Sport ecologist Dr. Madeleine Orr is pitching a ‘green game plan’ for sports fans. In “Warming Up,” Orr pairs her academic curiosity and storytelling to stir optimism (or “hopeium”) about using the power of sport to explain climate adaptation. The University of Toronto professor’s début book reminds readers sports are a bigger social connector than…

In “Ali Hoops,” the début children’s book by sports anchor Evanka Osmak, the 10-year-old heroine just wants a place in the game. Ali “daydreams about being a basketball star,” but frets about whether she can make her school team. Along the way, Ali learns lessons about who makes a true team off and on the floor — and illustrates how sports give a c…

Noah Gittell is here to get the baseball movie out of its big-screen slump. In “Baseball: The Movie,” his first book, he advocates for the return of a sports movie niche that has faded since “Moneyball” and “42” were hits in the early ’10s. Drawing on insights from fellow writers and ballplayers, Gittell shows how the baseball movie, since the time…

Whether Ben Johnson ever receives exoneration, the examination of the Canadian sprinter’s life and times by Mary Ormsby shows he got a raw deal. Johnson became the first track-and-field Olympian to lose a gold medal for doping after a positive test at the 1988 Summer Olympics. In “World’s Fastest Man*: The Life of Ben Johnson,” Ormsby raises alarmi…

In what might be his most ambitious work, author and hockey legend Ken Dryden affirms the value of finding our similarities. At the start of the 2020s, Dryden sought out people with whom he shared a uniquely Canadian coming-of-age experience during an ambitious era. In the early 1960s, Dryden was part of the ‘Brain Class’ at Etobicoke C.I. — studen…

How Pete Rose became so polarizing spurred Keith O’Brien to get granular in “Charlie Hustle,” which has become an instant The New York Times bestseller. In 1989, Major League Baseball’s hit king received a lifetime ban for betting on games in which he managed his hometown Cincinnati Reds. With reportorial digging, O’Brien reminds readers of everyth…

Jack McCallum is on the case of the Crispus Attucks Tigers, a young Oscar Robertson, and purloined glory in the heartland of hoops. In The Real Hoosiers, his 12th book, McCallum dives into why Indiana celebrates the 1954 Milan Miracle, and the film “Hoosiers,” more than Attucks. Repping a school community forced into existence in a “bewildering and…

Morgan Campbell’s debut memoir, “My Fighting Family: Borders and Bloodlines and the Battles That Made Us” is more than a sports book — but sport is a through line. Campbell, whose parents and a set of grandparents decamped from Chicago for Toronto during the sociopolitically turbulent late 1960s, shares much about growing up Black and learning his …

Gambling has become a new revenue stream for major sports leagues in the last few years, raising questions about how to protect competitive integrity. It also calls to mind the fallout from the Black Sox Scandal, the greatest game-fixing scandal in the history of North American sports. In "Joe Jackson vs. Chicago American League Baseball Club: Neve…

Erik Kramer built an NFL career on precision, timing, and accuracy, but it was his greatest miss that led to him building a complete life. Since surviving a 2015 suicide attempt, the former quarterback is making his ultimate comeback day after day, living with renewed sense of purpose. Athletically, Kramer climbed up from the "bottom of the barrel,…

Nothing is ever as good as it once was. That’s a lie —they improve, or more accurately, they evolve. Still, why not look back with a bit of wonder? Rich Cohen is the right writer to put the NBA, then and now, into perspective. In When the Game Was War: The NBA's Greatest Season, Cohen stress-tests his belief that the 1987-88 season was the zenith o…

Pride and Prejudice It could have easily been the title of Ted Nolan’s biography. My Life in Two Worlds: A Coach’s Journey from the Reserve to the NHL and Back encompasses the duality of his drive to show people from his world, Garden River First Nation, could succeed in another one, whilst centering their Indigenous identity. A career coach who ha…

The NHL Draft is one of hockey's great spectacles. Just after the Stanley Cup is awarded, the spotlight shifts to the draft floor, where teams hope to acquire future stars and the diamonds in the rough that can lead them — or keep them — in contention. As a former NHL president and general manager, Doug MacLean has seen the process from the inside.…

Jonathon Jackson captures the spirit of the thing Like “Slap Shot” itself, Jonathon Jackson might have been slightly ahead of his time when he set out to write about the timeless hockey movie. Nowadays, ‘how it was made’ books, podcasts, and limited series are everywhere. But it was back in 2006, Jackson set out to write about the “nuts and bolts” …

Act like a champion, talk like a champion, run like a champion. Wired like a prizefighter, Donovan Bailey became the fastest man on earth in the 1990s. He did it for himself while raising Canada's standing in international sport. In his memoir, the 100-metre and Olympic and world gold medalist tells his life story with intent. Rooted in Jamaica and…

Dave Hill is a multitalented man, but a fan for one season — hockey season. The comedian, essayist, and musician is meh toward his hometown NFL Cleveland Browns, but hockey had him hooked right off the hop. Over his life, it has become a source of perplexment as to why more Americans are not similarly stoked about hockey. In his fourth book, "The A…

Step into the arena. Step outside the bubble. Justin Davis offers the public a personal story of a life in hockey with all aspects considered. What was wrong? What can be changed? What did he like? What should be maintained? With Canada’s national winter sport facing a moral audit, check out our discussion with an NHL draft choice and Memorial Cup …

Baseball banter comes easily to John Gibbons, but it was a hard and winding road to get to that point. Over two stints covering 11 seasons, Gibbons won over Toronto Blue Jays fans. Getting the Jays back into pennant contention helped, but he became more relatable, a shrewd observer whom fans could imagine sharing baseball yarns and beers with up in…

Whether one calls it soccer or football, the women’s game is coming into its own. The advancements might seem brand-new considering the first World Cup was held in 1991 and the inaugural Olympic tournament kicked off in 1996. It would also be easy to assume that the charge forward for female footy began in North America. After all, the United State…

Canada ascending to FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 was surely cathartic for every footballer who has worn the Maple Leaf — especially Dwayne De Rosario, one of this nation's best ever . The Scarborough man helped grow the beautiful game in North America as one of the first stars of Major League Soccer, contributing to four MLS Cup-winning teams and twic…

Steve Simmons dishes it out, and Steve Simmons takes it. He would not have that any other way. It’s been A Lucky Life. As a national columnist with Postmedia, his articles are some of the most widely discussed amongst Canadian sports fans. He has also appeared regularly on radio and television including TSN’s The Reporters. Simmons began his profes…

In 2019, veteran live sports producer John Shannon was — no need for an euphemism — fired by Sportsnet. As he has learned across nearly a half century in sports media, one has to evolve or die. In this memoir, Shannon writes of how he has absorbed and applied lessons that are wrapped as mortal blows in order not merely survive, but thrive in an oft…

When it was announced that Hockey Hall of Fame centreman Bryan Trottier was releasing a memoir, one had to wonder why that had not already happened. Trottier won the Stanley Cup six times as a player and once again as an assistant coach. The son of a Cree-Chippewa-Métis father and an Irish-Canadian mother from a Saskatchewan ranching family, he als…

Barrie Shepley had his eureka moment while working a summer job in an auto plant. Captivated by Canadian swimmer Alex Baumann racing to gold at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, Shepley realized that he wanted to be in elite sport. His skillset was best suited to being a coach. Chasing greatness began with hustling. Starting from his residence room at…

It only took 50 years for the original Team Canada to fully participate in a book about that September, in 1972.John U. Bacon, a seven-time best-selling author based in Ann Arbor, Mich., was drafted to put "The Greatest Comeback" into words for a new generation. Through unfettered access, Bacon expands upon the time-honoured narrative about the Sum…