Baseball Best-Sellers, February 16, 2024

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 (see my piece on “Why Amazon’s search engine sucks“).

In addition, occasionally the powers-that-be over there try to pull a fast one by including a book in a category in 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 Amazon’s 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” adult books (romance/erotic fiction that features baseball as a theme although goodness knows there are a bunch of those out there).

So, with all that said…

The links under the authors’ names will take you to the Bookshelf Conversations I did with them. An asterisk denotes a book making its debut on the BBS list.

PRINT

Baseball Prospectus 2024
Why We Love Baseball: A History in 50 Moments, by Joe Posnanski
The Fantasy Baseball Black Book 2024, by Joe Pisapia
The Wingmen: The Unlikely, Unusual, Unbreakable Friendship Between John Glenn and Ted Williams, by Adam Lazarus
Ron Shandler’s 2024 Baseball Forecaster and Encyclopedia of Fanalytics
Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis
Rotoman’s Fantasy Baseball Guide 2024: From Acuña to Zunino
The Baseball 100, by Joe Posnanski
A Fan’s Guide to Baseball Analytics: Why WAR, WHIP, wOBA, and Other Advanced Sabermetrics Are Essential to Understanding Modern Baseball, by Anthony Castrovince
The Science of Hitting, by Ted Williams and Tom Underwood

KINDLE BOOKS

Willie Mays: The Life, The Legend, by James S. Hirsch
The Wingmen
Ball Four: 50th Anniversary Edition, by Jim Bouton
Moneyball
The Big Fella: Babe Ruth and the World He Created, by Jane Leavy
Love Me, Hate Me: Barry Bonds and the Making of an Antihero, by Jeff Pearlman
Why We Love Baseball
Sandy Koufax: A Lefty’s Legacy, by Jane Leavy
Why We Love Baseball
The Grandest Stage: A History of the World Series, by Tyler Kepner

AUDIBLE

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.

Moneyball (unabridged, narrated by Scott Brick)
Why We Love Baseball
The Baseball 100
Smart Baseball: The Story Behind the Old Stats That Are Ruining the Game, the New Ones That Are Running It, and the Right Way to Think About Baseball, by Keith Law
Ball Four: The Final Pitch, by Jim Bouton (narrated by the author)
The Science of Hitting
Astroball: The New Way to Win it All, by Ben Reiter
The Bad Guys Won, by Jeff Pearlman (read by the author)
Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig, by Jonathan Eig (narrated by Edward Herrmann who played Gehrig in the TV movie, A Love Affair: The Eleanor and Lou Gehrig Story)
Ninety Percent Mental, by Bob Tewksbury (read by the author)

Nothing really new save for the return of A Fan’s Guide to Baseball Analytics, a good primer for the beginning of the season.

Still not in the Amazon top ten? 501 Baseball Books Fans Must Read before They Die. FYI, as of this posting it ranks 1,009,932 overall in books (#88 in Literary Bibliographies & Indexes); last time, 1,918,343. Hank Greenberg in 1938: Hatred and Home Runs in the Shadow of War ranks 2,804,953; last time, 2,785,238.

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 dictionary; it has the other books in it, which reminds me of one of my favorite lines from one of my favorite shows.

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.