Baseball Best-Sellers, May 7, 2021

New: An asterisk serves to let you know that the author is a member of the Pandemic Baseball Book Club. I enthusiastically recommend you visit the site, sign up for their newsletter, and buy some merch.

A reminder: The Amazon rankings are updated every hour, so these lists might not be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them (or even by the time I finish posting them). But close enough for government work, as the saying goes.

In addition, occasionally the powers-that-be over there try to pull a fast one by including a book in a category to which it should not be listed (in my opinion). For example, The Book of Why: The New Science of Cause and Effect has appeared on the BBS list. “Why” is a good question. There might be a smattering of the national pastime in it, but not enough to make it a baseball book per se (again, IMO).

Finally, adults only here. That is, no books for younger readers. Also no “adult” books here, that is, no romance/erotic fiction that features baseball as a theme either (although goodness knows there are a bunch of those).

So, with all that said…

The links under the authors’ names will take you to the Bookshelf Conversations I did with them. The asterisk denotes the author is a “member” of the Pandemic Baseball Book Club.

PRINT

1. The Captain & Me: On and Off the Field with Thurman Munson, by Ron Blomberg and Dan Epstein *
2. 24: Life Stories and Lessons from the Say Hey Kid, by Willie Mays and John Shea *
3. On Story Parkway: Remembering County Stadium, by Jim Cryns
4. Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis
5. The Science of Hitting, by Ted Williams with John Underwood
6. If These Walls Could Talk: New York Mets: Stories From the New York Mets Dugout, Locker Room, and Press Box, by Mike Puma
7. The Cloudbuster Nine: The Untold Story of Ted Williams and the Baseball Team That Helped Win World War II, by Anne R. Keene
8. The Mental Game of Baseball: A Guide to Peak Performance, by H.A. Dorfman
9. So Many Ways to Lose: The Amazin’ True Story of the New York Mets―the Best Worst Team in Sports, by Devin Gordon (My review on Bookreporter.com) *
10. Our Team: The Epic Story of Four Men and the World Series That Changed Baseball, by Luke Epplin (My review on Bookreporter.com) *

E-BOOKS

1. Moneyball
2. The Captain and Me
3. Our Team
4. If These Walls Could Talk
5. Ball Four, by Jim Bouton and Leonard Shecter
6. The Natural, by Bernard Malamud
7. The Bronx Zoo, by Sparky Lyle and Pete Golenbock
8. Doc: A Memoir,  by Doc Gooden and Ellis Henican
9. How Baseball Happened, by Thomas Gilbert
10. The Giants of the Polo Grounds, by Noel Hynd

AUDIOBOOKS

Note: Amazon has changed the way they list audiobooks. No longer under the general category of “biography and memoir,” they are now treated in their own baseball/softball category. Here’s the general link to the section where you will find further links to the individual titles, their reader/narrators, and samples. Note further that these are updated regularly and the top ten list below might no longer be the same.

1. Moneyball
2. 24
3. The Mental Game of Baseball
4. Ball Four
5. Ninety Percent Mental
6. The MVP Machine
7. Stealing Home
8. Heads Up Baseball
9. The Science of Hitting
10. The Bronx Zoo

The New York Times no longer offers a monthly list of sports best-sellers. There are no baseball titles on their latest nonfiction hardcover weekly posting.

No surprise that 24 is on the list, seeing as how Willie Mays turned 90 yesterday.

Still not in the Amazon top-ten? 501 Baseball Books Fans Must Read before They Die. FYI, right now it ranks at 1,804,840 overall in books; last time, 1,279,613. Hank Greenberg in 1938: Hatred and Home Runs in the Shadow of War ranks 1,233,144 (#49 in “Teen & Young Adult Baseball & Softball”; last time, 359,206).

Shameless self-promotion: if you’re looking for some good baseball reading during this down time, why not pick up a copy of 501? It’s like the abridged dictionary; it has most of the other books in it.

Super-shameless self-promotion: And by the way, I am looking for a publisher for an revised edition of 501, UNP having passed on the opportunity. So if you have any suggestions, please drop me a line. Mucho appreciado.

A reminder: There’s an Excel “checklist” of the books list in 501. If you’re interested in keeping track of how many you have read or own, drop me a line.

If you have read either of my books, thanks, hope you enjoyed it, and please consider writing an Amazon review; it’s never too late.

Tagged as: Cleveland Indians, Moneyball, New York Mets, New York Yankees, Ron Blomberg, Thurmon Munson