Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
Several former Major Leaguers share a birthday today, including: Wade Boggs Boggs!The Techniques of Modern Hitting Billy Williams Billy Williams: My Sweet-Swinging Lifetime With the Cubs Babe Dahlgren Rumor in Town: A Grandson’s Promise to Right a Wrong
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To Thurman Munson, who would have been 63, believe it or not.
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My review of Bill Madden’s riveting profile of the Yankees owner was published on Bookreporter.com. You can read it here.
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Those who share my birthday include: The late Mike Coolbaugh, whose death from a line drive in a minor league game was achingly chronicled by S.L. Price in Heart of the Game: Life, Death, and Mercy in Minor League America. Lou Brissie, whose amazing comeback from devastating injuries suffered during World War II was the […]
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Yankees.baseball-news-update.com posted reviews of two titles: Dayn Perry’s Reggie Jackson, and 1921, by Spatz and Steinberg. While the writer deems both to be “serious and thoughtful volumes displaying highly impressive research…. neither book quite fully succeeds.” A celebrity first pitch I’d love to see: A profile in Smithsonian Magazine outs Harper Lee, author of the […]
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to Clyde King, who turns 86 today. And to William Elsworth “Dummy” Hoy, the first deaf Major Leaguer, who was born this day in 1862. Hoy was responsible (depending on whose story your believe) for helping to create umpires’ signals. His descendants have created a website in his honor and are coming out with a […]
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to Tommy John, born this date in 1943. Books by/about John include: T. J.: My 26 Years in Baseball The Tommy John Story The Sally and Tommy John Story Also born this date, Hall of Fame outfielder Al Simmons (Al Simmons: The Best)
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This top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, May 21. Title Rank General Steinbrenner: The Last Lion of Baseball, by Bill Madden 1 The Baseball Codes: Beanballs, Sign Stealing, and Bench-Clearing Brawls: The Unwritten Rules of America’s Pastime, by Jason Turbow with Michael Duca 2 The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron, […]
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The Life and Thunderous Career of Baseball’s Mr. October, by Dayn Perry. Morrow, 326 Pages, $25.99 Whatever words are used to describe Reginald Martinez Jackson, the Hall of Fame outfielder for the Oakland Athletics and New York Yankees (with less effectual stints on the Angels and Orioles), “complex” has to be among them. And that’s […]
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Two for the price of one this weekend, as the Times publishes an overview of Howard Bryant’s The Last Hero (“Much of this has been told before — most vividly in Aaron’s autobiography, “I Had a Hammer.” Written with Lonnie Wheeler and published in 1992, it explores the tangled theme of baseball and race with […]
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to Bobby Murcer, who would have been 64 today. He published Yankee for Life: My 40-Year Journey in Pinstripes, written with Glen Waggoner, shortly before his death. Also born this date, in 1921, “Prince” Hal Newhouser, subject of A Tiger in His Time: Hal Newhouser and the Burden of Wartime Ball, written by David M. […]
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to Reggie Jackson, born this date in 1946. Reggie (no last name necessary) has been the subject of several books, including Reggie Jackson: The Life and Thunderous Career of Mr. October, the just-released bio by Dayn Perry, which I’ll be reviewing for Bookreporter.com in the very near future. The Jackson collection includes: Also celebrating a […]
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Born this date in 1928. All’s I know is that I found the TV version of The Bronx Is Burning to difficult to watch, if only because of John Turturro’s ears.
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At home plate posted this extensive review of James Hirsch’s bio of the Hall of Famer. Upshot: “This book is a feast for serious baseball aficionados and a veritable banquet for Giants fans. The sheer heft should not matter to those folks. They should plunge right in, especially those who remember the young Willie. A […]
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This top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, May 14. Title Rank General The Baseball Codes: Beanballs, Sign Stealing, and Bench-Clearing Brawls: The Unwritten Rules of America’s Pastime, by Jason Turbow and Michael Duca 1 The Bullpen Gospels: Major League Dreams of a Minor League Veteran, by Dirk Hayhurst 2 Moneyball: The Art […]
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The Hall of Fame catcher (and my Montclair “neighbor”) was born this date in 1925. Ain’t it amazing how many books by/about him — on basically the same stuff — there are, including, but not limited to:
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I was reading this New York Times review of Howard Bryant’s new biography, The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron, when the title hit me. The Last Hero. What does that say about us? Are heroes just for kids? Have we become so jaded that such an idea seems old-fashioned? I probably say this […]
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Milt Pappas (1939). From the Baseball-Reference “Bullpen”: Milt Pappas came one batter short of throwing a perfect game for the Chicago Cubs on September 2, 1972. He had 2 balls and 2 strikes on hitter #27, Larry Stahl, and his last two pitches were ruled balls. He settled for the no-hitter, but he never forgave […]
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to Willie Mays, who turned 79 yesterday.
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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
