no title has been provided for this book

There are monsters everywhere.

Real monsters. Monsters that seek you out. That find you. And then wreak havoc.

Real Life Monsters are waiting for everyone. They all look different. They all look unique. They are all determined to destroy. That’s all they are interested in.

When these monsters show up they create crisis. For most people, major life crisis is not something that gets broadcast to the whole world. But sometimes it is. Sometimes that’s part of it. And for that type of crisis, you have an audience. They look, they gawk, they judge- not very many of them ask to help. You’re in too deep for them. They stay at a safe distance. They’re relieved they don’t live with that monster.

Matt Sayman didn’t expect crisis to seek him out during the summer before his senior year at Baylor University. He was living a dream life, by many people’s standards- by young aspiring ballers in particular. He was playing Division I basketball for a major contender in the Big 12. And he was no slouch, either. He was a scholarship player with a lot of experience. He was about to embark on the pinnacle of his basketball career that season. His team would elevate the Baylor program to new heights and, who knows, maybe bring back some championship hardware to campus.

But then crisis found him, and everything changed.

In The Leftovers: Basketball, Betrayal, Baylor and Beyond, Matt Sayman chronicles the summer and season of 2003-2004 as a player for Baylor University in the aftermath of one of the greatest crises to ever afflict a college basketball team. In the summer of 2003, one of Matt’s teammates was murdered by another member of the team.

What it’s not.

The Leftovers is not an instructional book on how to run practice, write up plays, or what kind of drills to use for ball handling. It’s not meant for coaches to use as a handbook, but coaches may want to hand it out to young players who will encounter their own monsters in this life, if they haven’t already.

What it is.

Matt produced a very well written and thorough backstory in The Leftovers. I always find the coming of age narrative of successful players to be enlightening and intriguing, and this does not disappoint. There were many people in Matt’s young life who played important roles in his development as a player and as a human being. Matt credits his mom for helping to develop his competitiveness. She recommended a book called The New Toughness Training for Sports, that Matt claims had a lasting impact on his life. Matt tells of all the camps, clinics, and travel basketball games he participated in. I got a little chuckle out of his mention of attending Coach Majerus’s camp at Utah, as I just did a post on John Willkom’s book, Walk On Warrior(LINK), where John highlights his own stories of Coach Majerus.

Matt’s commitment to the game was unrelenting. He lived by a credo he nicknamed JAMODI- Just A Matter Of Doing It, which he applied to his training. His support system of his parents, sister, and coaches worked together to help Matt’s basketball pursuits by moving his family to the Dallas area from Pennsylvania. All of this put him on a path to Baylor University.

The murder of his Baylor teammate was a disaster. Showtime produced a documentary on the events involved; you can view a trailer for that HERE. Matt participated in an interview for that production.

In The Leftovers, Matt takes you with him through all of the pain and confusion that ensued through out 2003-2004. Matt’s very detailed account of what he went through as a player, teammate, and student at Baylor is the treasure of this book. He is totally open, honest, and vulnerable in how this crisis affected him. Readers will empathize with him as he guides you through the depths of the challenges he faced. And you will be inspired by his perseverance through a seemingly impossible situation that many would have retreated from completely.

Coaches who read The Leftovers would do well by paying close attention to Coach Scott Drew in this story. Coach Drew was hired in the aftermath of the summer of 2003. Coach Drew knew that Matt and his senior teammates had been through a harrowing experience. His leadership going into Matt’s senior season was truly stellar, and a good argument could be made that Coach Drew and his assistants held the men’s basketball program together at a time when it could have completely disintegrated.

You will have a hard time finding a basketball story with this much emotion. I think that as time goes on, Matt Sayman’s The Leftovers will grow in its influence; for empathizing what he and his teammates went through, but also for those who can learn from his journey and apply those lessons to their own Real Life Monsters.