TWIBB: Nov. 12, 2010

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, by Michael Lewis	3
Steinbrenner: The Last Lion of Baseball, by Bill Madden	4
Willie Mays: The Life, The Legend, by James S. Hirsch	5
Essays and Writing
Moneyball	1
Beyond Belief	2
Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu: John Updike on Ted Williams, by John Updike	3
The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2011	4
The Greatest Baseball Stories Ever Told: Thirty Unforgettable Tales from the Diamond, by Jeff Silverman	5
History
The Philadelphia Phillies: An Extraordinary Tradition, by Scott Gummer	1
Willie Mays	2
Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu	3
Sandy Koufax: A Lefty’s Legacy (P.S.), by Jane Leavy	4
The Glory of Their Times: The Story of the Early Days of Baseball Told by the Men Who Played It (Harper Perennial Modern Classics), by Lawrence S. Ritter	5
Statistics
The Bill James Handbook 2011	1
Hardball Times 2011	2
Baseball Forecaster 2011, by Ron Shandler	3
Watching Baseball Smarter: A Professional Fan’s Guide for Beginners, Semi-experts, and Deeply Serious Geeks, by Zack Hample	4
Minor League Baseball Analyst 2011, by Deric McKamey	5

(Note: The list includes print editions/baseball titles only, allowing for non-baseball titles and kindle 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: Mantle remains the Number 4 best-seller on the NY Times‘ hardcover non-fiction list, as well as the top sports book on Amazon (# 40 overall). Hamilton’s inspirational autobio is #20 in the sports list.

It’s news to me: The Analysis/Forecaster books make me wonder about the market out there for such books. I know fantasy baseball is a multi-million (if not billion) dollar industry but I still don’t get it. Are there that many armchair GMs who need this kind of information? Is it relevant to the average fan? Can someone explain it to me? Seriously.