From the category archives:

National Public Radio

If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’ll know my affection for the NPR news quiz, Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me. And every now and then, they’ll throw me a bone my including some baseball content. Examples include an interview with Moose Skowron which led me down a rabbit hole when it comes […]

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Long-time followers of this blog know of my love for the NPR news quiz, Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me! Once in a while they’ll have some baseball-related topic or guest, as was the case this week in the opening segment, “Who’s Bill This Time?” (The transcript is as accurate as I care to spend the […]

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About the World Series. Haven’t done one of these in a long time. I think I even neglected to write when Keith Hernandez was a guest back when his latest memoir — I’m Keith Hernandez: A Memoir — was published last year. But with the Washington Nationals winning the first championship for the nation’s capital […]

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Don’t get me wrong. I love all my guests. But once in a while I get to chat with someone outside the usual baseball literary mainstream. That was the case with Scott Simon, host of NPR’s Weekend Edition. Yes, Simon, a lifetime Cubs fan, had previously published two books on baseball among his oeuvre: Home […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]

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Now hear this: Ron Darling

November 30, 2016

Not exactly sure why this is relevant a year after his book was published, but here he is talking with WAMC, the NPR affiliate of Albany, NY about his book, Game 7, 1986: Failure and Triumph in the Biggest Game of My Life.   Save

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When I saw this segment pop up in my iTunes podcast list, I was surprised. Surprised that Leonard Lopate would want Lenny Dykstra on as a guest, and surprised that Dykstra would appear. I do not know him at all other than  the profiles I’ve read about him but my impression is that he’s not […]

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Jazz bassist Esperanza Spalding was the guest for Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me‘s Not My Job segment last week. So the writer thought it would be cute… PETER SAGAL: Second base is baseball, the great American pastime. SPALDING: Oh no. SAGAL: One of the worst baseball players ever was one Smead Jolley. Mr. Jolly was […]

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Ken Burns was on the show yesterday to discuss his upcoming documentary on Jackie Robinson, to be aired next month on PBS.   If they’d just done this a few days earlier, it would have been a perfect feature for Black History Month. But I can also understand that you don’t want to publicize something […]

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Bits and pieces, Nov. 18, 2015

November 18, 2015

Been a bit busy lately with the two author events, so I know I’ve fallen behind. You never know where inspiration will come from. According to this public radio story, Haruki Murakami came up with the idea for his first novel, Hear the Wind Sing, as the result of a 1978 pro game in Japan, […]

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The Brian Lehrer Show conducted this great interview with former Mets pitcher and current TV broadcaster Ron Darling. Despite a number of sports media writers criticizing the way FOX handled its coverage, Darling would not pile on. But I appreciated his honesty as he spoke about the disappointment for himself and his booth-mates Keith Hernandez […]

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Usually I listen to Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, hosted by my Jersey homeboy Peter Sagal, on Mondays on the way to work. But my schedule was a bit altered due to Jewish holidays, so I just got to this today. In the opening segment — “Who’s Bill This Time?” — we were treated to […]

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My favorite NPR news quiz featured the Cubs owner on the “Not My Job” segment. Your can hear it here: Or just read the transcript (not as much fun) here.

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Been following the adventures of Brad Balukjian, who’s traveling the country in search of his baseball heroes for a book project. He was a guest on a recent edition of Slate’s excellent sports podcast, Hang Up and Listen. We had a Bookshelf Conversation prior to his departure and I hope to have another one upon his […]

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Since I posted the first of these on a Thursday, which is known on social media as a time of reflection, I thought to make it a regular thing under this rubric. These are kind of fun; it’s like a box of chocolates — you never know what you’re gonna get. (Actually, I never understood […]

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I love it when worlds collide, that is when two or more of my favorite things meet. In this case, I’m talking about the July 17 edition of the Pop Culture Happy Hour, one of my go-to podcasts. It’s what I always listen to on my way home from work on Fridays (on my way […]

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Another in a series of feeble attempts to catch up on older items. You will forgive the possible occasional duplication from previous entries. First off, well, this is kind of insulting to baseball and books. * Ed Lucas received a lot of attention for his recent memoir, and rightly so. I had a great conversation […]

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You know a current event has gravitas when a pop culture entity like The Daily Show or Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me includes it in its weekly program. WWDTM referred to the recent computer hacking “scandal” by the St. Louis Cardinals in their most recent episode: PETER SAGAL: All right, here, sir, is your last […]

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As much as I love listening to interview with authors, it gets to a point where they’re pretty much the same. I don’t know whether that’s a function of publicists sending out “talking points,” ostensibly to make the hosts’ jobs easier. I don’t know if the interviewers actually read all the stuff they get in […]

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