Fast Company

Jon Bradshaw's Fast Company profiles "six master gamblers" -- as the cover puts it -- in poker, pool, golf and backgammon. But "gambling," meaning playing a game of chance, isn't the best description of what they do. What they do is find an edge and press it. And money is not the objective; it is simply a way of keeping score. The objective is action and defeating an opponent. Bradshaw's style is sharp but completely transparent, allowing the philosophies and personal histories of his subjects to come through at full strength. His account of the Bobby Riggs-Margaret Court match in 1973 is a textbook piece of reportage, from Riggs's strategizing through the nearly shot-by-shot account of the event itself. Everyone remembers Riggs losing to Billie Jean King later that year; Bradshaw lifts this match out of its undeserved obscurity.