From the category archives:

Broadcasting

The MLB Network will present Holy Land Hardball, the documentary about the lone season of the Israel Baseball League, on Sunday, Jan. 10 at 10 p.m.

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From the National Baseball Hall of Fame: 2010 Ford C. Frick Award Ballot Finalized Winner to be Announced Feb. 1 Ten of baseball’s most beloved and honored broadcasters were named today as the finalists for the 2010 Ford C. Frick Award, presented annually for excellence in baseball broadcasting by the National Baseball Hall of Fame […]

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* Bits and pieces

December 24, 2009

Mike Silva of NY Baseball Digest recently posted this 2007 audio interview he did with former major leaguer Terry Leach. Leach, a side-arming reliever who pitched for several teams, including the Mets, wrote about his experiences in Things Happen for a Reason: The True Story of an Itinerant Life in Baseball. Long-time baseball analyst Peter Gammons, […]

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“But the most amazing thing of all: I get paid for doing this” (the closing lines for one of the comedian’s songs during his heyday in the late 1970s). I bring it up because, once again, it goes to the folly of using sports pundits as a source of reliable information. At least when it […]

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* TWIBB — September 19

September 19, 2009

This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Saturday, September 19. Title Rank General The Machine: A Hot Team, a Legendary Season, and a Heart-stopping World Series: The Story of the 1975 Cincinnati Reds, Posnanski 1 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Games, Lewis 2 The Yankee Years, Torre and […]

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* TWIBB — September 11

September 11, 2009

This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, September 11. Title Rank General The Machine: A Hot Team, a Legendary Season, and a Heart-stopping World Series: The Story of the 1975 Cincinnati Reds, Posnanski 1 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Games, Lewis 2 The Yankee Years, Torre and […]

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*The ethics of sportswriting

September 10, 2009

Former NY Times baseball writer Murray Chass takes on the subject of anonymous sources in his most recent column. This issue came up in baseball books a few times this year, most notably Serena Roberts’ biography on Alex Rodriguez. Critics took her to task for using A.S. and dubious testimonials about the ballplayer’s use of […]

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The legendary Detroit Tigers broadcaster Ernie Harwell published this piece praising the improved quality of baseball literature in his Free Press column of Aug. 16. Among the titles mentioned (just to name a few) are Jonathan Eig’s Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig and Opening Day: The Story of Jackie Robinson’s First […]

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The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel published this piece on the author of the new Vin Scully biography. The Amazon Report on Pull Up a Chair: The Vin Scully Story

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Curt Smith, who has a professed fondness for the boys in the baseball booth, has published another in-depth biography about an broadcasting icon. In Pull Up A Chair: The Vin Scully Story (Potomac), Smith — who has covered other industry stars as Mel Allen and Dizzy Dean— combines his admiration for the man was had […]

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The May/June issue of ForeWord Magazine, a publication that specializes in small and university presses, carries my feature on nine 2009 baseball titles, including: Under the March Sun: The Story of Spring Training High-Flying Birds: The 1942 St. Louis Cardinal Babe Ruth: Remembering the Bambino in Stories, Photos & Memorabilia Yankee Colors: The Glory Years […]

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It’s been a rough week for baseball fans. Nick Adenhart, Mark Fidrych, and Harry Kalas, all gone. Kalas was one of those “voices of God” that a few are blessed with (Charlton Heston and John Vernon also comes to mind). Whether he was broadcasting the Phillies games or doing the voice-over for NFL Films, Kalas […]

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* W2W4: A look ahead

January 1, 2009

Stealing an idea from ESPN the Magazine (and others, no doubt). Took my math-challenged mind awhile to figure out that W2W4 means “what to watch for.” Duh. Anyway, the always-informative BizofBaseball.com offers this list of ten stories to watch for in 2009, including: The economy Credit Digital media rights Cubs sale New stadia Ticket discounting/price […]

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It appears on a hit TV show like CSI. I don’t normally watch the show, but I caught a recent episode “on demand” and noticed this from a scene in a prison library. It comes about 20 seconds in and you have to be alert: as Gil Grissom is looking for a book an inmate […]

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* I saw it in the Times

October 25, 2008

One more reason that the current NY Times is not your granddaddy’s newspaper. The history of the World Series home run on TV (video).

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Tim McCarver appeared on The Leaonard Lopate Show on Friday to promote his new book, Tim McCarver’s Diamond Gems. (Great, another book of anecdotes.) For some reason, the segment was not made available when the others from the day’s show were. I wondered if it had more to do some diabolical desire on the part […]

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Many years ago, the New Yorks Mets operated a marketing campaign on the theme, “baseball like it ought to be.” Unfortunately, baseball ought to be good, or at least enjoyable, but if memory serves, this campaign ran at a time when they were stinko. I offer this as an introduction to this “Rites of Summer” […]

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