Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
It just occurred to me why Cait Murphy’s book, Crazy ’08, has been receiving so much renewed attention. It’s the 100th anniversary since the Cubs won their last World Championship. Duh. (Click on the picture to go to the Crazy ’08 Web site.)
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Pirates vs. Yankees, October 13, 1960, by Jim Reisler (Carroll & Graf) I thought I had addressed this book when it came out, but evidently I was think about Reisler’s previous book, A Great Day in Cooperstown: The Miraculous and Unlikely Beginning of the Baseball Hall of Fame. To me, “Best” is on a par […]
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This list appeared on the SABR listserve (?). Thanks, to Greg Spira for compiling this extensive collection. Some of these review may be duplicate of what I’ve already posted and I have made no changes in style or contents to his list. “Links to many, many reviews (not features) of new baseball books reviews […]
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An enthusiastic critique of this graphic novel by Comicstory-arc.com. And another from Publisher’s Weekly. Here are some samples from the book.
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If the reviewer had trouble with this, wait ’til he gets a hold of Derek Gentile’sBaseball’s Best 1,000. Imagine being that final player who made the cut. He can still say he was considered better than the other 19,000 or so players who qualified under Gentile’s guidelines. I’ll be doing a review of this one […]
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I especially get a kick when I find references to baseball books from outlets that have essentially nothing to do with the game. Case in point, this review of Lee Lowenfish’s “excellent” biography from the Greater New York blog.
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Born in 1919, Raschi won 120 games for the Yankees during their juggernaut years, averaging 20 wins from 1948-51, including three straight 21-victory seasons. He also pitched briefly for the Cardinals and K.C. Athletics. Not bad considering he didn’t become a major leaguer until 27, and didn’t join the rotation full-time until he was 29. […]
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From the Chicago Sun Times, this report of a local TV documentary on the WGN-Cubs 60-year relationship. An accompanying book, Cubs Forever, is due out from Triumph Books this spring. This leads to an observation on the recent trend towards “copy-cat” books that use the same format tailored to each team. For example, in addition […]
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PinstripesPA reviews Haunted Baseball by Dan Gordon and Mickey Bradley, while Tailgatecrashers post this piece about The New Ballgame: Baseball Statistics for the Casual Fan, by Glenn Guzzo. As the days go by and more attention is paid to the use of amphetamines and other drugs associated with easing ADD/ADHD, Jim Bouton’s Ball Four will […]
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How long ago did this book come out? Last October? I was at Barnes and Noble on Tuesday and saw it on the remainder table for $3.98. Further proof that the general public considers old timers like Tommy Lasora out of touch. Listen to him on a recent B&N podcast of Meet the Authors and […]
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Lots of “Bits and Pieces” With little beside the steroids business going on during this off-season, there’s lots of time to read and many bloggers are posting reviews, including. Baseball Between the Numbers: Why Everything You Know About the Game is Wrong, Cobb: A Biography, and Is This a Great Game or What, all from […]
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Extra Innings: The Joy and the Pains of Over-30 Baseball by Patrick Smith McFarland, 2007 As an, ahem, over-30 athlete myself, I could emphasize with Smith’s funny and thoughtful memoir of those of us still in love with playing a kid’s game; knowing better, but afraid to give it up, afraid to capitulate to he […]
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Skyhorse Publishing, 2007 Rick Wolff hosts a straightforward radio show about youth sports on WFAN in the New York market. Many is the time I almost reached for the phone to put in my two cents on the topic of the day or ask advice concerning my own child’s situation. So it was with great […]
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Edited by Michael G. Long. Times Books, 2007. By now, everyone — baseball fan or not — knows what a remarkable man Jackie Robinson was. In addition to his superior ability on the diamond and the responsibilities inherent in being the first African-American to break baseball’s notorious color line, he continued his work for civil […]
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Since my mother’s family comes from Montreal, I’ve always considered it a second home. So while you fans up north were ignoring Nos Amors, forcing them to move to DC, I was always fascinated with the team, especially since all the written material came out in both French and English versions. Very cool. I still […]
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is available on Amazon.com,
In my most recent "day job," I was the sports and features editor for a weekly New Jersey newspaper, where I hosted another blog. Busy, busy, busy.
I did a profile piece on the award-winning cartoonist Arnold Roth and he was nice enough to "immortalize" me.
My article on the later biographies of Babe Ruth appears in
My article on the Mets’ 1969 postseason appears in
Profiles of several Jewish baseball figures appear in
