Williams, Pete

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Williams, Pete

PERSONAL:

Married; children. Education: Graduated from University of Virginia, 1991.

ADDRESSES:

CAREER:

Writer. Cavalier Daily, Charlottesville, VA, sports editor; USA Today Baseball Weekly, writer and columnist for seven years; Fox Sports News, baseball insider reporter; Bay News 9, St. Petersburg, FL, weekend sports anchor; Fitness Buff Show, Tampa, FL, radio show cohost. Also taught courses in journalism at the University of South Florida.

WRITINGS:

Card Sharks: How Upper Deck Turned a Child's Hobby into a High-Stakes, Billion-Dollar Business, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1995.

Sports Memorabilia for Dummies, foreword by Gary Carter, IDG Books Worldwide (Foster City, CA), 1998.

(With Mark Verstegen) Core Performance: The Revolutionary Workout Program to Transform Your Body and Your Life, foreword by Nomar Garciaparra, Rodale (Emmaus, PA), 2004.

(With Mike Veeck) Fun Is Good: How to Create Joy & Passion in Your Workplace & Career, Rodale (Emmaus, PA), 2005.

(With Mark Verstegen) Core Performance Essentials: The Revolutionary Nutrition and Exercise Plan Adapted for Everyday Use, Rodale (Emmaus, PA), 2006.

The Draft: A Year inside the NFL's Search for Talent, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 2006.

(With Mark Verstegen) Core Performance Endurance: A New Fitness and Nutrition Program That Revolutionizes the Way You Train for Endurance Sports, foreword by Jessi Stensland, Rodale (New York, NY), 2007.

Contributor to periodicals, including Street & Smith's NFL Draft Preview, Street & Smith's SportsBusiness Journal, Men's Health, OverTime, San Jose Mercury News, Dallas Morning News, Washington Post, and USA Today Baseball Weekly.

SIDELIGHTS:

Pete Williams has based the majority of his career in journalism on sports and physical fitness. Williams began as a sports editor for the Cavalier Daily at his alma mater, the University of Virginia. He also worked for seven years with USA Today Baseball Weekly. Later he entered television, reporting on baseball for Fox Sports News and as the weekend sports anchor on Bay News 9 in St. Petersburg, FL. Williams also cohosts a radio show in the Tampa Bay area, Fitness Buff Show, focusing on physical fitness and health.

In 2005, Williams collaborated with marketer and minor league baseball team owner Mike Veeck to write Fun Is Good: How to Create Joy & Passion in Your Workplace & Career. They give their model to help service-oriented workplaces improve their productivity and service by injecting a sense of fun into the environment. The book includes case studies and success stories as well as covering new and old tactics for making these improvements in the office. A contributor to Publishers Weekly commented that the book is "sometimes amusing, but often repetitive." Susan C. Awe, writing in Library Journal, however, wrote that Fun Is Good is "written clearly and passionately."

Just a year later, Williams published a book on the football draft called The Draft: A Year inside the NFL's Search for Talent. By spending time interviewing and getting to know various college players, coaches, agents, scouts, and NFL team general managers, Williams was able to outline their interconnected relationships to show how the draft process comes together each year. Although Dick Friedman recommended the book in a Sports Illustrated review, he felt it was "needlessly repetitious." In a Library Journal review, John Maxymuk stated that The Draft "stands out for its thorough representation of what agents do to earn their commissions."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Cavalier Daily (Charlottesville, VA), March 28, 2006, Matt Boucher, review of The Draft: A Year inside the NFL's Search for Talent.

Library Journal, May 1, 2005, Susan C. Awe, review of Fun Is Good: How to Create Joy & Passion in Your Workplace & Career, p. 98; April 1, 2006, John Maxymuk, review of The Draft, p. 102.

Publishers Weekly, March 14, 2005, review of Fun Is Good, p. 54.

Sports Illustrated, March 28, 2006, Dick Friedman, review of The Draft.