{"product_id":"9781476716978","title":"Players: The Story of Sports and Money, and the Visionaries Who Fought to Create a Revolution","description":"“Provocative…terrific stories” (\u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e) of the people who transformed sports—in the span of a single generation—from a job that required even top athletes to work in the off-season to make ends meet into a massive global business.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt started, as most business deals do, with a handshake. In 1960, a Cleveland lawyer named Mark McCormack convinced a golfer named Arnold Palmer to sign with him. McCormack simply believed that the best athletes had more commercial value than they were being paid for—and he was right. Within a few years, he raised Palmer’s annual income from $5,000 to $500,000, and forever changed the landscape of the sports industry, transforming it from a form of entertainment to a profitable and fully functioning system of its own.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“A remarkable saga…filled with insights not only into sports, but also into human nature” (\u003ci\u003eThe Dallas Morning News\u003c\/i\u003e), \u003ci\u003ePlayers \u003c\/i\u003efeatures landmark moments, including the multiyear battle to free Palmer from a bad deal with the Wilson Sporting Goods Company; the 1973 Wimbledon boycott, when eighty-one of the top tennis players in the world protested the suspension of Nikola Pilic; baseball pitcher Catfish Hunter’s battle to become MLB’s first free agent; and how NFL executives transformed pro football from a commercial dud to the greatest show on earth.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“An entertaining, illuminating read” (\u003ci\u003eNew York Journal of Books\u003c\/i\u003e), \u003ci\u003ePlayers \u003c\/i\u003eis a riveting, fly-on-the-wall account of the rise and creation of the modern sports world, and the people who made it happen. “No part of the media and entertainment industry has seen a more substantial economic transformation than sports….A half-century tour spanning a variety of widely recognized and lesser-known sports figures and competitions that have played roles in the industry’s development….\u003ci\u003ePlayers\u003c\/i\u003e could not be more timely” (\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e).","brand":"Simon \u0026 Schuster","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47144506851568,"sku":"9781476716978","price":12.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781476716978_p0.jpg?v=1763609550","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781476716978","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}