This is really getting to be old-home month, give or take. First it was Danny Gallagher, author of several titles about the Montreal Expos. Then it was Robbie Hart, with his new documentary. Next week, Curtis Pride, the deaf ballplayer who made his Major League debut with the team in 1993, the first of six […]
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Montreal Expos,
Terry Mosher
If you’d asked me a few years ago about my favorite teams, I definitely would have said the Mets, followed by the Montreal Expos. But now? It just might be the reverse, since I’ve been living in the past lately. I spent many a happy summer in Montreal, where the maternal side of my family […]
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Montreal Expos
A bit of a departure here. Ben Yagoda has not written a book about baseball (yet). Nor has he written a song or made a film about the game. But he is a super fan and has written reviews of others’ books about the game. Close enough for jazz. I wanted to speak with him […]
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Ben Yagoda
There was something about Bill Littlefield’s voice when he read his poetry (or as he refers to it, doggerel) on NPR’s Only a Game that was so soothing, as opposed to those loud-mouthed shouters on various sports talk programs. I miss him. But to prove that the Bookshelf is timeless, I had him on recently […]
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Bill Littlefield
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 […]
I knew things would go well when I saw the collection of caps behind Tyler Kepner, senior writer for The Athletic and author of The Grandest Game: A History of the World Series and K: A History of of Baseball in Ten Pitches. Like Kepner — and most young baseball fans — I had dreams […]
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Bookshelf Conversations,
Tyler Kepner
The passing of Rocky Colavito last month was the impetus for this one. The majority of people with whom I have these Conversations are your standard interview fare. By that I mean I only know them because of their work. In this case, I can honestly say the subject is a good friend. When I […]
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Scott Raab
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 […]
I’ve long believed that the death of a famous athlete leads to renewed interest in any books about him, a theory that holds when you look at the weekly Baseball Best-Sellers. Sure enough, the recent passing of Pete Rose provided an uptick in sales of books about the controversial superstar and since Keith O’Brien wrote […]
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Keith O'Brien,
Pete Rose
Just about 30 years ago, I bought Baseball’s Golden Age: The Photographs of Charles M. Conlon. Even if you’re not a connoisseur of the early 20th century game, I’m willing to be you’ve sen photos taken by Conlon. Many of the close-ups are haunting. To me, the players always seemed much older than the 20- […]
I don’t have a whole lot of hobbies, so when I see a book that combines any of them on my periodic “Coming down the pike” stories, I get extra pumped. Baseball: The Movie covers two of them. Now that I no longer have Turner Classic Movies, since they went to a subscription platform, I […]
As I keep mentioning, regular readers of The Bookshelf know of my disdain for superlatives and similar declarations, such as “Greatest,” “Worst,” “Complete,” in titles. But there are a few cases in which they seem totally appropriate. In the case of Andy McCoullough’s new (and first) book, Clayton Kershaw just might be The Last of […]
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Andy McCullough,
Clayton Kershaw
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 […]
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Boston Red Sox,
Dwight Evans
I always felt a bit jealous of beat writers like Andy Martino. They get to go to every game, sit in (mostly) the best seats, have great access, etc. Of course, that’s an idealistic view. Travel can be brutal, players can be jerks (as can writers and their editors), competition can be fierce. Look at […]
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Andy Martino,
New York Yankees
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 […]
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New York Yankees,
Willie Mays
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 […]
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New York Yankees
Take two. Don’t know what happened, but the original post from earlier this week disappeared like a Doc Gooden curveball. Not even a draft of it, so I’m trying to recreate it as faithfully as possible. It seems to many outside the area that New Yorkers have an inflated image of themselves (at least those […]
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Brooklyn Dodgers,
Kevin Baker,
New York Giants,
New York Yankees
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 […]
A couple of weeks ago I visited a local shop that purportedly sold comics and baseball cards. Alas, I learned that was not the case. The owner told me there was no real business for cards over the past several years. I would say that that’s a shame but the reality is there have been […]
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Baseball Cards
It should come as no surprise that this year’s CASEY Award, presented by Spitball Magazine, goes to Joe Posnanski for his latest masterpiece, Why We Love Baseball: A History in 50 Moments. It almost seems unfair that such great work should come from the same writer in such quick succession. From the press release from […]
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Joe Posnanski,
Spitball Magazine
is available on Amazon.com,
