Don’t Put Put Me In, Coach:
My Incredible NCAA Journey from the End of the Bench to the End of the Bench



The author of this hilarious book is Mark Titus. This book was published in the United States by Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc., and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. It is an autobiography. This book will grab you and never let you go. You are constantly laughing and you never want to stop reading. It is also one of those books that you would want to read multiple times. This book starts with Titus meeting Greg Oden, Mike Conley, and his other AAU teammates through his career at Ohio State. Greg Oden and Mike Conley are now both currently in the NBA. You’ll learn of Thad Matta’s great sense of humor that meshed nicely with Titus as the consummate joker. There are a lot of up and downs in Titus’s journey in his high school and NCAA journey. Mark tried to get into Harvard, but because his coach didn’t let him play in the first half of his last game, Mark wasn’t recruited. When he went to Ohio State he was not your regular walk-on. He was always joking and messing around and never took anything seriously. He went to the National Championship game his freshmen year, but lost in a close game against Florida. Mark is also the founder of his blog called Club Trillion. This just means that when someone plays for a little in a game, they never get any stats, so when people see their name there are a bunch of zeroes. The point is that you shouldn’t try to do this, and instead just let it happen by itself like it was an accident. One of Mark’s most memorable teammates was “The Villain”. His real name is Evan Turner, but that is his nickname, because Turner would always loose his cool during practices, curse out loud, and try to get into fights with Mark in which Evan threw punches. There was one time when Ohio State was having practice and it was for 90 minutes. The goal was for Evan not to melt down and get very angry and start cursing. When Evan would loose his cool, the amount of time remaining of practice would contribute to the amount of suicides they would have to run. Turner made it 80 minutes through. At the last 10 minutes of practice, they took foul shots. Mark was partners with Evan. “The Villain” took his free throws and it was Mark’s turn. Evan chest passed it to Mark and he kept on asking for a bounce pass. This happened for a long time until Turner rocketed at Titus and yelled “SHOOT THE BALL.” This wasn’t the end of practice, but when they switched places Evan threw a shoulder at Mark and that’s what got Coach Matta’s attention. They ended up running three suicides. On Mark’s last day being a senior at Ohio State, everybody clapped for him, and about 3000 people were wearing T-shirts with his blog’s logo on it. They won the Big Ten that game and Mark was overcome with emotion that game. Mark Titus is one of Ohio State’s most winningest player in history. So if you like Ohio State basketball, humorous, and well-written books, this is the piece for you.