Expensive Basketball

A Best Sports Books of 2025

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Rap Year Book and Basketball (and Other Things), a clever and inventive examination of some of basketball's most iconic players, moments, games, and more, with original illustrations by Ian Klarer.

Everything in basketball is measured. Everything in basketball is counted, and quantified, and computed. And yet, no matter how expansive the list of various pinpoint-specific statistical categories gets, some basketball things remain uncountable, and unquantifiable.

Some moments are more poetry than calculation; more art than numerical value; more feeling than data processing. And thus: Expensive Basketball.

From the final 196 seconds of Kobe Bryant's playing career to the Sue Bird backpedal, from the erosive terror of Tim Duncan to the Larry Bird memory carousel, Expensive Basketball is an affirmation of feelings.