* TWIBB — September 25

This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, September 25.

Title	Rank
General
The Machine: A Hot Team, a Legendary Season, and a Heart-stopping World Series: The Story of the 1975 Cincinnati Reds, by Joe Posnanski	1
Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis	2
Game Six: Cincinnati, Boston, and the 1975 World Series: The Triumph of America’s Pastime, by Mark Frost	3
The Yankee Years, by Joe Torre and Tom Verducci	4
Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain, by Marty Appel	5
Essays and Writing
Moneyball	1
As They See ‘Em: A Fan’s Travels in the Land of Umpires, by bruce Weber	2
Sixty Feet, Six Inches: A Hall of Fame Pitcher & a Hall of Fame Hitter Talk about How the Game is Played, by Bob Gibson and Reggie Jackson	3
View from the Booth: Four Decades with the Phillies, by Chris Wheeler	4
Heads-Up Baseball : Playing the Game One Pitch at a Time, by Tom Hanson	5
History
The Machine	1
Game Six	2
Munson	3
Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, by Larry Tye	4
View from the Booth	5
Statistics
The Book: Playing the Percentages in Baseball, by Tango et al	1
The Bill James Handbook 2010	2
Watching Baseball Smarter: A Professional Fan’s Guide for Beginners, Semi-experts, and Deeply Serious Geeks, by Zack Hample	3
Baseball Prospectus 2009: The Essential Guide to the 2009 Baseball Season	4
Baseball Between the Numbers: Why Everything You Know About the Game Is Wrong, by Baseball Prospectus	5

Analysis: Posnanski’s book ranks an amazing #265 overall on Amazon. Mark Frost’s latest covers pretty much the same event, although its focus is one iconic game. Kind of strange, though: what’s the big attraction at this point that warrants not one but two books? The event took place in 1975, making this the 34th anniversary, so it’s not remarkable like the Mets in ’69 or even the White Sox in ’59, which opened the door for the reprinting of Bill Veeck’s The Hustler’s Handbook.

I also noticed for the first time the disparity in the rankings. While Posnanki’s new title ranks very well among books in general, let alone baseball titles, the statistical titles begin in the low 10,000s…