Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here
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Flipping through the dial last night when I cam across Ronald Reagan starring as Hall of Fame pitcher Grover Cleveland Alexander in The Winning Team, a 1952 bio-pic. Alexander played from 1911-1930 and pitched in the 1915, ’26, and ’28 World Series, the last two as an elder member of the St. Louis Cardinals. He’s [...]
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The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum will recognize the twin traditions of baseball and film when, for the fifth consecutive year, it hosts the Baseball Film Festival in Cooperstown, Oct. 1-3. The Hall of Fame is accepting submissions for the 2010 Baseball Film Festival through Aug. 13. Films can be of any length [...]
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Would that be cool for the Miller brothers? This NY Times review of their movie, Touching Home, is a good start. You can also view an interview with Josh and Logan here. A reminder, the film premieres in NYC tonight at the Village East Cinema.
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This is the time of year when we get the lists of the best and worst movies, books, etc. of the year. And because this is 2009, we get the bonus best/worst of the decade. Larry Tye’s Satchel was selected by The New York Times as one of the 100 notable books of the year, [...]
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(If you live in the Washington, DC area.) The Library of Congress will host a series of baseball films from Sept. 28-Oct. 2, as part of its “Baseball Americana Lunchtime Film Series” in the Pickford Theater of the Madison Building. Monday, Sept. 28 In Search of History: The World Series Fixed! The Black Sox Scandal [...]
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The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum will recognize the twin traditions of baseball and film when, for the fourth consecutive year, it hosts the Baseball Film Festival in Cooperstown, Oct. 2-4. Thirteen films, with themes ranging from women in baseball to a baseball league in Israel, will be screened as filmmakers compete for [...]
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Sugarball is coming to the small screen. DVD and Blue-Ray versions will be available on Sept. 1. The critically-acclaimed feature film takes a realistic look at the peaks and valleys of a young Dominican pitching phenom as he leaves his home to embark on a dream life. The adjustments, triumphs, and setbacks make for compelling [...]
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Channel surfing over the weekend. Found a few baseball flicks of varying quality. Don’t Look Back: The Story of Leroy “Satchel” Paige, a 1981 biopic starring Lou Gossett, Jr. as Paige, Cleavon Little as some annoying sidekick named “Rabbit,” and Clifton Davis as Cool Papa Bell. Came in on a scene where Paige is auditioning [...]
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From the famous Monty Python “Parrot Sketch.” Why do I bring this up? because Moneyball, the movie, may not be dead after all. Sony Pictures Entertainment has quietly moved to salvage its troubled movie project “Moneyball” by hiring the prominent screenwriter Aaron Sorkin for a quick rewrite, while looking to add Scott Rudin, known for [...]
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Given the draft of the script. I’ll watch anything about baseball. Cartoons, documentaries, lousy films (Jackie Robinson was a great ballplayer, but a poor actor). But this draft of the aborted Brad Pitt vehicle would sorely try my patience (Groucho Marx: “Don’t mind if I do. You must try mine sometime.”). Moneyball, the non-fiction neo-classic [...]
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From the K.C. Star, which gave the film 3.5 out of 5 stars. Upshot: …the movie achieves a rare sense of realism. Plus, since it refuses to follow a formula, we have no idea where the story is headed. It is rare when a film takes us in a direction we might not have been [...]
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Because you can frame the ticket stubs and put them on the bookshelf…Or simply the book, The Year the Yankees Lost First The Pennant, by Douglas Wallop, on which the musical was based. So, a remake of Damn Yankees, starring Jim Carrey as the Devil and Jake Gyllenhaal as “Shoeless Joe from Hannibal, Mo?” Seems [...]
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Another top ten list of baseball flicks, this one from the folks who bring you the VideoHound’s Golden Movie Retriever: Bull Durham Field of Dreams The Natural Pride of the Yankees Major Leagues The Bad News Bears (1979) The Stratton Story A League of Their Own Eight Men Out The Rookie
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From the Hall of Fame: Three Movies Win Awards at Baseball Film Festival –Dreaming in Blue Takes Home Best Film– (COOPERSTOWN, NY) – The third annual Baseball Film Festival at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum concluded with the presentation of three awards determined by a panel of four judges on Sunday afternoon [...]
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In my "day job," I'm the features and sports editor for a weekly New Jersey newspaper. I'm also the editor of the Bibliography Committee Newsletter for the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).
I did a piece on the award-winning cartoonist Arnold Roth and he was nice enough to "immortalize" me.
My article on Yankees Fantasy Camp appears in the current issue of Broadside Bombers.
My article on the later biographies of Babe Ruth appears in
My article on the Mets' 1969 post-season appears in
The Bookshelf was featured in in this column by Tom Hoffarth of the Los Angeles Daily News
An overview of several sports titles is one of the featured articles in the May/June issue of ForeWord Magazine.
What I'm reading now:
Banned in the Bronx: The Yankee Hater Memoirs 1953-2005
So far, so: refreshing, since I'm a Yankee hater, too.
Beyond Batting Average
So far, so: surprisingly comprehensive.
Chasing Baseball: Our Obsession with Its History, Numbers, People and Places
So far, so: early.
What I just read:
Born to Play: My Life in the Game
Grade: C. Average memoir, but Pedroia would be the first to admit he was an average student, so I don't think he'd be upset by the grade.
What's next:
L'Époque Glorieuse des Expos, by Alain Usereau (Still. Merde.)
"Housecall service for your pet"
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That's Bull
November 14, 2008 · View Comments
With rumors of a sequel to Bull Durham running around, I thought I’d take this opportunity to vent about something that’s been bugging me for awhile. I recently watched the movie for the umpteenth time and one scene in particular always makes me scratch my head. It takes place in the night game in which [...]
Tagged as: Baseball Movies, Bull Durham
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