TWIBB: Noc. 19, 2010

The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Nov. 19 at 10 a.m.

Title	Rank
General
The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the End of America’s Childhood, by Jane Leavy	1
Beyond Belief: Finding the Strength to Come Back, by Josh Hamilton and Tim Keown	2
Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis	3
San Francisco Giants Torture to Rapture 2010 World Series Champions, by the San Francisco Chronicle	4
Steinbrenner: The Last Lion of Baseball, by Bill Madden	5
Essays and Writing
Moneyball	1
The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2011	2
Sports Illustrated: The Baseball Book, by Sports Illustrated	3
Beyond Belief	4
The Yogi Book, by Yogi Berra	5
History
Giant Surprise: San Francisco s 2010 World Champions/em>	1
Willie Mays: The Life, The Legend, by James S. Hirsch	2
The Baseball Book	3
The Yogi Book	4
The Glory of Their Times: The Story of the Early Days of Baseball Told by the Men Who Played It, by Lawrence S. Ritter	5
Statistics
The Bill James Handbook 2011	1
Hardball Times 2011	2
Watching Baseball Smarter: A Professional Fan’s Guide for Beginners, Semi-experts, and Deeply Serious Geeks, by Zack Hample	3
Baseball Forecaster 2011, by Ron Shandler	4
Hot Stove Economics: Understanding Baseball’s Second Season, by J.C. Bradbury	5

(Note: The list includes print editions only, allowing for other editions that affected the rankings. Also, the rankings change hourly, so the result you get when you visit Amazon.com might not be the same.)

Analysis: The Last Boy slips to Number 7 on the NY Times‘ hardcover non-fiction list; it remains the top sports book on the Amazon 100 (# 62 overall) and the top title in the sports category.

It’s news to me: The rush is on tot capitalize on the Giants’ World Championship with the usual “quickie” titles, including the obligatory offering by the local newspaper. And with the GM meetings underway, this is the perfect time to pick of Bradbury’s Hot Stove Economics. Analysis/forecast books remain hot in the essay/stats categories.