the Boston Globe in 1968, sports enthusiasts have been blessed with the writing and reporting of Bob Ryan. Tony Kornheiser calls him the "quintessential American sportswriter". For the past 25 years, he has also been a regular on various ESPN shows, especially The Sports Reporters, spreading his knowledge and enthusiasm for sports of all kinds.
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No my idea of a memoir
- By Michael Friedman on 12-19-14
By: Bob Ryan
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The Strenuous Life
- Theodore Roosevelt and the Making of the American Athlete
- By: Ryan Swanson
- Narrated by: David de Vries
- Length: 11 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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In full and intricate detail, featuring an amazing cast of characters from the worlds of politics, athletics, entertainment and more, this is the story of how President Theodore Roosevelt helped shepherd in a sports and fitness revolution that forever changed the complexion of the United States.
By: Ryan Swanson
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Got Your Number
- The Greatest Sports Legends and the Numbers They Own
- By: Mike Greenberg, Paul Hembekides
- Narrated by: Mike Greenberg
- Length: 5 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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ESPN personality ( Get Up and #Greeny) and New York Times bestselling author Mike Greenberg partners with mega-producer Hembo to settle once and for all which legends flat-out own which numbers. In short essays certain to provoke debate between and amongst all generations, Greeny uses his lifetime of sports knowledge to spin yarns of the legends among the legends and tell you why some have claimed their spot in the top 100 of all time.
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love it
- By Burnie P. Gaeta on 11-15-24
By: Mike Greenberg, and others
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Baseball
- A History of America's Game
- By: Benjamin G. Rader
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 12 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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A succinct history of baseball, newly revised and updated. In this third edition of his lively history of America's game, widely recognized as the best of its kind, Benjamin G. Rader expands his scope, covering record crowds and record income, construction of new ballparks, a change in the strike zone, a surge in recruiting Japanese players, and an emerging cadre of explosive long-ball hitters. The book is published by The University of Illinois Press.
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Good book!
- By Judy Ellis on 04-15-18
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Pistol
- The Life of Pete Maravich
- By: Mark Kriegel
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 12 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Pistol is more than the biography of a ballplayer. It's the stuff of classic novels: the story of a boy transformed by his father's dream and the cost of that dream. Even as Pete Maravich became Pistol Pete, a basketball icon for baby boomers, all the Maraviches paid a price. Now acclaimed author Mark Kriegel has brilliantly captured the saga of an American family: its rise, its apparent ruin, and, finally, its redemption.
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Extremely Good!
- By steve on 12-12-12
By: Mark Kriegel