Former Mayfield basketball coach writes book

Former Mayfield basketball coach, Bradley Bailey, has an upcoming book signing at Barnes and Noble, 700 S. Telshor Blvd. from 1 to 4 p.m. on September 13.

Bailey’s book, “Winning Is Never Enough: Suffering Sports and Hope, How to Deal with the Friday Night Loss on Monday Morning,” came out of his own life experience.

“I was the guy that had the team that didn’t always win the championship. I often ddin’t get to stay somewhere very long because of that. What do you do when you put everything into it, but the results are less than you hope?” He said.

He said the result was a book about what’s important in life and what matters.

Bailey is a Christian and the book approaches these issues from a faith-based perspective.

“Everybody believes in something. I ask the reader to examine themselves and their life and determine what their starting point is. Why do we behave the way we do? What is underneath the everyday externals,” he said.

Bailey has 25 years of coaching experience with 18 as head coach. He coached both high school and college, with a stint at Arizona Christian University in Phoenix. He was coaching at Mayfield High School in 2020 when the public health order shut down schools and various activities due to the COVID-19 pandemic. That ended a state basketball tournament abruptly. After the public health order was lifted to allow students to return to school, Bailey said he wasn’t rehired.

“It wasn’t a fire but still it hurts. That’s one of the instances I faced,” he said. “I really wanted to succeed but whatever powers that be didn’t give me the opportunity to do it again.”

Bailey said he went into retirement at that point and began writing books.

He said that he hopes that readers will glean that there are “eternal values that produce hope that go far beyond the score, the outcome that truly have value forever.

“A lot of times that comes out of brokenness,” he said.

Bailey described getting fired as “gut wrenching.

“It’s almost like going through a divorce. I had the experience of being fired as coach more than once. It hurts so much,” he said.

But, Bailey said that a person grows after getting knocked down and having to get back up.

Bailey, who has two master’s degrees, one in theology and one in counseling, said he is working on a second book about gambling and Name, Image, Likeness, which allows college athletes to make significant amounts of money off of the creation of their own brand. The NCAA changed its policies to allow NIL for college athletes in 2021.

“If you’ve got somebody maing $2 million, $3 million and they’re 19 years old, how do you coach that? It’s a free for all,” Bailey said.

He called it “the wild west of NIL.”