Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
Now brought to you by … the breakfast cereal of AMC’s The Killing. Very cool. Anyway… * Ben Platt posted this review of Kostya Kennedy’s new biography of Joe DiMaggio on MLB.com. * The “Bats” baseball blog of The New York Times ran this profile of Steve Stone, author of the new book Said In […]
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John Jayme of Eugene, OR, is the latest winner of the Bookshelf Facebook Friend drawing. This month’s book is Campy: The Two Lives of Roy Campanella, by Neil Lanctot. The next book, in preparation for Fathers’ Day, will be “Baseball Is . . .”: Defining the National Pastime, edited by Paul Dickson. Tell your friends!
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Day 23: New York Mets: 50 Amazin’ Seasons — The Complete Illustrated History Day 24: The Runmakers: A New Way to Rate Baseball Players Day 25: Wizardry: Baseball’s All-Time Greatest Fielders Revealed Day 26: Pitchers of Beer: The Story of the Seattle Rainiers Day 27: Bullpen Diaries: Mariano Rivera, Bronx Dreams, Pinstripe Legends, and the […]
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My annual Spring Baseball Book Roundup was recently posted to the Bookreporter.com site. Titles include: 56: Joe DiMaggio and the Last Magic Number in Sports Joe DiMaggio: The Long Vigil Campy: The Two Lives of Roy Campanella Uppity: My Untold Story About the Games People Play The House That Ruth Built: A New Stadium, the […]
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And speaking of Jeter… From the Montreal Gazette of April 27: Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez are teammates, but that’s not to assume they’re friends. The Captain, an unauthorized biography by sportswriter Ian O’Connor, chronicles the soap operatype relationship between the two New York Yankees superstars. In the new book, which is supposed to hit […]
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The Two Lives of Roy Campanella, by Neil Lanctot. Simon and Schuster, 2011. My first thoughts when I heard about this book was, “It’s about time.” Roy Campanella was a three-time NL MVP and a Hall of Famer, yet aside from It’s Good to Be Alive, his own ghostwritten autobiography, there have been no “adult” […]
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The Infinite Baseball Card Set Blog posted links to a few reviews about the fun new publication, including that of the Bookshelf.
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Here’s the latest week’s worth of Tom Hoffarth’s Book a Day feature from the LA Daily News. Day 16: The Most Famous Woman in Baseball: Effa Manley and the Negro Leagues Day 17: 1961*: The Inside Story of the Maris-Mantle Home Run Chase Day 18: Bottom of the 33rd: Hope, Redemption, and Baseball’s Longest Game […]
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The Hall of Fame pitcher was born this date in 1921. Spahn, Sain, and Teddy Ballgame: Boston’s (almost) Perfect Baseball Summer of 1948, by Nowlin, 2008 The Greatest Game Ever Pitched: Juan Marichal, Warren Spahn, and the Pitching Duel of the Century, by Jim Kaplan, 2011 The Warren Spahn Story, by Shapiro, 1958 Warren Spahn, […]
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Apropos of the review I posted the other day of Jerome Charyn’s new biography Joe DiMaggio: The Long Vigil, I wanted to point out that the book has a web presence of its own. Should be interesting to peruse; some are baseball sites, some are not.
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Time once again for a major links dump to make up for bad behavior. Warning: some of these links go back to March. Just sayin’. * A member of Red Sox Nation pays tribute to a “mortal enemy” by giving the NY Times photo book on Derek Jeter the thumbs up. * The Wall Street […]
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Don Mattingly turns the big 5-Oh today. Donnie Baseball: The Definitive Biography of Don Mattingly Don Mattingly’s Hitting Is Simple: The ABC’s of Batting .300 Also born this date in 1929, Harry Agganis, the Golden Greek, who tied way too young, at the age of 26 due to massive pulmonary embolism. Harry Agganis, ” the […]
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Since I started blogging about baseball literature and collectibles, I’ve become increasingly enamored with and appreciative of the “art” of the game. Not the way the players perform, but by those who depict those performances through the pencil, the paintbrush, the camera, or any other method. It’s especially rewarding to find “unknown” artists (although they […]
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by Jerome Charyn. Yale University Press, 2011. * * * This year marks the 70th anniversary of one of those sports records still considered to be unbreakable: Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak. While most of the books over the years — especially those written in a long-ago time, when athletes were always heroic rather than […]
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As in Tom Hoffarth’s one-a-day Book reviews: Day 7: The Baseball Hall of Fame Collection Day 8: Baseball — How to Play the Game Day 9: The Bill James Handbook 2011 Day 10: Baseball in the Garden of Eden Day 11: The Greatest Game Ever Pitched Day 12: Mexican American Baseball in Los Angeles Day […]
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Congratulations to Nathan Cordery of Stoney Creek, Ontario, this month’s winner of the Bookshelf Facebook prize: John Thorn’s Baseball in the Garden of Eden: The Secret History of the Early Game. The next book prize will be Neil Lanctot’s Campy: The Two Lives of Roy Campanella. In addition, as a special “season opener” bonus, another […]
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NPR has had several baseball segments in recent days on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, The Leonard Lopate Show, The Brian Lehrer Show, and Only a Game. Leading off (this isn’t in chronological order) is comedian Jessi Klein who was featured in WWDTM‘s “Not My Job” portion of the program. SAGAL: Well, Jessi Klein, we’re […]
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This originally appeared in the New Jersey Jewish News, March 31. It’s not quite one of the Four Questions, but Washington Post sportswriter Thomas Boswell devoted an entire best-selling collection of his columns to explain Why Time Begins on Opening Day. For long-chilled fans, time begins again today, baseball’s earliest start ever. Several new books […]
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is available on Amazon.com,
In a former life, I was the sports and features editor for a weekly New Jersey newspaper, where I hosted an award-winning bog about Jews and Sports.
I did a profile piece on the legendary cartoonist Arnold Roth and he was very generous in immortalizing me in this caricature.
My article on Sandy Koufax in the 1965 World Series appears in
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
