You Can Observe a Lot by Watching - by Yogi Berra

About the Book

Yogi Berra, one of baseball's greatest catchers and bestselling author of "When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!" uses stories and black-and-white photos from his legendary career to show readers how to be better team players.

Book Synopsis

The most valuable team player in sports shows you what "teamwork" really means
What does it take to be a real team player, especially in a society that glorifies selfishness and a corporate culture that often uses "team player" as a buzzword but rewards only the showboaters and prima donnas? Well, You Can Observe a Lot by Watching. In this happy and hilarious guide to teamwork, sportsmanship, and winning, Yogi Berra draws on the timeless wisdom handed down by example from ballplayers who came before him to inspire you to make the right choices and become not only a better team player--at sports, at work, and in life--but a better person.
Filled with colorful stories from his life and career, not to mention the down-to-earth wit and insight that Yogi fans love, You Can Observe a Lot by Watching shows you how to make a bad team good and a good team great.

From the Back Cover

"The most valuable team player in sports" shows you what "teamwork" really means

What does it take to be a real team player, especially in a society that glorifies selfishness and a corporate culture that often uses "team player" as a buzzword but rewards only the showboaters and prima donnas? Well, "You Can Observe a Lot by Watching." In this happy and hilarious guide to teamwork, sportsmanship, and winning, Yogi Berra draws on the timeless wisdom handed down by example from ballplayers who came before him to inspire you to make the right choices and become not only a better team player--at sports, at work, and in life--but a better person.

Filled with colorful stories from his life and career, not to mention the down-to-earth wit and insight that Yogi fans love, "You Can Observe a Lot by Watching" shows you how to make a bad team good and a good team great.

Review Quotes

Notorious for his run-ins with the English language, baseball great Berra has become an improbably prolific author. He and coauthor Kaplan follow up 2002's What Time Is It? You Mean Now? with this charming, if meandering, book about teamwork. In anecdote after anecdote about his legendary career with the Yankees, his not-so-legendary career as a manager, and his days growing up on the streets of St. Louis, Berra shows how respect and cooperation made him a success on the field and in life. Lessons include the importance of punctuality, owning one's mistakes, and a positive attitude. For better or worse, nuggets of wisdom ("Never give an opponent added motivation") are buried beneath a mountain of less-than-insightful sports ephemera (Derek Jeter is "a good leader because he always knows and does what's right"). Still, Berra's optimism and wry, absurdist sense of humor make it a fast read that should resonate with fans; as one would expect, Berra includes plenty of well-meaning advice in his signature, well-near-meaningless style: "Unless you have an excuse, there's no excuse." (May) (Publishers Weekly, June 2008)

""...[it] offers nearly half a century's distilled wisdom on the subject of teammates and the value of team play from the biggest winner (14 pennants and 10 World Series rings) in baseball history..."" (YouCanObserveSyn, April 13, 2008)

""...[it] offers nearly half a century's distilled wisdom on the subject of teammates and the value of team play from the biggest winner (14 pennants and 10 World Series rings) in baseball history..."" (Post Dispatch (St Louis), April 6, 2008)

About the Author

YOGI BERRA is one of baseball's greatest catchers, the Yankees' greatest players, and the game's greatest ambassadors.

DAVE KAPLAN, a former editor and reporter for the "New York Daily News," is the director of the Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center. He has cowritten Yogi's last three books.