Blonde Bomber: A Ride With Shide

This book is for everybody, not just sports fans or former/existing athletes.Rarely do you see this level of honesty and sincerity. This book is REAL and you will have no choice but to be captivated by the high's and lows. It will make you reflect on your own life, your decisions, struggles, high points and most importantly the value of relationships.This book needed to be written by somebody and the perfect courageous person, in the midst of the mightiest of struggles.........knocked it out of the park. Anybody with a pulse will be rooting for and supporting Jay and others like him after reading this gem.

Jay is from my home town. I know he was successful in his career but it was nice to read his back story.

When Jay Shidler headed off from little Lawrenceville, Illinois, to play basketball at the University of Kentucky in the late 1970s, it wasn't an example of a small-town star reaching beyond his grasp. His qualifications were exceptional.The 6-1 Shidler was one of the best high school athletes ever produced by his state, a lights-out shooter with serious hops who electrified crowds like no one else. His bleach-blonde hair and good looks gave him the aura of a rock star. When he scored 93 points in two games on the final day of the 1976 state tournament — there was no 3-point line back then — his status as a schoolboy legend was secure. Jay Shidler and Isiah Thomas are still the best two high school basketball players I ever saw, and I refuse to rate one ahead of the other.It was no surprise, then, to anyone in Illinois when Shidler became a starter as a freshman at Kentucky for coach Joe B. Hall, on a team full of experienced players. Those were the days when most athletes stayed in college for the full four years of their eligibility. I was there as a sportswriter for an early-season game in Bloomington, Indiana, when Shidler scored 20 points in a rout of Bobby Knight's Hoosiers. It seemed that the sky was the limit for Shidler. He was destined to become a big-time player for a big-time program.Unfortunately, that game at Indiana was about as good as it would get for Shidler. Although he was a significant contributor on Kentucky's 1978 NCAA championship team, injuries and a tortured relationship with Hall kept him from realizing his full potential. After he was done with basketball, he struggled mightily to determine what to do with the rest of his life, as many athletes do.Shidler and co-author Paul Corio have written a fearlessly honest book about what college basketball is like from the inside. We have plenty of books about this world from coaches and sportswriters, yet not so many from players. It would be easy for Shidler to be bitter about his experience, wallowing in self-pity over things that went wrong, but he owns up to mistakes he made and seems genuinely grateful for the opportunity he had. In his darkest hour of struggle, many years after the ball had stopped bouncing for him, former UK teammates Jack Givens and Kyle Macy reached out to him with timely words of encouragement and hope. (Tip: Have a box of tissues nearby.) By the end of the book, he's in a good place and seemingly at peace."Blonde Bomber: A Ride With Shide" is must reading for Illinois and Kentucky basketball fans who remember Shidler's playing days. But it's so much more than the standard retelling of big games played by big names. It gets inside the mind of a small-town athlete who never was entirely comfortable with fame. It explores the coach-athlete relationship at length. (Shidler's high school coach, Ron Felling, was a profoundly positive influence on him.) It shows that the statistics in the box score tell only a small part of an athlete's story.Kudos to Shidler and Corio for a surprisingly thoughtful and honest "Blonde Bomber." They dared to go deep, and I'm glad they did.

When I dove into this book about Jay Shidler, "The Blonde Bomber," I couldn't put it down. Anyone who saw Jay play high school basketball at Lawrenceville or College Hoops for the Kentucky Wildcats are flooded with memories of his amazing shooting prowess, his incredible vertical leap, and his relentless defensive skills as you read the many stories and behind-the-scenes details of his career. As a guy who played against him in high school, I thought I knew all I needed to know about Shidler, but this book provided details and accounts of his life that I had no idea had happened. I appreciate how raw the book is. He tells the good, the bad, and the ugly. Even though he was Mr Basketball in Illinois, recruited by many top level college programs, and set amazing scoring records, he went through many painful experiences in his life that are important learning lessons for all of us. As a State Champion, National Champion, and paid Professional basketball player, Jay experienced many of the mountaintops in athletic achievements, yet had to go through and endure many valleys in his life before coming full circle. This book tells the whole story. I promise you will have a new perspective on life after you read it.

This book will stand the test of time. It is a real account of this fascinating era of sports. It is not the normal Bird vs Magic stories that are told repeatedly. Jay was a hero to many of us growing up and watching basketball during his playing days. He is honest and tells a different account of big time sports .

This is a fascinating book and an intimate look at what it was like to be a superstar athlete in a small midwestern town who went on to play for Kentucky in an NCAA National title game! Jay Shidler and Paul Corio capture the intense highs and difficult lows of Jay's basketball career. Jay Shidler holds nothing back when he tells of growing up in Lawrenceville, Illinois, and reveals all regarding his family and high school career. Jay also provides an inside look regarding his college career playing for one of the top basketball programs and great coaches in Joe B. Hall at Kentucky. Truly a riveting book, especially for small town basketball players who dreamed of achieving such success as well as for Kentucky Wildcat fans...actually for any fan of college basketball. Kudos to Jay Shidler and Paul Corio, this is a great book and must read for fans of high school and college basketball!

I grew up a Kentucky Wildcat fan. This book was a treat to me in that I got to see the human side of one of KY's fan favorites. ....and then it touched my heart. We are all so proud of you Jay for never giving up! Thank you Jack Givens and Kyle Macy for being team mates for life, and thank you Paul for bringing it all together.

For anyone interested in a "behind the scenes" look at being a star athlete in high school and college, this is a great book. For University of Kentucky fans, it's fun to get a glimpse of UK basketball history. It's not only a story about basketball though. It's also about friendships, faith and perseverance. The "Ride with Shide" is one you don't want to miss.