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Type of bind: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 362.29
Format: Bargain Price
Label: Gotham
Manufacturer: Gotham
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 352
Printing Date: March 23, 2006
Publishing house: Gotham
Sale Popularity Level: 18615
Studio: Gotham
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Product Description:
The blockbuster New York Times bestseller that caused a media firestorm and stayed in the headlines for weeks at last arrives in paperbackwith a new afterword about the Barry Bonds perjury investigation.
This is the complete inside story of the BALCO steroids scandal from the award-winning reporters who broke the news nationally. In the summer of 1998, as baseball was still struggling to regain popularity lost during the contentious 1994 players strike that caused the World Series to be canceled, a race to break the home-run record transfixed the nation. Over the subsequent three seasons, baseball players across the country hit home runs at unprecedented rates. Although sportswriters pointed to suspicions of juiced baseballs and small parks being responsible, there were whispers that illegal performance-enhancing drugs were being used. But home runs were big business, and baseball carried on with a weak performance-drug testing regime.
In December of 2004, after more than a year of investigation, San Francisco Chronicle reporters Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams broke the story that in a federal investigation of a nutritional supplement company called BALCO, Barry Bonds and fellow slugger Jason Giambi had admitted to taking steroids. Immediately the issue of steroids in baseball became front-page news. In Game of Shadows, Fainaru-Wada and Williams expose the secrets of BALCO, illuminating how professional athletes risked their health for a competitive edge.
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Rated by buyers 
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Any true fan of baseball will love this book. Not only does it provide factual reporting, but is presented in a way that anyone who picks it up can read it & understand.
It is nowhere near a "long read," it's long, but is written in a way that it will suck you in until you flip that last page. I liked it so much I ordered a copy for my dad!
I am nowhere near a Barry Bonds fan, but this book doesn't 100% focus on Bonds. A great read!!!
Rated by buyers -
"Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal that Rocked Professional Sports" details the story of how performance-enhancing drugs have entered the world of sports. As of this time, the case has not been completely wrapped up, with Barry Bonds still awaiting trial for perjury and tax evasion. The book is really a definitive reference to performance drugs, their composition, their effect in bodies and why they work. As banned drugs in most sports, there has been a constant game of cat-and-mouse between athletes and governing bodies to stay one step ahead of the other, to prevent these drugs from being used. In baseball's case, the only governing body for athletes and owners was greed, so using the drugs was winked at by both. The result of this was the creation of records by people who never would have come close to creating them. Equally incredible was the creation of "mutations" (for lack of a better word) in the bodies of users: Barry Bonds, for example, had his shoe size grow from 10½ to 13, his jersey size increase from 42 to 52, and his head grow two sizes, despite being bald - all in his late 30s, long after the normal body grows anything close to this much. No telling what kind of health risks he will be running in the years to come. This is no doubt, though, that this is a riveting book - despite what may seem to be a boring topic, the authors make it a thorough and interesting book.
Rated by buyers -
Bought this for my husband... he loves it. Good read for those into Baseball and baseball history.
Rated by buyers -
I am a big baseball fan so i had to read this book and , altough, it is a sad thing to find out how huge is this problem, i am grateful that those who have lied and hide this problem have been prosecuted.This book is a great account of the problems of drugs in sports.So far, everything that the authors have said in this book have been proven true.This book is a no non-sense approach to the story with the authors putting all the cards on the table and not holding back.I think their approach to the subject is fantastic and the fact that they have researched and documented all their information is a testimony to that.Great book!!
Rated by buyers -
There is no way to make a positive case for anabolic steroids or HGH in any sport. The story of BALCO and the involvement of one of the biggest names in sports makes for an interesting read Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal that Rocked Professional Sports albeit one of the darkest sides of professional sports.
Hidden behind a "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?" back-drop, the book names people who became contenders by buying into the back street sales of steroids in order to build strength, enhance musculature, elongate careers and cheat their way into the record books with the excuse that they were better than other players but just needed that edge to be best, as though it was their divine right! Gone were the days of Willie Mays, Roger Maris, Hank Aaron and Mickey Mantle, those who made and broke records by sheer talent and will. The days of steroids were now foisted upon an unsuspecting public via Victor Conte, a self-made, self-serving and self-proclaimed nutritionist who became a "cocktail" mixer to the super stars of sports. Throw into that mix the world of Major League Baseball, who, along with its Commissioners, owners, managers, trainers and pumped up stars, turned a deaf ear and a blind eye to all that was happening around them. Together, they've turned a wonderful, healthy and beautiful sport that was America's Favorite Pastime into a debacle of muscle-bound "terminators" whose job it is to hit the long ball and keep people coming to fields and stadiums where they can witness the side-show of freaks which once was, the heart of American sports.
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