The Education of Kendrick Perkins
A Memoir
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- $17.99
Publisher Description
The Education of Kendrick Perkins is an intimate memoir about race, fatherhood, and basketball, from former NBA player and outspoken cultural critic, Kendrick "Perk" Perkins.
At age eighteen, Kendrick Perkins left his grandparents' run-down yellow house in Beaumont, Texas for the last time. Sure, he'd traveled the country for camps and tournaments. He'd banged and bruised with the biggest and most skilled players the amateur basketball world had to offer. But he'd always come back home. In this powerful and intimate memoir, readers follow Perkins on his journey from small-town Texas athlete to the NBA.
Both on and off the court, Perk gained a reputation for his candor and conviction--his unabiding sense of right and wrong. Now he tells all, offering the sports insights for which he has become a stellar ESPN commentator, and for the first time ever, sharing frank opinions about racial justice, political consciousness, and fatherhood. Years spent playing against and alongside giants like Kobe Bryant and LeBron James helped shape Perk's athleticism, but this is a story all his own, the story of an education.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Kendrick Perkins, the former pro basketball player turned TV analyst, is far more interested in discussing “we” than obsessing about “me.” Basketball provided Big Perk an escape from the crippling poverty of his grandparents’ East Texas home, but even a multimillion-dollar contract couldn’t shield him from systemic racism. Perkins’ memoir covers his on-court career—including winning a championship in Boston—but the book’s main focus is his staunch belief that athletes can impact social change. During his pro career, he played with some of the greatest players of his generation, including LeBron James and Kevin Durant, and it’s their character as people that he wishes to explore. Perkins also brings the same direct approach that’s fueled his postretirement television career to his own story, tying together his journey with the larger Black experience. Perkins’ fearless commitment to seeing the world with his eyes wide open makes this a sports memoir that resonates well beyond the basketball court.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Former NBA center Perkins takes readers behind the scenes of pro hoops and shares his views on racism in this affecting memoir. Perkins was raised by his grandparents from age five, when his mother was murdered. He recounts the loving environment in his grandparents' home, noting "there were headwinds, forces blowing back at me the whole time, but there was enough pressure in the opposite direction to keep me moving forward on the right path," and counts basketball, which he began playing at age seven, as one of those positive forces. Drafted just out of high school in 2003, Perkins details his professional arc through the NBA, including his time on the Boston Celtics' 2008 championship team, but spends ample time discussing off-court matters, stating that Barack Obama missed the truth that "American society seeks the incarceration of Black men" in his famous "Father's Day Speech"; reflecting on famous Black athletes like Jackie Robinson, who harnessed their status to advance civil rights; and contending that LeBron James has had some of the greatest impact on racial equality by leveraging his own social media influence to protest discrimination and violence. Perkins's inside view of how Black NBA athletes have fought for equality over the course of history is eye-opening. This will resonate with basketball fans and champions of social justice.
