John Feinstein Books in Order

Feinstein turns his attention to Ivy League football, following coaches, players, and rivalries in a conference that refuses to chase realignment or big television money. He highlights tradition, academics, and the quieter but still intense stakes of fall Saturdays in the Ancient Eight.

This book looks inside Duke men’s basketball under Mike Krzyzewski, framing the program around its five national titles. Feinstein blends season-by-season storytelling with portraits of players and staff to show how a modern college dynasty is built and sustained.

Feinstein traces David Feherty’s path from European Tour winner to beloved, sharp-tongued broadcaster. He covers Feherty’s humor, his struggles with addiction and loss, and the way he reinvented himself as one of golf’s most candid and human storytellers.

Andi Carillo is an eleven-year-old tennis prodigy, suddenly chased by agents and big-money promises, while her best friend Jeff Michaels slips into the number-two spot and starts to envy her rise. Their season tests loyalty, pressure, and what winning is really worth.

Feinstein examines race and power in modern sports, from coaching and front-office hiring to player protests and anthem demonstrations. Drawing on wide-ranging interviews, he shows how much has changed, how much has not, and what resistance still looks like from inside locker rooms.

Feinstein travels through college basketball’s overlooked corners, visiting mid-major programs and small gyms where March dreams still matter. He profiles coaches, players, and fan bases whose seasons are defined not by TV contracts, but by the chance to reach one shining weekend.

In this reflective project, Feinstein looks back on the friendships he formed with coaches, athletes, and fellow journalists. He shares personal stories from locker rooms, press rows, and long road trips that shaped both his reporting and his life away from deadlines.

Jeff and Andi swap soccer for basketball, only to find new kinds of bad coaching and bias on the court. As a clueless, sometimes racist coach mismanages Andi’s team, both friends must decide how loudly to push back while still trying to win games.

Sixth graders Jeff Michaels and Andi Carillo make their school’s new soccer team, but a sexist coach benches Andi despite her obvious talent. When Jeff’s TV-reporter dad helps the story hit the airwaves, a local squabble turns into a citywide fight over fairness in youth sports.

Seventeen-year-old Frank Baker is a golf phenomenon headed for the U.S. Amateur and a possible Masters invite. His father wants him to cash in immediately, while a secret adviser urges patience. Frank has to balance family pressure, amateur rules, and the lure of quick money.

Centering on pros like Alex Smith, Andrew Luck, Joe Flacco, Ryan Fitzpatrick, and Doug Williams, Feinstein shows what it really means to play quarterback in the NFL. He digs into injuries, film rooms, leadership, contracts, and the scrutiny that comes with the game’s most visible job.

This book goes inside the 2016 Ryder Cup at Hazeltine, where a frustrated U.S. team finally broke Europe’s dominance. Feinstein follows captains, stars, and role players through selection, preparation, and three electric days that reminded everyone why team golf can feel so personal.

Best friends Tom, who is Black, and Jason, who is white and Jewish, earn scholarships to an elite football academy. Coaches quickly slot them into stereotypical positions, exposing deep-seated racism. The boys must decide how much they are willing to risk to challenge the system.

Feinstein traces the intertwined careers of Dean Smith, Mike Krzyzewski, and Jim Valvano, three coaches whose schools sit within a short drive of one another. Through rivalries, friendships, and personal struggles, he shows how their battles reshaped ACC basketball over decades.

In the spring chapter of the Triple Threat series, Alex Myers hopes baseball will be a fresh start. Instead he collides with Matt Gordon, a teammate returning from a steroid scandal, and a new rivalry over both playing time and a girl they both care about.

Alex Myers turns from football to basketball, expecting to be the star guard. Instead he comes off the bench while old controversies still hang over him. As he fights for trust and minutes, he learns that being the sixth man can mean changing a game in subtler ways.

Feinstein spends a season in Triple-A baseball, following players, managers, and an umpire living just a step from the majors. Their stories show the grind, uncertainty, and small pleasures of a world where one phone call can change a life or never come at all.

Freshman quarterback Alex Myers lands on a powerhouse high school team where the coach’s son already owns the starting job. When Alex finally breaks through, a surprise positive steroid test threatens his season and reputation, forcing him to uncover who really wants him off the field.

High school star Terrell Jamerson is the top basketball recruit in the country, with his best friend Danny Wilcox riding shotgun. As agents, shoe reps, and boosters swarm them with offers, the boys have to navigate temptation, NCAA rules, and adults who see them as business opportunities.

This portrait of Arnold Palmer combines narrative and photography to follow his journey from small-town amateur to global golf icon. Feinstein highlights Palmer’s fearless style, major victories, business savvy, and the personal touch that built the devoted following known as Arnie’s Army.

Teen reporter Susan Carol Anderson makes the U.S. Olympic swim team, while Stevie Thomas covers her first Games as a journalist. When a powerful agency seems willing to manipulate results to protect its investment, Stevie races to expose a plot that could taint Susan Carol’s big moment.

Drawing on decades of reporting, Feinstein revisits his relationships with figures like Bob Knight, Dean Smith, Mike Krzyzewski, Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, and John McEnroe. He shares behind-the-scenes stories that show how access, trust, and occasional conflict shaped his best-known work.

Stevie Thomas and Susan Carol Anderson head to Annapolis and West Point to cover the Army–Navy football game. Amid pageantry and tradition, they stumble onto a secret that threatens to ruin the matchup, forcing them to weigh service-academy loyalty against their duty as reporters.

Feinstein revisits the 2003 golf season, when Mike Weir, Jim Furyk, Ben Curtis, and Shaun Micheel broke through to win the four majors while Tiger Woods faltered. He follows each underdog through the aftermath, asking how a single week of brilliance reshapes a career and a life.

Covering the World Series, Stevie and Susan Carol focus on Norbert Doyle, a journeyman pitcher suddenly thrust into the spotlight. As holes appear in his touching backstory, the teen reporters uncover a buried tragedy and a tangle of lies that could turn a feel-good tale upside down.

Co-written with Rocco Mediate, this book tells the inside story of Mediate’s improbable duel with Tiger Woods at the 2008 U.S. Open. It follows his career, mindset, and that unforgettable week when a veteran journeyman nearly toppled the game’s dominant star.

This season-long portrait of pitchers Mike Mussina and Tom Glavine follows them through 2007 in New York, chasing personal milestones while anchoring the Yankees and Mets. Feinstein uses their routines, slumps, and adjustments to explain the mental and physical demands of modern pitching.

Feinstein chronicles the 2005 PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament, where veterans and hopefuls play six nerve-racking rounds for a few precious cards. Through their wins and heartbreaks, he shows how thin the line is between golf’s elite and those fighting just to stay in the game.

Assigned to the Super Bowl, Stevie Thomas discovers that several players on a playoff team failed drug tests that have been quietly buried. With Susan Carol’s help, he has to decide whether breaking the biggest story of his young career is worth the enemies it will create.

At the U.S. Open tennis tournament, rising star Nadia Symanova disappears just before a match. Teen reporters Stevie and Susan Carol suspect more than a simple publicity stunt and dig into agents, family conflicts, and tournament politics to find out who benefits from her vanishing.

Feinstein takes readers behind the scenes of the Final Four, exploring what the event means to coaches, players, officials, and even scalpers. Using past tournaments and personal stories, he shows how one weekend can define careers and reshape entire college programs.

Embedded with the Baltimore Ravens for a season, Feinstein watches the NFL from inside meeting rooms, training rooms, and sidelines. He shows how injuries, roster churn, and constant pressure create a culture where every player knows he could be replaced by the “next man up” at any moment.

Middle school reporters Stevie Thomas and Susan Carol Anderson win a contest that sends them to the Final Four with press passes. There they overhear a plot to blackmail a star player into throwing the title game and must decide how to expose it without getting hurt.

Built around years of weekly lunches with legendary Celtics coach Red Auerbach, this book strings together his favorite stories. Feinstein lets Auerbach talk about players, rivals, front-office battles, and life, capturing the voice of a coach who always had another tale ready.

This biography tells the story of Bruce Edwards, Tom Watson’s longtime caddie, from their early days on tour through Edwards’s battle with ALS. Feinstein traces their friendship, the grind of pro golf, and the grace Edwards showed as his health failed.

Open recounts how Bethpage Black, a demanding public course on Long Island, became the site of the 2002 U.S. Open. Feinstein follows the years of preparation and then the championship itself, highlighting players, officials, and the everyday golfers who helped create a historic week.

This narrative reconstructs the 1977 NBA game in which Kermit Washington’s punch nearly killed Rudy Tomjanovich. Feinstein explores both men’s lives before and after the incident and how that single moment changed league rules, public perception, and the futures of everyone involved.

Feinstein spends a season with the Patriot League, one of Division I basketball’s smallest conferences, where academics truly come first. He follows players and coaches who juggle demanding coursework with long bus rides and still chase the dream of reaching the NCAA tournament.

Covering the Masters, U.S. Open, British Open, and PGA Championship in 1998, Feinstein shows how golf’s four majors test players in different ways. He blends tournament drama with history, personalities, and the growing pressure modern stars face to measure up in those four weeks.

Subtitled "Tiger Woods, Master or Martyr," this book looks at Woods’s rapid rise in the late 1990s, the expectations he carried, and the business and media forces around him. Feinstein questions what it means for one young golfer to become a global symbol so quickly.

Focusing on the 1996–97 ACC season, Feinstein follows nine programs from midnight practices through league play and into March. Along the way he captures the stress on coaches, the grind on players, and the unique culture of a conference where every night can feel like a rivalry game.

Feinstein spends a season inside Army and Navy football, from summer training to the pageantry of their annual game. He shows how military life, academic demands, and service commitments shape players who know their football careers will likely end with graduation.

Burned-out reporter Bobby Kelleher retreats to Shelter Island for rest but is drawn into the recruiting circus around a Lithuanian high school basketball phenom. When a coaching friend is murdered, Bobby must untangle the money and motives driving big-time college basketball.

Following a year on the PGA Tour, Feinstein focuses less on superstars and more on pros fighting to keep their cards. He captures locker room banter, pressure-packed Sundays, and the emotional swings of golfers whose livelihoods depend on a few swings each week.

Spending a season inside Major League Baseball, Feinstein looks at players, managers, front offices, and the commissioner’s office. He examines labor battles, escalating salaries, clubhouse life, and the competing interests that make running and playing the sport far from simple.

When Maryland’s governor is assassinated during a speech, reporter Bobby Kelleher covers the story and soon finds himself investigating a conspiracy that links radical activists and far-right extremists. His search for the truth pits him against people who are comfortable with violence.

Feinstein spends the 1990 season on the men’s and women’s professional tennis tours, following stars and journeymen across the Grand Slams and lesser events. He reveals rivalries, politics, and the commercial pressures that shape a sport where access to players is tightly controlled.

This book revisits Duke’s 1978 basketball team, which reached the national title game but never did win a championship together. Feinstein follows players and coaches years later, exploring what it means to be remembered for coming close rather than finishing the job.

Feinstein chronicles the 1987–88 college basketball season from practices in October through the Final Four. He drops in on bluebloods and mid-majors, star players and end-of-bench grinders, offering a wide-angle look at how a single season feels from the inside.

Granted unprecedented access to Indiana coach Bob Knight and his 1985–86 team, Feinstein documents every practice, tirade, and quiet conversation. The result is a close-up of a combustible coach, his players, and the pressure cooker of big-time college basketball.