Jen Bryant - Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball

Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work

Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

12345

Contents

Guide

ABOVE THE RIM

HOW ELGIN BAYLOR CH ANGED BASK ETBALL

BY JEN BRYANT

ILLUSTR ATIONS BY FR ANK MORRISON

Abrams Books for Young Readers

New York

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Sincere thanks to the following people, without whose guidance, support, and

expertise this book would not have been born: Matt Zeysing, curator, and Alex Pedro, curatorial

assistant, Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, Springfield, Massachusetts; Carol Welch

and Laura Salvucci, reference department, Chester County Library, Exton, Pennsylvania; the

reference specialists at the Main Reading Room, Humanities and Social Sciences Division, Library

of Congress, Washington, D.C.; Tamar Brazis and Howard Reeves, wise and patient editors at

Abrams Books for Young Readers, New York; Rob Sternitzky, copyeditor; Pamela Notarantonio, art

director; Frank Morrison, artist, who brought Elgins story so brilliantly to life on these pages.

The illustrations in this book were created using oil on illustration board.

Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for

and may be obtained from the Library of Congress.

ISBN 978-1-4197-4108-1
eISBN 978-1-64700-161-2

Text copyright 2020 Jen Bryant

Illustrations copyright 2020 Frank Morrison

Edited by Howard W. Reeves

Book design by Steph Stilwell and Max Temescu

Published in 2020 by Abrams Books for Young Readers, an imprint of ABRAMS.

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,

or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording,

or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

Abrams Books for Young Readers are available at special

discounts when purchased in quantity for premiums

and promotions as well as fundraising or educational use.

Special editions can also be created to specification. For details,

contact specialsales@abramsbooks.com or the address below.

Abrams

is a registered trademark of Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

ABRAMS The Art of Books
195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007
abramsbooks.com

To my agent, Alyssa E. Henkin, and her family

J.B.

To the children who love basketball as much as I love painting

F.M.

On a steamy summer day in 1945,

a boy and his brothers

played stickball in the street.

There were plenty of nice parks in Washington, D.C.,

where people swam or played tennis, basketball, and baseball.

But the child was black, and those parks were

whites only.

Sometimes, late at night,

when the city was asleep,

the older boys tunneled under

the padlocked fences

and played there anyway.

But things can change in time,

the child knew.

Time was important.

Thats why his own name, Elgin,

came from his fathers favorite watch.

Now Elgin and his friends could play it, too.

At first, they didnt have the right equipment,

so they played with a tennis ball.

Then someone found a volleyball.

Then, finally

... Yes! A real basketball.

He was fourteen when a hoop appeared in the field down the street.

And this time, there was no whites only sign.

It wasnt fancyjust a place to play basketball.

A fine game of skill and strategy,

and of running back and forth

a flat-footed game as level as the court itself.

Some of the older boys were very goodand they knew it.

Hey, you see that shot I made? one bragged.

Thats nothinyou see that shot I blocked ? another boasted.

Oh yeah? Well, you just try to slide by me! another challenged.

Elgin heard what they said.

But bragging was not his style.

On the court, he let his body

do the talking.

In one smooth move,

like a plane taking off,

he would leap...

higher and higher

and higher

as if pulled by some

invisible wire,

and just when it seemed

hed have to come down,

no!

Where did he learn those moves?

the other players asked.

Elgin didnt have an answer. I dont know,

he told them. Its spontaneous.

Hed HANG there, suspended, floating like a bird or a cloud,

changing direction, shifting the ball to the other side,

twisting in midair, slashing, crashing,

gliding past the defense, upupabove the rim.

And with a flick of his wrist,

or a roll off the fingertips,

he put the ball IN.

The way he played was so

different that people

stopped what they were doing

and watched.

Next page

12345

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

Similar books «Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball»

Look at similar books to Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball. We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.

Duane Elgin

The Living Universe

Kathy Elgin

Henry VIII: The Charismatic King Who Reforged a Nation

Theodore Vrettos

The Elgin Affair: The True Story of the Greatest Theft in History

Suzette Haden Elgin

Native Tongue

Jennifer Grainger

Vanished Villages of Elgin

Duane Elgin

Choosing Earth: Humanitys Great Transition to a Mature Planetary Civilization

Elgin

Voluntary Simplicity Second Revised Edition: Toward a Way of Life That Is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich

Baylor Elgin

Hang time: my life in basketball

Catherine Z. Elgin

True Enough

Elgin Baylor

Hang Time: My Life in Basketball

Baylor

The Man Who Changed Basketball Bijan C. Bayne

Duane Elgin

Voluntary Simplicity: Toward a Way of Life That Is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich, Second Edition

Discussion, reviews of the book Above the Rim: How Elgin Baylor Changed Basketball and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.