Baseball Best-Sellers, January 3, 2025

Here we go again…

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 (i.e., 12 and under). 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. And a Ω (omega) means it’s an award winner.

1. The Cloudbuster Nine: The Untold Story of Ted Williams and the Baseball Team That Helped Win World War II, by Anne R. Keen (Paperback)
2. The Wingmen: The Unlikely, Unusual, Unbreakable Friendship Between John Glenn and Ted Williams, by Adam Lazarus
3. Why We Love Baseball: A History in 50 Moments, by Joe Posnanski Ω (My review on Bookreporter.com)
4. Baseball Prospectus 2025 (Jan. 25. 2025)
5. The Baseball 100, by Posnanski Ω
6. The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City, by Kevin Baker (My review on Bookreporter.com)
7. Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball, by Keith O’Brien (My review on Bookreporter.com)
8. The Ultimate New York Yankees Trivia Book: A Collection of Amazing Trivia Quizzes and Fun Facts for Die-Hard Yankees Fans!, by Ray Walker
9. Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis Ω (paperback)
10. Motor Preferences for Baseball: A Coach’s Guide to Identifying and Respecting Player Strengths to Enhance Performance and Reduce Injury, by David Genest and Matthew Swope *

KINDLE BOOKS

1. The Wingmen
2. Why We Love Baseball
3. Charlie Hustle
4. Moneyball
5. The Baseball 100
6. Once More Around the Park, by Roger Angell
7. Big Data Baseball: Math, Miracles, and the End of a 20-Year Losing Streak, by Travis Sawchick
8. Bushville Wins!: The Wild Saga of the 1957 Milwaukee Braves and the Screwballs, Sluggers, and Beer Swiggers Who Canned the New York Yankees and Changed Baseball, by John Klima
9. Can’t Anybody Here Play This Game?: The Improbable Saga of the New York Mets’ First Year, by Jimmy Breslin
10. Seasons in Hell: With Billy Martin, Whitey Herzog and, “the Worst Baseball Team in History”—The 1973–1975 Texas Rangers, by Mike Shropshire

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.

1. The New York Game
2. Moneyball (unabridged, read by Scott Brick)
3. The Baseball 100
4. Why We Love Baseball
5. Rickey: The Life and Legend of an American Original, by Howard Bryant
6. Charlie Hustle
7. Ball Four: The Final Pitch, by Jim Bouton (narrated by the author)
8. Winning Fixes Everything: How Baseball’s Brightest Minds Created Sports Greatest Mess, by Evan Drelich
9. The Methany Manifesto, by Mike Methany with Jerry B. Jenkins
10. Banana Ball, by Jesse Cole

A few old favorites have returned to displace all those trivia collections. Guess readers are getting more serious.

Still not in the Amazon top ten? 501 Baseball Books Fans Must Read before They Die. FYI, as of this posting it ranks 930,150 (#73 in Literary Bibliographies & Indexes); last time, 562,409 overall in books.  Hank Greenberg in 1938: Hatred and Home Runs in the Shadow of War ranks 3,376,621; last time, 3,423,317.

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.