PSA for the PBCC, April 14, 2021

Headnote: One of the thing I like about the Pandemic Baseball Book Club is that it’s a kind of “one stop shopping.” Instead of posting about various authors, projects, and events, all I’m doing here is cutting and pasting their weekly newsletter. Do take a moment to read the author Q&A. I find them particularly interesting as they discuss the arduous process of bringing their projects to presss.

By the way, here are Conversations I’ve had with some of the authors associated with the PBBC:

John Shea
Joan Ryan
Jason Turbow
Anika Orrock
Brad Balukjian
Dan Schlossberg
Devin Gordon (which is mentioned in their weekly update below)
Coming soon: Luke Epplin (Our Team). Here is my review for his book on Bookreporter.com.

Visit the PBBC for the latest batch of authors with new books coming out this year.

Getting Down to the Grand Prize
Today, the PBBC gave away its 10th of 10 University of Nebraska 2021 baseball releases. (Congratulations to @intertrodeVP, who won a copy of Escape From Castro’s Cuba, by Tim Wendell.) All that’s left is to announce our grand prize winner, who will receive all 10 books, on Friday. If you haven’t yet entered, head over to @pandemicbaseba1, where you’ll find a pinned tweet with instructions aplenty. The titles being given away are:

Clubbie by Greg Larson
Cobra by Dave Parker and Dave Jordan
Comeback Pitchers by Lyle Spatz and Steve Steinberg
Escape From Castro’s Cuba by Tim Wendell
Forty Years a Giant by Steven Treder
The Best Team Over There by Jim Leeke
The Pride of Minnesota by Thom Henninger
Tony Lazzeri by Lawrence Baldassaro
Two Sides of Glory by Erik Sherman
1962 by David Krell

Stay tuned for lots of conversations featuring the above authors—including the one below.

***

ASK AN AUTHOR
Greg Larson
Clubbie: A Minor League Baseball Memoir (University of Nebraska Press, April 1, 2021)

What’s your book about?
A starry-eyed baseball fan accidentally becomes part of the minor league system that exploits his heroes. Clubbie follows the Aberdeen IronBirds for two seasons in the low minors—not from the perspective of a journalist or a player, but from my own perspective as the clubhouse attendant. It’s like Bull Durham meets Catcher in the Rye. From players quitting in the middle of games, teammates attacking each other with bats, and an improbable shot at a title, Clubbie details the tobacco stains and dirty socks of minor league life.

What does a clubbie do, exactly?
As a clubhouse attendant, I was basically the team mom: I fed the players, did their laundry, cleaned the clubhouse, etc. I was also the equipment manager and liaison between the front office and the clubhouse. I made booze and tobacco runs, drove players to the airport, took batting practice with the team, put on a jersey and warmed up the right fielder one inning, cleaned poop off the walls—and everything in between.

Why this book? Why now?
Minor league baseball is transforming, with 40 minor league teams losing their affiliation status this year. Short-season leagues no longer exist. The New York-Penn League (in which Clubbie takes place) has been wiped off the map. Clubbie is a rare—and perhaps final—behind-the-scenes artifact of a mysterious, now-gone world that most fans never got a chance to experience in person.

How did your editor help?
Amanda Jackson, my copy editor with University of Nebraska Press, pointed out two spots in the narrative that were confusing for the reader. One was the final scene—important stuff. She pointed out that my jump in time between the penultimate scene and the final scene was jarring. She helped me elegantly add some contextual clues to allay the reader’s confusion while still maintaining a bit of magic at the end of the book. If it weren’t for her fix, I would have let that ending go right through my legs like Buckner’s ground ball.

Was there anything you found extremely difficult to cut?
Two deleted scenes stand out as particularly painful to cut. One scene detailed a visit to the team seamstress, Mar—a little old lady who reminded me of a shopkeep in a video game. She radiated warmth. Mar had dusty old merchandise cluttering every inch of her store, and made adorable suggestions for the clubhouse, such as telling me I should get an ice cream machine and give the players soft-serve for lunch after batting practice. Mar was one of those amazing characters you meet in minor league baseball. Her shop beautifully contrasted the sometimes-harsh ethos of the clubhouse.

The other difficult cut was my section on Howie “Stretch” Schultz. Howie and I both attended Hamline University in Saint Paul, Minnesota, a half-century apart. Howie was signed by Branch Rickey to play first base for the Dodgers. Branch Rickey, of course, was the founding father of the modern minor league system. I used my connection to Schultz, and his connection to Rickey, as a vehicle to provide background on the minor league system. (Added bonus: when Jackie Robinson joined the Dodgers, the guy he replaced at first base was Howie Schultz.) It was the most research-heavy section of the book, but it also bogged down the storyline, I had to say goodbye to all those hours of scrolling through microfilm.

(Those deleted scenes and more can be found at clubbiebook.com.)

Do you have a favored work routine? Has that been affected by the pandemic?
I used to write on my laptop, but these days I’m writing by hand. I usually write from 10 a.m. to noon. If the morning is cold, I’ll wake up, hike the Barton Creek greenbelt here in Austin, gather some firewood along the way and make a fire in my living room. Then I’ll grab my yellow legal pad and write three pages by the fire. If the weather is warm I’ll write outside, either on my patio or at the park.

I prefer writing with crappy hotel pens, black ink only. They have the perfect amount of resistance for my sloppy hand movements. Fancy pens are too smooth for my liking.

What’s your next book project?
I’m about halfway through a novel at the moment. It’s a heavily autobiographical quarantine adventure/love story, based on an experience I had in 2020. I fell in love with a Costa Rican woman I hosted for two days through Couchsurfing. She invited me to come visit her on a one-way ticket in March. I did. Then the world fell apart and we were quarantined together, having known each other for less than a week. I won’t give anything else away—I’ve already said too much.

Buy Clubbie here.

***

NOW UP AT BASEBALL PROSPECTUS
We heard lots of stories last year about the way that various ballplayers handled playing under COVID protocols. Nobody seemed to wonder similar thoughts about umpires, though … nobody except Bill Nowlin. This week at Baseball Prospectus, our favorite SABRmeister offers up an original piece about the umpire experience as baseball resumed last season.

“With no minor league baseball being played, each team fielded a 60-player pool, plus an additional 30-plus emergency players, from which to draw for their regular roster. The sites where they worked out were also home to a considerable number of Triple-A umpires—12 first-line designees and 19 others—who, like the players alongside them, were hoping for a call-up. Circumstances pushed the typical timeline, with some umpires gaining major league eligibility before they’d even worked big league spring training or the Arizona Fall League. For the first time, umpires wore uniform numbers with triple digits. All 31 of the designated minor league umps saw major-league action in 2020.”

***

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING ABOUT US
Luke Epplin is blowing up. He talked to The New York Times about Our Team, and his book was reviewed in the Washington Post.

Greg Larson was named one of Old Dominion University’s 40 Under 40 alumni award winners, along with some guy named Verlander.

***

WHERE ELSE WE’RE TALKING
LGBTQ Reads did a Q&A with Andrew Maraniss about Singled Out. Andrew also appeared on the inimitable Infinite Inning podcast, where Steven Goldman gave him the Steven Goldman treatment.

Dave Jordan explored Dave Parker‘s Hall of Fame candidacy on the Pod of Fame. Parker himself appeared on Dave Zirin’s Edge of Sports podcast.

Greg Larson did interviews about Clubbie with MiLB insiders: Behind the Mike with Michael Antonellis, and Talkin’ Mets with Mike Silva. He also did a presentation for the Play Catch movement.

Devin Gordon appeared on Ron Kaplan’s Baseball Bookshelf to discuss So Many Ways to Lose.

Start Spreading the News excerpted Lincoln Mitchell‘s The Giants and Their City, running a passage about Candlestick Park.

***

WHAT ELSE WE’RE DOING
Dale Tafoya, author of Billy Ball, announced that the University of Nebraska Press will publish his next book, “One Season in Huntsville: The Huntsville Stars and Baseball Fever in Rocket City,” in 2023. It’s the story of the 1985 Huntsville Stars, a Double-A club that won the Southern League championship in its first year of existence, bringing baseball fever to Huntsville in the process. Congratulations, Dale!

Lincoln Mitchell wrote about Mitch McConnell for CNN, then talked about it on Background Briefing with Ian Masters.

On the 50^th anniversary of Harry Caray’s arrival in Chicago, the Chicago Tribune featured an article by Phil Rosenthal that heavily referenced Don Zminda’s book, “The Legendary Harry Caray.” (All the material in the article is from the book.)

Bill Nowlin went onto the San Francisco Giants pregame show with Marty Lurie to discuss the next-to-be-announced SABR book, Jackie! Perspectives on 42, which he co-edited with Glen Sparks.

***

UPCOMING APPEARANCES
Frank Guridy will appear tonight at a Rice University webinar—”Segregated Houston: Black Life Beyond the Hedges”—sponsored by the Task Force on Slavery, Segregation, and Racial Injustice. Wednesday, April 14, 7 p.m. EST.

The New York Giants Preservation Society will host an online event for Lincoln Mitchell, who will discuss The Giants and Their City. Thursday, April 15, 7 p.m. EST. Email Lincoln at lincoln@lincolnmitchell.com for the link.

Lawrence Baldassaro will discuss his Tony Lazzeri bio with Tom Shieber, senior curator of the Baseball Hall of Fame. Sponsored by Boswell Book Co. in Milwaukee. Thursday, April 15, 8 p.m. EST. Register here.

Erik Sherman will give a virtual talk for the Baseball Hall of Fame. April 20, 2 p.m. EST.

Mark C. Healey’s first “in-person” book signing for Gotham Baseball will take place at The Avoid The Day Bookstore in Rockaway Beach, NY. Saturday, April 24, 12:30 p.m. EST

Registration is now open for the online launch event for Andrew Forbes‘ The Only Way is the Steady Way on April 25.

***

GET SHOPPING
When they say that a t-shirt is “extra soft,” do they really mean it? At the Pandemic Baseball Book Club shop we do. It’s just like a regular t-shirt, only softer. Like, once you get it you’ll want to rub it across your face, maybe for hours. This is not the recommended use for a t-shirt of any kind, but also it couldn’t hurt.