Sports Careers

Fascinating facts and first-person accounts highlight some of the most interesting jobs that take place behind the scenes in professional sports. Get a glimpse at what it takes to make it as a coach, team physician, sportscaster, and more and find out what goes on behind the glamour.

Michael Jordan credits George Mumford with transforming his on-court leadership of the Bulls, helping Jordan lead the team to six NBA championships. Mumford also helped Kobe Bryant, Andrew Bynum, and Lamar Odom and countless other NBA players turn around their games. A widely respected public speaker and coach, Mumford is sharing his own story and the strategies that have made these athletes into stars in The Mindful Athlete: The Secret to Pure Performance.

Using the greatest material from his popular Blog Maverick, Cuban has collected and updated his postings on business and life to provide a catalog of insider knowledge on what it takes to become a thriving entrepreneur. He tells his own rags-to-riches story of how he went from selling powdered milk and sleeping on friends' couches to owning his own company and becoming a multibillion-dollar success story.

In the world of strength and conditioning, learning how to move others not just physically, but also psychologically and emotionally is paramount to getting the most out of them. People are the ultimate performance variable, and understanding how to effectively blend knowledge of proper training with the nuances of human behavior is integral to helping athletes achieve their ultimate goals. Unfortunately, while much attention has been given to the science of physical training, little attention has been given to the science of communication.

Troy Horne here. Your mental-toughness guide! I am here to help parents understand how to help your young athlete navigate this mental-toughness journey. I know where you are, and I know how to help you help your young athlete find their mental toughness.

Being a champion is a choice. Bullies, self-doubt, failure, abuse, humiliation and setbacks plagued his life. Through a desire to keep pushing forward and the resilience of never quitting, MMA pioneer and Jiu Jitsu World Champion Chad George found a way to transform his self-destructive thinking to believing he can accomplish anything. In "A Champion's Mindset" he shares his journey of building the fighter within and how we all have to FIGHT for what we want in life.

When Meb Keflezighi - the first person in history to win both the Boston and New York City marathons as well as an Olympic marathon medal - ran his final marathon in New York in 2017, it marked the end of an extraordinary distance-running career. Meb's last marathon was also his 26th, and each of those marathons has come with its own unique challenges, rewards, and outcomes. In 26 Marathons, Meb takes listeners on those legendary races, along every hill, bend, and unexpected turn of events that made each marathon an exceptional learning experience, and a fascinating story.

For more than 20 years, author Martin Rooney has coached professional sport stars, Olympic champions, and business leaders to high levels of performance, analyzing thousands of real-life examples of what works and what doesn’t. Coming across like a simple parable, this engaging audiobook gives you an easy-to-use yet highly effective formula for becoming a better coach for your teams, in your business, and in your personal life.

In spring 2018, England cricket had a performance problem. The Test team hadn’t won a Test match overseas for nearly two years. Recently crushed in the Ashes, England teams were world ranked 5th, 4th and 2nd across the three formats. The England and Wales Cricket Board approached Ed Smith, asking him to bring in a whole new philosophy. Over the next three years, England’s teams won 7 out of 10 completed matches—better than England had ever performed in the board’s history. Making Decisions shares Ed’s approach to finding success.

In The Winning Mindset, Professor Damian Hughes, the acclaimed author of Liquid Thinking and How to Think Like Sir Alex Ferguson, draws on both his lifetime experience and academic background within sport, organization and change psychology to reveal the best ways to create a winning mindset in both personal and professional life.

When I started my first martial art school, all I knew about growing a dojo was that I needed more students. So, I set about getting more students every way I knew how, and I kept adding more ways to do that as I went along.

Martial arts business owners! In Martial Arts School Staff and Leadership Team Training, I'm revealing my entire system for recruiting, selecting, and training staff and leadership teams for martial arts school owners. Any style! Any system! Any school! You can easily adapt and use this system for training and developing your own staff and leadership team. And not only will you find out how to train them—you'll learn how to train them right so you keep your program quality high!

To really be successful, you can’t expect to work until the day you die. You need to gather enough assets, investments and cash to pay for your lifestyle after your income stops. This book will tell you exactly how to do that, and share a dozen real-life examples and stories from real millionaires who own gyms. They're all from within the Two-Brain Business mentorship program, and I know you'll love them, because they're just like you.

My RAD Career is a roller coaster ride through Hollywood in the 1980s as seen through the eyes of one of the cult figures of the era, Bill Allen (star of the movie RAD). Starting as a teen actor on his first ill-fated film alongside a young George Clooney, Bill shares his personal and professional relationships through film and television roles with some of the greatest actors and directors of a generation. Told like you're sitting with him over drinks at a bar, Bill takes you inside the show biz bubble to reveal his most jaw-dropping experiences spanning three decades.

Whether you’re a seasoned veteran of the game or have never set foot on a court, How Basketball Can Save the World will empower you to become more resilient, tolerant, and wise in your relationship with yourself, others, and the world around you.

Imagine if you had as much energy for your family at 8 p.m. as you have at the office at 8 a.m.? Whether or not you can hit a home run or run a marathon, this program will train you to perform at the highest possible levels in both your professional and family life.

I'm Mike Massie, author of Small Dojo Big Profits and over a dozen other martial arts business books and courses. I've spent years learning how to put together all the "gold nuggets" of information that I picked up from watching and listening to real martial arts business "masters", observing what they did and taking it home to test it in my own studio. Along the way, I learned what not to do through trial and error, all while developing and honing this into a complete system for maximizing martial arts school profits while keeping my overhead to respectable levels.

Fitness coaching is more than just a job. It is a true vocation that allows you to accompany people towards a better version of themselves, both physically and mentally. Becoming a fitness coach is of course learning how to create effective programs, but it is also understanding human psychology, inspiring your clients and building a career that combines passion and success. If you have opened this book, it is because you feel this calling: to help others achieve their physical goals, to bring a real change in their lives and, at the same time, to build a rewarding and prosperous career.

Why is it that athletes on the same team, with the same training, nutrition and strength have different levels of performance? When all else is equal, there is a specific mindset that lets the distinct few gain an advantage. You do not need to be an athlete to benefit from Personal Podium! This book offers actionable steps and inspiring stories that will tap into your greatest potential no matter your life pursuits.

In Sport Matters: Leadership, Power, and the Quest for Respect in Sports, Shropshire examines the need for diversity, inclusion, respect, and equality in sports, focusing on the need for leadership to embrace and deliver these principles in a real and tangible way within the sports industry. He also introduces the sports power matrix, a framework for understanding power within the sports industry.