Anita DeFrantz has a deep background in sport — and the politics of sport. The fifth longest-serving International Olympic Committee member (Canadian Dick Pound is at the top of the list), DeFrantz won bronze for the United States in the women’s eight rowing event at the 1976 Olympics in Montreal before her bid to go to the Games a second time in Moscow in 1980 was dashed by a boycott during the Cold War. DeFrantz took on then-American President Jimmy Carter, leading a lawsuit against that decision, and has been a vocal critic of Olympic boycotts. While the lawsuit was unsuccessful, DeFrantz did not lose her passion for the Olympics. The University of Pennsylvania law school graduate was a vice-president of the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic committee (Russia and others boycotted those Games). Two years later, DeFrantz became the first American woman and first African-American to be named an IOC member. DeFrantz, who previously served two terms as a vice-president of the IOC, is one of...