Baseball Best-Sellers, October 16, 2026

Amazon keeps changing the way they report, so that will be mirrored here. Sometimes there will be rankings of Kindle and audio-books on baseball, other times, not.

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 had with them. An asterisk denotes a book making its debut on the BBS list. And a “Ω” means it’s an award winner, almost always in the print version.

PRINT

1. Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis Ω
2. It’s All About the Players, by Peter Gammons (my review on Bookreporter)
3. Why We Love Baseball: A History in 50 Moments, by Joe Posnanski (my review on Bookreporter) Ω
4. The Cloudbuster Nine: The Untold Story of Ted Williams and the Baseball Team That Helped Win World War II, by Anne R. Keene (my Bookshelf review here)
5. Banana Ball: The Unbelievably True Story of the Savannah Bananas, by Jesse Cole
6. Touching All the Bases: A Story of Power, Purpose, and Surviving the Bronx, by Dave Winfield with Alan Maimon
7. The Baseball 100, by Posnanski
8. Ball Four: The Final Pitch, by Jim Bouton
9. The Mental Game of Baseball: A Guide to Peak Performance, by H. A. Dorfman
10. The Science of Hitting, by Ted Williams and John Underwood

KINDLE

1. Love Me, Hate Me: Barry Bonds and the Making of an Antihero – A Nuanced Biography of Baseball’s Celebrated, Controversial Icon, by Jeff Perlman
2. The Last of His Kind: Clayton Kershaw and the Burden of Greatness, by Andy McCullough
3. The Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O’Neil’s America, by Posnanski
4. Yogi: A Life Behind the Mask, by Jon Pessah
5. Nine Innings: The Anatomy of a Baseball Game, by Daniel Okrent (Kindle Unlimited, see note)
6. The Inside Game: Bad Calls, Strange Moves, and What Baseball Behavior Teaches Us About Ourselves, by Keith Law
7. Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics, and the Battle for the Soul of a City, by Jonathan Mahler
8. The Era, 1947–1957: When the Yankees, the Giants, and the Dodgers Ruled the World, by Roger Kahn (Kindle Unlimited, see note)
9. The Last Innocents: The Collision of the Turbulent Sixties and the Los Angeles Dodgers, by Michael Leahy Ω (Kindle Unlimited, see note)
10. The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the End of America’s Childhood, by Jane Leavy

AUDIO BOOKS

1. Nolan: The Singular Life of an American Original, by Tim Brown (my review of the print edition on Bookreporter)
2. The Methany Manifesto, by Mike Methany with Jerry B. Jenkins
3. The Captain: The Journey of Derek Jeter, by Ian O’Connor
4. The Bad Guys Won: A Season of Brawling, Boozing, Bimbo Chasing, and Championship Baseball with Straw, Doc, Mookie, Nails, the Kid, and the Rest of the 1986 Mets, the Rowdiest Team Ever to Put on a New York Uniform – and Maybe the Best, by Pearlman (read by the author)
5. Unhittable: How Technology, Mavericks, and Innovators Engineered Baseball’s New Era of Pitching Dominance, by Rob Friedman
6. Make Me Commissioner: I Know What’s Wrong with Baseball and How to Fix It, by Jane Leavy (read. by the author)
7. Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball, by Keith O’Brien
8. Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty, by Charles Leerhsen

Note: These books are included as Kindle Unlimited titles. See the books’ pages for details.

Still not in the Amazon top ten? 501 Baseball Books Fans Must Read before They Die. FYI, as of this posting it ranks 3,220,787 in books overall; last time, 3,205,483. Hank Greenberg in 1938: Hatred and Home Runs in the Shadow of War ranks 3,649,898; last time, 3,628,659.

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.

BUT…

Some exciting news (now we’ll see who’s paying attention and reading down this far).

Necessity is the mother of invention. Thanks to emergency surgery in which I said goodbye to a recalcitrant gallbladder, I have a couple off months for recuperation during which time I will be working on a revision of 501.

The new version will include all the original stuff but as you know if you’re a baseball reading fool, there have been a lot of great books published since 501 came out a dozen years ago. So since this isn’t a ranking where one title might be pushed off the list, the new material will appear as an added chapter.

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.