Bits and pieces, Sept. 12, 2018

A semi-regular (I guess that sounds better than “irregular”) attempt to catch up on the baseball book and other news wince my last similar posting.

* NY Daily News sportswriter/author Bill Madden contributed this list of the best baseball books of all time. All are worthy of the accolades (A Day in the Bleachers, The Glory of Their Times, et al) but there’s nothing really new there.

* The San Francisco Chronicle (Surprised it still exists actually) ran this review on adopted son Felipe Alou’s eponymous book.

* The Week is one of my favorite magazines; I highly recommend it. They do a roundup in the media of the top stories and other issues like this article on “Women love baseball. why doesn’t baseball love them back?”

* Baseball Cop is making a lot of people angry with its allegations of PED use and other crimes against the sport. That includes David Ortiz. To be honest, these books that purport to blow the doors off scandals in general aren’t my cup of tea so I’m not going to say a whole lot about it. Just Google “Baseball Cop” and you’ll get all the dirt you want.

* Political/baseball writer Curt Smith — whose most recent book is The Presidents and the Pastime: The History of Baseball and the White House (sitting on my nightstand) — believes Franklin Roosevelt should have a place of honor in the Hall of Fame. (I think the writer of this piece on Smith’s book left out the word “more” in his title.)

* Skip Desjardin, author of September 1918: War, Plague, and the World Series (also on my nightstand), explains the importance of the national pastime during World War I, the end of which approaches its centennial this year.

* Journalist Jay Nordlinger doesn’t think the game needs “fixing,” the topic of this piece in the National Review. Salient point: “If you don’t like baseball the way it is, you won’t like it much more with the catch-up rule. If baseball is too long for you, a reduction by 24 minutes will not likely sway you. That is my quick and main reaction.”

* Another review of Keith Hernandez’s memoir, this one from Dan’s Paper, a Hampton’s-centric publication.

* Doug Glanville contributed this essay on “The Magic of the Baseball Nickname” to The New York Times around the weekend when the players wore those names on their jerseys. By the way, baseball-Reference doesn’t list a nickname for Glanville, who published The Game from Where I Stand: From Batting Practice to the Clubhouse to the Best Breakfast on the Road, an Inside View of a Ballplayer’s Life in 2010.

* This doesn’t really qualify as a “nickname,” but according to the Baltimore Sun, the Orioles “will host National Federation of the Blind Night on Sept. 18, when they play the Toronto Blue Jays at Camden Yards. That night, Orioles players and coaches will wear first-of-their kind big league jerseys with their names spelled in Braille, and the first 15,000 fans will receive Braille alphabet cards. Carlos Ibay, a blind singer/pianist, will perform the national anthem and Mark Riccobono, president of the NFB who is also blind, will throw out the first pitch.”