The Story of the Houston Astros PDF Download

Author: Evan Drellich
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0063049058
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 446

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Book Description
The reporter who broke the Houston Astros' cheating scandal reveals how a baseball team could so dramatically descend into corruption, with never-before-told details of a broken management culture, the once-revered leaders who enabled it and the scandal itself. Baseball, that old romantic game, has been defaced and consumed by corporate America. As Moneyball-thinking and Ivy League graduates grabbed hold of the sport, the Astros set out to build a cost-efficient winning machine on the principles of the outside business world, squeezing every dollar out of every transaction, player and employee. In less than a decade, ex-Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow helped revolutionize the game. He created an environment that led to one of the worst cheating scandals in baseball history, a Shakespearean tragedy of innovation and failed change management. Through years of extensive interviews, former Houston Chronicle beat writer Evan Drellich, now a national writer for The Athletic, delivers the definitive account of baseball’s most controversial franchise and how a modern baseball team truly works—without the usual myth-spinning. Drellich reveals the rise and fall of the Astros to be a collision of subcultures. The team’s top boss was a former McKinsey consultant who lived on the bleeding edge with no guardrails. He hired outsider after outsider to change the organization as quickly and cheaply as possible. The wins piled up, and so did the cash for the billionaire owner with a checkered business past. But not even a World Series title could cover up the rot. All of it came at a cost to fans, employees, and the sport on a whole. But as Winning Fixes Everything makes clear, “The Astros Way” isn’t going anywhere. Drellich uses the saga of the Astros’ scandal to detail the evolution of baseball itself.

Author: Bill Brown
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781939055088
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Houston Astros: Deep in the Heart shares the stories of the plays and the players who have kept Houston returning to the diamond"from the sandlot days, through the birth of indoor baseball, to the state-of-the art experience at Minute Maid Park. By the time the Astros made it to the World Series, they had captured the heart of Houston. This richly illustrated volume chronicles every aspect of the long road they took to face the White Sox in 2005 and provides insights on the legends"Bob Aspromonte, Jose Cruz, Larry Dierker, Nolan Ryan, Joe Niekro, the Killer Bees, and many more. Packed with pictures never released to the public, each chapter increases fans' appreciation of this determined team. Memories and memorabilia from the team's playoff appearances from 1997 to 2001, their close call in 2004, and their triumphant march from tombstones to champagne in 2005 bring back the heyday, reminding readers how important it is to stay in the game.

Author: Adele Richardson
Publisher: The Creative Company
ISBN: 9781583414897
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 48

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Book Description
Examines the history, players, and future of the Houston Astros baseball team.

Author: Andy Martino
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0593311434
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
“A baseball book that reads like a spy novel—a story about cheaters and the cheated that has the power to forever change how we feel about the game.” —Brian Williams, MSNBC anchor and host of The 11th Hour The definitive insider story of one of the biggest cheating scandals to ever rock Major League Baseball, bringing down high-profile coaches and players, and exposing a long-rumored "sign-stealing" dark side of baseball By the fall of 2019, most teams in Major League Baseball suspected that the Houston Astros, winners of the 2017 World Series, had been stealing signs for several years. Deconstructing exactly what happened in this explosive story, award-winning sports reporter and analyst Andy Martino reveals how otherwise good people like Astros manager A. J. Hinch, bench coach Alex Cora, and veteran leader Carlos Beltrán found themselves on the wrong side of clear ethical lines. Along the way, Martino explores the colorful history of cheating in baseball, from notorious episodes like the 1919 “Black Sox” fiasco all the way to the modern steroid era. But as Martino deftly shows, the Astros scandal became one of the most significant that the game has ever seen—its fallout ensnaring many other teams, as victims, alleged cheaters, or both. Like a riveting true sports whodunit, Cheated is an electrifying, behind-the-scenes look into the heart of a scandal that shocked the baseball world.

Author: Ben Reiter
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0525576657
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The inside story of the Houston Astros, whose relentless innovation took them from the worst team in baseball to the World Series in 2017 and 2019 “Reiter’s superb narrative of how the team got there provides powerful insights into how organizations—not just baseball clubs—work best.”—The Wall Street Journal Astroball picks up where Michael Lewis’s acclaimed Moneyball leaves off, telling the thrilling story of a championship team that pushed both the sport and business of baseball to the next level. In 2014, the Astros were the worst baseball team in half a century, but just three years later they defied critics to win a stunning World Series. In this book, Ben Reiter shows how the Astros built a system that avoided the stats-versus-scouts divide by giving the human factor a key role in their decision-making. Sitting at the nexus of sports, business, and innovation, Astroball is the story of the next wave of thinking in baseball and beyond, at once a remarkable underdog tale and a fascinating look at the cutting edge of evaluating and optimizing human potential.

Author: Joe Holley
Publisher: Hachette Books
ISBN: 031648525X
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 237

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Book Description
An inside look at the 2017 Houston Astros championship season, focusing on the epic seven-game World Series, the front office decisions that built a winning team, and the resilience of the city in the wake of Hurricane Harvey. On November 1, 2017, the Houston Astros defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers in an epic seven game battle to become 2017 World Series champs. For the Astros, the combination of a magnificently played series, a 101-victory season, and the devastation Hurricane Harvey brought to their city was so incredible it might give Hollywood screenwriters pause. The nation's fourth-largest city, still reeling in the wake of disaster, was smiling again. The Astros' first-ever World Series victory is a great baseball story, but it's also the story of a major American city -- a city (and a state) that the rest of the nation doesn't always love or understand--becoming a sentimental favorite because of its grace and good will in response to the largest natural disaster in American history. The Astros' miracle season is also the fascinating tale of a thoroughly modern team. Constructed by NASA-inspired analytics, the team's data-driven system took the game to a more sophisticated level than the so-called Moneyball approach. The team's new owner, Jim Crane, bought into the system and was willing to endure humiliating seasons in the baseball wilderness with the hope, shared by few initially, that success comes to those who wait. And he was right. But no data-crunching could take credit for a team of likeable, refreshingly good-natured young men who wore "Houston Strong" patches on their jerseys and meant it--guys like shortstop Carlos Correa, who kept a photo in his locker of a Houston woman trudging through fetid water up to her knees. The Astros foundation included George Springer, a powerful slugger and rangy outfielder; third-baseman Alex Bregman, whose defensive play and clutch hitting were crucial in the series; and, of course, the stubby and tenacious second baseman Jose Altuve, the heart and soul of the team. Hurricane Season is Houston Chronicle columnist Joe Holley's moving account of this extraordinary team--and the extraordinary circumstances of their championship.

Author: KCI Sports Publishing
Publisher: Kci Sports Publishing
ISBN: 9781940056579
Category : World Series (Baseball)
Languages : en
Pages : 128

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Book Description
History Earned! chronicles the Houston Astros incredible run to their first ever World Series championship. This dazzling hardcover keepsake includes highlights from the Astros 101-win regular season, special playerfeatures, game-by-game recaps of all the playoff games, and extended coverage of the World Series triumph over the Los Angeles Dodgers. Over 100 full-color photos included. The perfect holiday gift for Astros fans.

Author: Ben Lindbergh
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541698959
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 428

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Book Description
Move over, Moneyball -- this New York Times bestseller examines major league baseball's next cutting-edge revolution: the high-tech quest to build better players. As bestselling authors Ben Lindbergh and Travis Sawchik reveal in The MVP Machine, the Moneyball era is over. Fifteen years after Michael Lewis brought the Oakland Athletics' groundbreaking team-building strategies to light, every front office takes a data-driven approach to evaluating players, and the league's smarter teams no longer have a huge advantage in valuing past performance. Lindbergh and Sawchik's behind-the-scenes reporting reveals: How undersized afterthoughts José Altuve and Mookie Betts became big sluggers and MVPs How polarizing pitcher Trevor Bauer made himself a Cy Young contender How new analytical tools have overturned traditional pitching and hitting techniques How a wave of young talent is making MLB both better than ever and arguably worse to watch Instead of out-drafting, out-signing, and out-trading their rivals, baseball's best minds have turned to out-developing opponents, gaining greater edges than ever by perfecting prospects and eking extra runs out of older athletes who were once written off. Lindbergh and Sawchik take us inside the transformation of former fringe hitters into home-run kings, show how washed-up pitchers have emerged as aces, and document how coaching and scouting are being turned upside down. The MVP Machine charts the future of a sport and offers a lesson that goes beyond baseball: Success stems not from focusing on finished products, but from making the most of untapped potential.

Author: Sara Gilbert
Publisher: Creative Paperbacks
ISBN: 9780898126402
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
The history of the Houston Astros professional baseball team from its inaugural 1962 season to today, spotlighting the team's greatest players and most memorable moments.

Author: Sara Gilbert
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781566600125
Category : JUVENILE NONFICTION
Languages : en
Pages : 52

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Book Description
Although baseball has passionate fans in Canada, Japan, and many other countries, it will always be known as America’s pastime. In this updated version of the bestselling series, readers will learn the full history of each team, from the storied Boston Red Sox to the perennial powerhouse New York Yankees. Side panels and “All-Time Team” profiles enhance the historical narrative, spotlighting famous players and memorable moments, while spectacular photos capture all the hard-hitting, base-stealing action. The history of the Houston Astros professional baseball team from its inaugural 1962 season to today, spotlighting the team’s greatest players and most memorable moments.