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Playing to Win
- Narrated by: Michael Lewis
- Length: 2 hrs and 13 mins
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Playing to Win
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Summary
When New York Times best-selling author and journalist Michael Lewis got involved in his kids’ local softball league, it all seemed so wholesome and simple. Ten years later, his family looked back to find that they had spent thousands of dollars - not to mention hours - and traveled thousands of miles in the service of a single sport.
All over America, families are investing blood, sweat, tears, and retirement savings in their children’s sports careers, all with the ultimate goal of…what exactly? A college scholarship? A professional contract? Simply the taste of victory?
Through the lens of the highly competitive world of girls’ softball, Lewis reveals the youth sports industrial complex that has arisen to aggressively monetize after-school pastimes. The major players aren’t the ones on the field - they’re the ones stripping the pockets of unwitting parents to the tune of billions of dollars a year, creating an arms race of amateur athletics and enabling the Varsity Blues scandal. So what’s in it for the parents - or, for that matter, the kids themselves? This from-the-bleachers portrait of our national obsession with youth sports explores the consequences of high-stakes play for families, communities, and the kids in the game.
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What listeners say about Playing to Win
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- M. SMITH
- 11-12-21
Excellent yet heartbreaking
I really enjoyed this, great to hear the story of his daughter and her softball career. But heartbreaking when I found out about her death just a year or two after it was written.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Marcos
- 26-11-22
Looking beyond the game
Fantastically narrated, Lewis opens our eyes to a different kind of side of sports, from youth leagues to college, admissions, and their journeys of the children & parents that grow in that world
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Jeeves by another name
- 09-01-22
Eye-opening but lacks conclusion
A great short listen - worth the Audible subscription!
Have enjoyed Lewis' other books (Moneyball and The Big Short) so expected good things from this bite-size audiobook. Did not disappoint - a brutally honest eye-witness account of the kids' sports-industry in the USA.
Appreciate the author's aim was to give an account rather than a commentary, but felt the book lacked a conclusion. There was much to horrify about the way American families sacrifice so much for child sports, but little by way of constructive suggestions for what needs to change. Won't spoil your enjoyment of book, but is what holds me back from giving a 5 star review.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- romperstomper
- 04-08-21
heartbreaking and honest
terrible to hear that Dixie Lewis died in a car accident in 2021. the relationship between her and her dad are a the center of a book that has important things to save about privilege in the US (in particular how it relates to the educational system)
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- chemclimber
- 23-02-22
A look at Junior Sports Industrial Complex
Amazing insight from the ultimate softball Dad into the American sports industrial complex, Made even better because it's delivered by Michael who is a very high performer in his own right.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Robert Caldwell
- 17-06-22
Enjoyable easy listen.
A book about family, sport and the money that makes it.
Was not what I was expecting, but still a nice insight into youth softball in the USA.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
- J. M. Poulain
- 13-10-21
Parental obsession with the Youth Industrial Sport
With his usual style of anecdotes into statistics Micheal Lewis investigates the financial side of Youth Sports in the USA that Tens of Millions of parents spend thousands of Dollars on their child's sport.
In a really creepy way of making 12 year old girls promise themselves to a particular college university and having parents spend thousands on plane tickets and coaching.
Never reaches as far as conclusions to some of the implications or anyone recommending changes
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Paul
- 10-03-23
Interesting but ultimately pointless
The book starts with an interesting perspective on non competitive sports, but draws no conclusions from it. Then Simply falls back on the usual USA competition for scholarship and therefore this is all quite dull
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Kefrif
- 09-04-23
Michael Lewis using his talents to whinge a bit about the cost of nurturing a child’s aspirations .
This has been a fairly interesting listen. I mean that in the most literal sense, because you don’t connect to the subject matter particularly, It comes off as a disguised complaint about his family having spent countless years and dollars on youth sports.
The problem is that the listener isn’t particularly motivated to care much about any of it. Mr Lewis even says as much - in as far as that if you don’t have a child in that sport system, you won’t be able to anchor yourself to any opinion of it.
I can’t blame him for his opinions on the youth sports industrial complex, because how it is tied to college, admissions and scholarships seems like a crooked game.
The subject probably deserves a much longer form piece of work being done on it, which I’d like to see Mr. Lewis do at some point in the future.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Barbara T.
- 03-01-24
Interesting analysis
Good insight of the youth sport industry in the US and college admissions rules. Quite disconcerting
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