Marc Tracy and Franklin Foer’s new collection Jewish Jocks: An Unorthodox Hall of Fame, a series of essays profiling some of the most influential Jewish personalities in the world of sports, has won the 2012 National Jewish Book Award for best Anthology. Jonathan D. Sarna’s When General Grant Expelled the Jews, published by our cousins at Nextbook Press, is a finalist in the American Jewish Studies category. You can view the full list of award-winners here.

Tracy, a former Tablet staff writer and longtime friend of Jewcy (he wrote about Krusty The Clown, the great Jewish entertainer on The Simpsons, for our Network Jews series), recently stopped by Tablet’s podcast, Vox Tablet, where he and Foer discussed some of the lesser-known Jewish athletes featured in the book—such as Sidney Franklin, the bullfighter from Brooklyn—as well as bigger names like Oakland Raiders manager Al Davis. Have a listen:

2012 National Jewish Book Award Winners [Jewish Book Council] Previously: Network Jews: Krusty the Clown, Jewish Entertainer on ‘The Simpsons’

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Over at Tablet, Jordan Teicher introduces us to Sandy Pyonin, a little-known basketball coach from New Jersey who’s been responsible for getting 34 players to the NBA, most notably Kyrie Irving and Al Harrington. His latest prospect? Tyler Roberson, who recently committed to Syracuse.

Still, no one seems to have heard much about Pyonin, whose day job is at Jersey’s Golda Och Academy, where he runs the basketball program and teaches gym class. The guy doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page. What gives?

Former players regularly use the word “crazy” to describe their coach—crazy as in ridiculously focused, intense, and fanatical. Zack Rosen, point guard for Hapoel Holon of the Israeli Super League, trained with Sandy from 2003 to 2005. “The guy knows the game and he knows how to work you. He pushes you every day.” Before joining Hapoel Holon, Rosen had an accomplished career at the University of Pennsylvania, winning Ivy League Player of the Year in 2012 and earning a spot on the Philadelphia 76ers Summer League roster after graduating. Rosen believes Pyonin helped him develop a strong work ethic in those early years at the Y.

The NBA’s Jewish Playmaker [Tablet]

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• Jewish Jocks editor Marc Tracy explains how sports are a lot like Hollywood. [Prosen People]


• Jews need to stop eating margarine, Taffy Brodesser-Akner explains. [Tablet]

• It looks like HBO has already greenlit a third season of Lena Dunham’s Girls. You know, before the second season even airs. [Vulture]

• Jennifer Lawrence likes to watch Rob Schneider movies. [Vulture]

• And now, for something completely different: two Jewish guys doing stand-up. [The Pit]

• Homeland star Damien Lewis wrote “From one Muslim to another” on a DVD set the cast signed for Obama. [EW]

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• The Islanders are ditching Nassau Coliseum for Jay-Z’s Barclays Center, which was their second choice of residence after Murray Hill.

• Frank Foer explains why his new book, Jewish Jocks: An Unorthodox Hall of Fame, co-edited with Marc Tracy, isn’t the world’s shortest book.

• Judd Apatow will guest-edit Vanity Fair’s April comedy issue.

• In related news, Seth Rogen says that Judd Apatow is no Ben Affleck.

• Josh Lambert agrees with Jewcy columnist Jacob Silverman on the troubling way people keep referencing porn star James Deen’s Jewishness.

• Drunk Jeff Goldblum is back, and this time he’s using PayPal:

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There’s a great article today in Tablet Magazine about the epic rise and fall of Tamir Goodman, the high school basketball phenom nicknamed ‘Jewish Jordan’—and his unlikely friendship with Omri Casspi, the first Israeli to play in the NBA. When Casspi was traded from the Sacramento Kings to the Cleveland Cavaliers, Goodman, who lives in Cleveland, brought over a mezuzah! How do you say ‘bromance’ in Hebrew?

The two bonded, it seems, not only over their shared faith—Casspi, who was raised in a secular Israeli home, has gotten more religious since getting drafted to the NBA in 2009—but also over their professional experiences. When Casspi struggled last season, he turned to Goodman for advice. If anyone knows how to deal with disappointments on the court, it’s the former ‘Jewish Jordan’ himself, who retired from the sport at 27 and now happily coaches basketball camps for young Jewish kids.

From the article:

“Omri is the story of the underdog, the self-made man,” says David Blatt, the coach of Maccabi Tel Aviv, who has worked with both athletes. And Goodman’s is the story of how the weight of expectations can overwhelm a young athlete. “Even today the term ‘Jewish Jordan’ makes me cringe because it did such a disservice to him,” Blatt says. Despite their different trajectories, however, Casspi and Goodman would discover they had more in common than they realized. They would share the same agent, Steven Heumann; the same team uniform, Maccabi Tel Aviv; and then, in 2011, the same Cleveland area code.

The Jewish Jordan Subs Out [Tablet Magazine] From the archives: Will There Ever Be a Jewish Jordan?
Why I’m Glad There Isn’t A Jewish Tim Tebow

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• Lena Dunham forgot her pants again. Instead, she got a $1 million book deal.

• Brooklyn native Barbra Streisand says playing at the Barclays Center is a homecoming for her.

• Being a Jew in China means everyone assumes you’re good with money.

• Jewish Jocks, a new book edited by Frank Foer and friend-of-Jewcy Marc Tracy, was deemed ‘highbrow brilliant’ by the New York Magazine approval matrix.

• The world came full circle when Jerry Seinfeld wrote to the New York Times to criticize an opinion column hating on the word ‘really.’

• Rashida Jones impersonates a Jewish grandmother and does a German accent on Conan:

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