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The Best Team Money Can Buy
The Los Angeles Dodgers' Wild Struggle to Build a Baseball Powerhouse
By Molly Knight
Table of Contents
About The Book
With a new Afterword covering the 2015 season.
The bestselling, inside-the-clubhouse story of two tumultuous years when the Los Angeles Dodgers were re-made from top to bottom, becoming the most talked-about and most colorful team in baseball. “It’s as if Molly Knight ushers you behind the closed clubhouse doors.” (Buster Olney, ESPN)
In 2012 the Los Angeles Dodgers were bought out of bankruptcy in the most expensive sale in sports history. Los Angeles icon Magic Johnson and his partners hoped to put together a team worthy of Hollywood: consistently entertaining. By most accounts they have succeeded, if not always in the way they might have imagined.
In The Best Team Money Can Buy, Molly Knight tells the story of the Dodgers’ 2013 and 2014 seasons with detailed, previously unreported revelations. She shares a behind-the-scenes account of the astonishing sale of the Dodgers, as well as what the Dodgers actually knew in advance about rookie phenom and Cuban defector Yasiel Puig. We learn how close manager Don Mattingly was to losing his job during the 2013 season—and how the team turned around the season in the most remarkable fifty-game stretch of any team since World War II. Knight also provides a rare glimpse into the in-fighting and mistrust that derailed the team in 2014 and paints an intimate portrait of star pitcher Clayton Kershaw, including details about the record contract offer he turned down before accepting the richest contract any pitcher ever signed.
Exciting, surprising, and filled with juicy details, “a must-read for fans of the Dodgers and all Los Angeles sports teams….Knight’s undercover work is like none other” (Library Journal). The Best Team Money Can Buy is filled with “fascinating perspectives” (Los Angeles Times) and “interesting anecdotes about some of baseball’s most compelling figures” (The Sacramento Bee).
The bestselling, inside-the-clubhouse story of two tumultuous years when the Los Angeles Dodgers were re-made from top to bottom, becoming the most talked-about and most colorful team in baseball. “It’s as if Molly Knight ushers you behind the closed clubhouse doors.” (Buster Olney, ESPN)
In 2012 the Los Angeles Dodgers were bought out of bankruptcy in the most expensive sale in sports history. Los Angeles icon Magic Johnson and his partners hoped to put together a team worthy of Hollywood: consistently entertaining. By most accounts they have succeeded, if not always in the way they might have imagined.
In The Best Team Money Can Buy, Molly Knight tells the story of the Dodgers’ 2013 and 2014 seasons with detailed, previously unreported revelations. She shares a behind-the-scenes account of the astonishing sale of the Dodgers, as well as what the Dodgers actually knew in advance about rookie phenom and Cuban defector Yasiel Puig. We learn how close manager Don Mattingly was to losing his job during the 2013 season—and how the team turned around the season in the most remarkable fifty-game stretch of any team since World War II. Knight also provides a rare glimpse into the in-fighting and mistrust that derailed the team in 2014 and paints an intimate portrait of star pitcher Clayton Kershaw, including details about the record contract offer he turned down before accepting the richest contract any pitcher ever signed.
Exciting, surprising, and filled with juicy details, “a must-read for fans of the Dodgers and all Los Angeles sports teams….Knight’s undercover work is like none other” (Library Journal). The Best Team Money Can Buy is filled with “fascinating perspectives” (Los Angeles Times) and “interesting anecdotes about some of baseball’s most compelling figures” (The Sacramento Bee).
About The Author
Photograph by Andrew Bick
Molly Knight wrote about baseball for ESPN the Magazine for eight seasons. Her work has also appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Glamour, SELF, Baseball Prospectus, and Variety. A native of Los Angeles and lifelong Dodgers fan, she lives in LA. The Best Team Money Can Buy is her first book.
Product Details
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster (July 14, 2015)
- Length: 336 pages
- ISBN13: 9781476776316
Raves and Reviews
“From the outside looking in, the Dodgers have been a bubbling cauldron of personality, talent and moods, with the occasional dollop of jealousy. In The Best Team Money Can Buy, it's as if Molly Knight ushers you behind the closed clubhouse doors to see it for yourself.”
– Buster Olney, ESPN
"Fascinating perspectives. . . . [Knight] knows her way around the clubhouse, and she writes about the game with authority."
– David L. Ulin, The Los Angeles Times
“With unprecedented access, Knight brings readers inside the clubhouse and the front office as no other writer has with any team, showing us a modern-day soap opera playing out at 60 feet 6 inches.”
– Keith Law, Analyst for ESPN's "Baseball Tonight"
“A well-written book that offers a nuanced look into the dynamics of a big league clubhouse. . . . A must-read.”
– Brendan Gawlowski, Baseball Prospectus
“In The Best Team Money Can Buy, Molly Knight lifts the curtain on one of the premier franchises in sports, taking readers beyond the field and into the clubhouse, board rooms and homes of some of the most compelling athletes of this generation. It is a rocky path—but a rollicking ride—for a glamour team bankrolled by billionaire owners who lifted the team from bankruptcy and will try anything to win a championship. With keen observations culled from tireless reporting, Knight deftly paints an intimate, nuanced portrait of the people behind it all, bringing these characters to life as nobody has before.”
– Tyler Kepner, national baseball writer for The New York Times
“An entertaining chronicle of two Dodger seasons. . . . Knight supplies plenty of juicy clubhouse details.”
– Gene Maddaus, L.A. Weekly
“For any self-respecting fan, putting this book down would be like trying to eat just one garlic fry. . . . An agile exploration of the Dodgers’ vertiginous 2013 season. Knight had her notebook out for all of it.”
– Los Angeles Magazine
"Consistently absorbing. . . . Knight is a talented journalist, and there's enough tumult in these pages to hold the attention of even a casual fan."
– Kevin Canfield, The San Francisco Chronicle
“Entertaining . . . offers interesting anecdotes about some of baseball’s most compelling figures, among them Clayton Kershaw, Zack Greinke, Don Mattingly and the enigmatic Yasiel Puig.”
– Ailene Voisin, The Sacramento Bee
"Knight delivers an elegant précis of a baseball team's season, and you don't have to be a Dodgers fan to enjoy it."
– Kirkus Reviews
"A compelling, well-examined book that exemplifies what occurs behind the scenes. A must-read for fans of the Dodgers and all Los Angeles sports teams. Knight's undercover work is like none other."
– Library Journal
Resources and Downloads
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- Book Cover Image (jpg): The Best Team Money Can Buy eBook 9781476776316
- Author Photo (jpg): Molly Knight Photograph by Andrew Bick(0.1 MB)
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