I grew up in Southern California and was a huge fan of professional basketball, attending games through the 1980s, when the sport’s popularity put ticket prices out of my reach. I had a secret dream to be a sportswriter, so might be a tiny bit envious of the career of Scott Howard-Cooper, the author of this new biography of Steve Kerr. Howard-Cooper also grew up in Southern California, and has been a sportswriter at the Los Angeles Times since 1981, covering the NBA since 1988. 

Full disclosure: I LOVE Steve Kerr. He isn’t your typical NBA guy: the son of two academics, he was born in Beirut and grew up splitting time between Southern California and the Middle East. His path to the NBA was fascinating: even as a student, he was a terrific shooter, but was virtually ignored by all major college basketball recruiters, until he was fortunate to get a scholarship to Arizona, where he played under the first of several amazing mentors, Lute Olson. While at Arizona, his father, who was then the President of American University in Beirut, was the victim of a terrorist assassination. He had always thought “Bad things happened to other people. I was immune from anything like that …”

After playing alongside Michael Jordan et al in Chicago, where he  was coached by another mentor, Phil Jackson. Over the years, his teammates included Jordan, Shaquille O’Neal, Tim Duncan, and Steve Nash, and coaches included Greg Popovich during Kerr’s time in San Antonio. After his playing career, he became a coach at Golden State, where he “…would…continue to emphasize the four core values–competition, compassion, mindfulness, and joy…” Over the years, Kerr has won eight NBA titles (five as a player, three as a coach), and will surely be in the Hall of Fame one day. Despite serious health problems during the Warriors’ championship years that caused him to take leaves of absence, he kept working: “instead of wanting to get healthy  to return to work, he returned to work to get healthy.”

Overall, this is one of the best sports biographies I’ve read, and Howard-Cooper has done a terrific job capturing the focus on communication and teamwork that Kerr is known for. In his acknowledgments, the author notes that he had a “…vision that the story be about a man who had an interesting career but a fascinating life.” I recently read Tall Men, Short Shorts, another NBA-focused book by Leigh Mountville, sportswriter for the Boston Celtics, that focuses on the 1969 Lakers-Celtics championship series but has a wealth of stories about basketball players and coaches. That one was done primarily from the author’s memory (he admitted that he wishes he’d kept a journal over the years), while this book is incredibly well researched and documented. So much so that my Kindle showed I was just 74% through when I got to the Notes. Steve Kerr–a Life is definitely a must-read for basketball fans, but will be enjoyed by anyone who appreciates a well-written story about an incredible person. I give it one star for each of Kerr’s rings earned as a player: Five big stars. Thanks to William Morrow / Custom House and NetGalley for an advance copy in exchange for this honest review. And I love Steve Kerr more than ever.