How to Cheat in Sports: Professional Tricks Exposed!
By Scott Ostler, Arthur Mount and Rick Reilly
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About this ebook
Scott Ostler
Scott Ostler is a nationally syndicated sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, and an eleven-time winner of the California Sportswriter of the Year award. He previously covered sports for the Los Angeles Times and the National Sports Daily. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
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Book preview
How to Cheat in Sports - Scott Ostler
HOW TO CHEAT IN SPORTS
Professional Tricks Exposed!
by SCOTT OSTLER
Foreword by Rick Reilly • Illustrations by Arthur Mount
Dedicated to my late dad, Don Ostler, the last honest man.
Foreword
Introduction
CH. 1 FOOTBALL
How to lose a defensive back
How to win a jump ball
How to set a pick
How to repel pesky jersey-grabbers
How to stay with a faster guy
How to be a shutdown cornerback
Lore—Making the cut
CH. 2 BASKETBALL
How to grind down an opponent
Sidebar: More tips from a master of defense
How to draw a pushing foul
How to flop like a pro
Sidebar: Do refs cheat?
How to get a defender to foul your foot
How to slow down a running team
How to get your opponent to choose the wrong basket
How to swap identities
Lore—The big bang
How to win a jump ball against a taller foe
How to extend your screen
How to adjust the rims
How to foul a shooter without getting caught
CH. 3 BASEBALL
How to cork a bat
Lore—Notes on a corkboard
How to throw a yarnball
How to throw a scuffball
Sidebar: It takes a village to scuff
Lore—The ball sorter
How to throw a spitball
Lore—Mr. Spit
Lore—Cops and rubbers
Lore—Educational TV
How to sell a missed tag or trap
How to peek at the catcher
How to alter a baseball’s molecular structure
Sidebar: The man who fixed Coors Field
How to deke the runner
How to use spies to detect the pitcher’s tips
Lore—Tipping the tippers
How to manage a swamp
Lore—The legend of Matty Schwab
CH. 4 MISCELLANEOUS
NASCAR: Their cheatin’ hearts
Ice Hockey: How to skate around the rules
Soccer: How to help
the ref
Golf: How to improve your game without improving your game
Golf: How to get relief
Golf: How to get into your opponent’s head
Sidebar: Cheating the golf cheaters
Bowling: How to roll with the best
Lacrosse: How to gear up
Water Polo: How to draw a foul
Horseshoes: How to skew a shoe
Kickball: How to get a leg up
Acknowledgments
FOREWORD
Rick Reilly
I didn’t write this foreword. Scott Ostler did. But I’m putting my name on it. That’s the kind of cheating I learned from Scott.
Have you ever played basketball with this man? Aside from his questionable use of elbows, his knack for grasping your shirt and shorts for leverage, and his habit of flopping like a Barry Bonds musical, he’s really very strict about the rules.
Yet here he is, writing a very funny how-to book on sports cheating. Imagine that—celebrating cheating at a time when the purity of sport is under question. But maybe it’s not as simple as that. Perhaps he believes by shining a light on the dark world of cheating, a more informed sports fan can watch for it, and tipped-off athletes can counter it. Then again, we are talking about Scott, so he’s probably just doing it to payoff his bookies.
It figures that one of the best sportswriters in San Francisco history would write a book about cheating, in that San Francisco is to cheating what Sheboygan is to bratwurst. Gaylord Perry of the Giants used to throw a spitter that needed triple-ply Bounty by the time it got to the plate. Barry Bonds’ records in the book should all have tiny syringes next to them. Victor Conte and his Bay Area BALCO lab will go down as the Henry Ford of Fraud.
I do understand why people cheat in sports. Whether you’re playing in the Super Bowl or a weekend touch-football mud bowl, competitive juices flow and the temptation is strong to stretch the rules. The will to win creates temporary (at least) insanity. It causes Kevin McHale to play in the ’87 NBA Finals with a broken foot, knowing he is shortening his career. It causes Washington Senators pitcher Tom Cheney to pitch 16 innings (228 pitches!) in one game, even though he isn’t getting overtime. It causes Dallas Cowboys TE Jason Witten to keep running for the end zone after his helmet comes off, despite being pursued by a 260-pound Eagles linebacker who’s in a cannibal club.
The primitive urge to win also causes many athletes, pro and amateur, to not only walk the fine line between honesty and larceny, but to sometimes swan dive off that fine line and wallow in Rosie Ruizville.
But what’s amazing is they do it without shame! I once heard an Argentinean explain why Diego Maradona’s Hand of God goal to win the 1986 World Cup (see page 156) wasn’t cheating. Tricking the referee is all part of the game,
he said. Ohhhhhhh.
And thus, this fascinating little book. With diagrams, no less.
Still, I’m stunned that bowlers cheat. It’s bowling, people!
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go cork my Big Bertha.
INTRODUCTION
WHEN I CONSIDER LIFE, ’TIS ALL A CHEAT. . .
—John Dryden
NEVER GIVE A SUCKER AN EVEN BREAK.
—W. C. Fields
Please don’t tell my mom I wrote this book.
I don’t want her to think her first son is a cheater, and he’s not. I have never cheated in sports, unless you count letting my sons beat me in sports when they were tots. Yes, I dumped games, like those World Series-tanking 1919 Black Sox, but I was helping my children build self-esteem. Somewhere down the line they’re going to return the favor.
So why did I, a noncheater, write a book about cheating in sports?
For the adventure. It’s been fun to explore a universal behavior that affects us all but isn’t talked about much until the cookie jar lid slams down on some poor sap’s hand. Cheating is everywhere. As Madge the Manicurist said to her shocked customer in that old TV commercial for dish soap, You’re soaking in it!
I did not find a sport free of cheating. Chess? Lousy with cheaters, at the highest levels. Yachting, rowing, lacrosse, bowling? You bet. Maybe cheating in so-called gentlemanly sports isn’t cricket,
but there is even cheating in cricket.
It’s not like I was picking at a scab on sports. Cheating goes right down to the bone. We were dealing with a core issue, and most people got that, so the interviews were fun. Asking people to talk about cheating is like asking them to talk about sex. Some find the subject uncomfortable or distasteful; others simply are not dialed in to that universe. But most people jumped right in. Hall of Famers, journeymen, high school coaches—almost everyone happily shared stories (and asked what others had offered).
Few interview