I’ve always been floored by the quality of the feedback and discussion from Smart Football readers (whether on this site, Grantland or on Twitter or Facebook), so it’s always fascinating to see which books are most popular among readers. The following is a breakdown of the books purchased over the last year by Smart Football readers. I get very minor referral revenues from Amazon purchases and, as a result, I am able to track which books are purchased by readers. The data is entirely anonymous but it is, to me at least, quite interesting. (Click to enlarge the charts.)
The Most Popular Books Bought by Smart Football Readers in 2014
The Most Popular Books Bought by Smart Football Readers in 2014 (excluding The Essential Smart Football)
Below is the full list of books. Note that I simply included the top books and did not include a separate “other” category. I thought the list was fairly eclectic this year, as non-football books had numbers comparable to the football ones. And, as usual, books that focused on football strategy dominated all other sports or football titles.
- The Essential Smart Football, by Chris B. Brown
- The Hurry-Up, No-Huddle: An Offensive Philosophy, by Gus Malzahn
- How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character, by Paul Tough — My readers have good taste, as this was my favorite book that I read this year.
- Attacking Coverages With the Passing Game, by Steve Axman
- Concept Passing: Teaching the Modern Passing Game, by Dan Gonzalez
- Developing an Offensive Game Plan, by Brian Billick
- Complete Offensive Line, by Rick Trickett
- Football Scouting Methods, by Steve Belichick
- Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt, by Michael Lewis
- The Outsiders: Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success, by William Thorndike
- The Metaphysical Club: A Story of Ideas in America, by Louis Menand
- Coaching the Under Front Defense, by Jerry Gordon
- Recoded and Reloaded: An Updated Structure for a Complete Passing Game at Any Level, by Dan Gonzalez