Three Ring Circus Audiobook By Jeff Pearlman cover art

Three Ring Circus

Kobe, Shaq, Phil and the Crazy Years of the Lakers Dynasty

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Three Ring Circus

By: Jeff Pearlman
Narrated by: Brian Hutchison
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About this listen

The story of the Lakers dynasty from 1996 through 2004, when Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal combined - and collided - to help bring the Lakers three straight championships and restore the franchise as a powerhouse.

In the history of modern sport, there have never been two high-level teammates who loathed each other the way Shaquille O’Neal loathed Kobe Bryant and Kobe Bryant loathed Shaquille O’Neal. From public sniping and sparring, to physical altercations and the repeated threats of trade, it was warfare. And yet, despite eight years of infighting and hostility, by turns mediated and encouraged by coach Phil Jackson, the Shaq-Kobe duo resulted in one of the greatest dynasties in NBA history. Together, the two led the Lakers to three straight championships and returned glory and excitement to Los Angeles.

In the tradition of Jeff Pearlman’s best sellers Showtime, Boys Will Be Boys, and The Bad Guys Won, Three-Ring Circus is a rollicking deep dive into one of sports’ most fraught yet successful pairings.

©2020 Jeff Pearlman (P)2020 Recorded Books
Basketball Sports Sports History
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What listeners say about Three Ring Circus

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Enjoyable trip down memory lane

I loved that era of Lakers basketball, and the drama was like a soap opera on the floor. Narrator mispronounced a handful of names, which as an NBA diehard at the time drove me a little crazy, but outside of that his performance was outstanding.

Was hard to read about a young Kobe right after his untimely death.

Still, this book was like a time capsule for me.

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Great stories, tough to listen to now tho

The stories and insight were great, unforgivingly honest, but with his passing it was genuinely hard to hear Kobe's name that many times.

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A++ Book Horrible Narrator

Book is so good. Best of Pearlman’s so far, and I’ve loved the all. That said narrator’s inability to pronounce any nba player’s name was unreal. So distracting and he wasn’t even close. Too bad.

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Great Insider info.

Great Read, very detailed, even on the games. Goes season by season, year by year starting with the 1995-1996 season, but does skip a lot of the the in-game drama of the final 2 seasons imo.

Not for the Typical Kobe fan-boys, it gives you the truth and may be a bit too blunt for casual Kobe fans.

Great sports read, especially if you grew up on that Late 90s/Early 2000s basketball.

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Amazing

Amazing story and well written. Changed my outlook on the Laker team I grew up loving.

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Lakers will be Lakers

This is very similar to Showtime and Boys Will Be Boys. If you enjoyed either of those books, then you’ll certainly enjoy this. I’m not even a huge basketball fan.

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Well written

A well written book with some interesting insights.

Narrator was 90% good. A few slips in pronunciation of names. Not obscure names, famous names. Small thing but obvious to NBA fans.

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Great story not so great narration

Provided an interesting retrospective of the 3-peat era, but the narrator’s inability to pronounce names was not ideal. They should consider narrators who actually know a little bit about what they’re narrating.

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Very objective perspective

A lot of great insights I'd never heard. Great reporting and writing from Jeff Pearlman. From someone that disliked this team at the time I still highly recommend this book to any basketball/NBA/Lakers fan!

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Great book, bad liaten

The narrator really could've used a pronunciation guide for the player's names. Good story though.

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1 person found this helpful