Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
“Hey, that’s Crash Davis. He’s played in more towns than I have. Helluva guy — real different. I actually saw him read a book without pictures once” Max Patkin in Bull Durham It may not be a Crash Davis project, but here’s announcing the Noah Syndergaard Book Club (via The New York Times). At least […]
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The Society for American Baseball Research is celebrating its golden anniversary with a series of series. As it pertains to the mission statement of this site, here’s the take on the top 50 books of the last half-century, released earlier today. The project was spearheaded by Andy McCue, who offers this introduction: There have been […]
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A few months back I made a major decision: it’s time to cull the herd of baseball books. Majorly. I used to keep track on Library Thing. You can browse my collection via a link on the sidebar —–>. But I haven’t kept it up over the past two or three years. There was just […]
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Not to be maudlin or anything, but I’ve decided to get rid of the vast majority of my baseball library now, rather than leave it for my family when the time comes. It will be refreshing to have all that additional space and maybe free up the attic to me more of a man cave […]
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Editor’s note: This twist on the popular theme of favorite baseball books comes from the Facebook Baseball Book group. A lot of interesting and surprising choices here. Different strokes for different folks. Because I don’t want the risk of lawsuits (or bodily harm), I have removed the identities of the commenters and have edited it […]
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(Update: I do not have a middle name. My parents were very poor. So sometimes I fiddle around with one to see what kind of junk mail it engenders. The latest one is “Fitzgerald.”) Spent the day at the BookExpo America at the Javitz Center in Manhattan. It’s always fun to see what the industry […]
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The two small publishing houses that comprise most of the high-brow literature about the National pastime both got a little love recently. David Davis wrote this nice company profile in The New York Times on the University of Nebraska Press, which will be putting out my 501 book next year (God willing). Rob Neyer over […]
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The old joke goes, “You can’t have everything. Where would you put it?” That’s kind of the way I’ve come to think about my library. Obviously there’s no way I can acquire every book I’d like, plus the ones I do have, gathered over 30 years, are starting to make a dent in the floor. […]
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It’s all right, I’m half-Quebecer on my mum’s side. Anyway the Getting Blanked blog, a Blue Jays-centric site, is starting up a Baseball Book Club! The first meeting — which will discuss Michael Lewi’s Moneyball, will take place at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 27, at Opera Bob’s. Dustin Parkes, proprietor of Getting Blanked, writes: […]
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The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Nov. 12 at 2 p.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, […]
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The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, Sept. 10. Title Rank General Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis 1 Steinbrenner: The Last Lion of Baseball, by Bill Madden 2 The Game from Where I Stand: A Ballplayer’s Inside View, by Doug Glanville 3 The Baseball Codes: Beanballs, […]
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Doug Glanville is a busy guy these days. Not only does he have a new book out (From Where I Stand; quite good, look for a review soon), but he’s recently joined the staff on ESPN’s Baseball Tonight. He still managed to find time to contribute this list of his favorite baseball books to The […]
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This week’s best-selling baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, April 9. Title Rank General The Bullpen Gospels: Major League Dreams of a Minor League Veteran, by Dirk Hayhurst 1 The Baseball Codes: Beanballs, Sign Stealing, and Bench-Clearing Brawls: The Unwritten Rules of America’s Pastime, by Jason Turbow and Michael Duca 2 Willie Mays: […]
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For those of you who have expressed a curiosity as to my personal library, here’s a sampling: Most of the books are in the attic, which I know isn’t a great idea for any number of reasons. Before the great flood of ’08, I had a nice bunch of book cases, but afterward, once we […]
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The current issue of American Heritage Magazine incldues this story on the early days of the game adapted from Baseball Americana: Treasures from the Library of Congress by Harry Katz, Frank Ceresi, Phil Michel, Wilson McBee and Susan Reyburn (HarperCollins Publishers).
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This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, July 17. Title Rank General Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, Tye 1 Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain, Appel 2 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, Lewis 3 Bert Sugar’s Baseball Hall of […]
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A lot of fans proably forget that the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown is also a library. I spent a great week up there several years ago, doing research for a book about baseball during the Korean War years. the staff couldn’t have been nicer, and the access of walking around like I belonged was […]
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Posted the second list before the first, so here it is: Ball Four (Jim Bouton, 1970) | This book changed everything about how we cover and view sports and the people who play them. It also almost got me and my friend Prisby thrown out of sophomore English because we kept reading passages out loud […]
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From umpbump.com: Baseball book club alert: Manny Ramirez has been reading (and even underlining passages of) The Secret, the best-selling New Age book by Rhonda Byrnes (via The Joy of Sox) as part of the left fielder’s new, Mannytating lifestyle. And according to Call of the Green Monster, Jonathan Papelbon picked up To Kill A […]
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is available on Amazon.com,
In my most recent "day job," I was the sports and features editor for a weekly New Jersey newspaper, where I hosted another blog. Busy, busy, busy.
I did a profile piece on the award-winning cartoonist Arnold Roth and he was nice enough to "immortalize" me.
My article on the later biographies of Babe Ruth appears in
My article on the Mets’ 1969 postseason appears in
Profiles of several Jewish baseball figures appear in
TWIBB — Aug. 7
August 7, 2009
This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, August 7. Title Rank General Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain, Appel 1 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, Lewis 2 Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, Tye 3 The Yankee Years, Torre and […]
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