Making the Majors: Transformation of Team Sports in America ~ Paperback ~ Eric M. Leifer

The author of this text traces the growth and development of major leagues in baseball, football, basketball, and hockey in the USA, and predicts fundamental changes as the majors pursue international expansion. He shows how every past expansion of sports publics has been accompanied by significant changes in the way sporting competition is organized. With each reorganization, the majors have created teams closer in ability, bringing repetition to competition across time, only to expand and energize the public's search for differences between teams and for events that disrupt the repetitive flow. Leifer's ideas have significant implications for the future of major league sports.Table of ContentsPreface Introduction Pursuing Accomplishment Constraints on Accomplishment Challenges Ahead Laying the Groundwork The Summer Game A Fall College Game An Inner-City Game A Winter Game On the Eve of Major Leagues Getting Established The First Major League Building a Viable League Early Challenges The Early Prototype A Successful Challenge The Landis Years Overview of a Successful Prototype Attachment Failures Out of Canton Into the Midwest Across the Border Failure Reconsidered The Modern Prototype Television and the NFL Problems Facing Rival Leagues Organizational Innovations Persisting Performance Inequality Modernization Reluctant Modernization Late Modernization Persisting Localism Where They Stand Changing Ways Deal Making in the Past The Meaning of Deals Structures of Deal Making The Impact of Deal Making on Performance Pursuing Opportunities Publics and Performance No Place Like Home Game Outcomes Publics and Performance Inequality Publics in Perspective The Accomplishment Facing the Future A Strange New World Appendix: The Major Leagues Appendix: Statistics Brief Appendix: League Statistics Notes References IndexAuthor BiographyEric Leifer has taught sociology at the University of North Carolina and at Columbia University. He is now an independent scholar and businessperson.