Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
So I watched the Onion SportsDome last night. Meh. Michael Hale of The New York Times said it best in his review yesterday: Some of these segments are quite amusing, but they’re rarely more amusing than they would have been if published in The Onion (the newspaper or the Web site). You get the sense […]
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There are certain baseball movies I never fail to watch whenever they’re on TV. Although with some, I find the more I watch, the less entertaining they seem and the more annoyed I get. Case in point: A League of Their Own. For the most part, I still love this film. But the past few […]
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Not sure how I feel about these things. On the one hand, the technology is available so that it’s easy to turn books like these over quickly. On the other hand, is it an homage, or just a money grab? Newspapers (such as the San Francisco Chronicle, left) have managed fast turnarounds when their local […]
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Three baseball entries are among the non-fiction titles on The New York Times as “100 Notable Books of 2010.” THE LAST BOY: Mickey Mantle and the End of America’s Childhood. By Jane Leavy. (Harper/HarperCollins, $27.99.) Many biographies of Mantle have been written, but Leavy connects the dots in new and disturbing ways. THE LAST HERO: […]
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(A nod to one of my favorite old lawyer shows, Judd for the Defense, which starred Carl Betz, who played the father on The Donna Reed Show, which once featured a guest appearance by Willie Mays.) Anyway… I was watching the Top Defensive Plays of 2010 in the MLB Network (A TV fits on my […]
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As it pertains to J-E-T-E-R. I really hate this kind of stuff. Both the Yankees Derek Jeter seem to be bordering on the unreasonable as they dicker over a new contract. The Yankees’ corner claim that it’s all business, that Jeter isn’t getting any younger, that he shouldn’t be unduly rewarded for past performance, and […]
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::Heavy sigh:: Still hacking from spending several hours a couple of weeks ago in my attic trying to weed out some baseball material. As you can imagine, it’s very difficult. Part of it must be psychological: As long as you have “stuff,” you’ll never die. To put it another away, “I can’t die; look at […]
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While writing up the previous entry and reading the Forbes’ review of Ken Burns’ addenda, I was reminded that I wanted to add my two cents. The Forbes‘ writer thought there was too much information crammed into too little time. In one sense I agree, but perhaps if less time had been allotted for certain […]
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Hardball times posted this graphic that compares the Yankees and Twins, salary-wise: I wonder how something like this would translate to the “real world.” You know, pro athletes versus teachers, fire fighters, president of U.S., etc.
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A handful of players have been fortunate enough to enjoy a storybook ending to their career: ending with a bang. None have done it with as much mystique as Ted Williams. The Splendid Splinter played his last major league game against the Baltimore Orioles on September 28, 1960. A dreary affair, with nothing on the […]
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I predict that in the not too distant future, we will see: At least one new title on Roger Clemens, taking into account the current situation. In addition, I wouldn’t be surprised if previous books on Clemens and his drug use were reissued A cautionary tale about Stephen Strausburg A treatise of the drop in […]
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Bleacher Report ran this slide show on The Top 10 MLB Players Immortalized in Obscure Trivia.Very cool. Goodness knows I regularly encounter two or three trivia titles/”brain teasers” on the remainder table of my local Barnes and Noble, either on the game in general or a team or some other topic within a topic. The […]
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“Omar Minaya may upgrade pitching, but middling New York Mets are better off waiting to make moves,” Filip Bondy, New York Daily News “Forget about Mets dealing for Lily and Myers,” Joel Sherman, New York Post “Time for Mets to make moves,” Larry Brooks, New York Post “Top 10 New York Mets busts since 2001,” […]
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Earlier today I challenged Mark Juddery to back up the claim in his new book that baseball is the most overrated sport. Tonight, he offers his answer, via email, presented without editorial comment: Here are a few words written just for the Baseball Bookshelf site. (Well OK, it’s basically a reworked version of the book […]
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June 14: A piece on catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia’s troubles getting the ball back to the pitcher MLB poll: Which outfielder has the best arm? What’s up with all this great pitching? Wave of the Future, by Tom Verducci. More on the MLB draft here, here, here, and here. Joe Posnanski on Stephen Strausburg June 14 […]
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Better leave it there, because you can’t take it to Yankee Stadium. According to the team’s posted security measures: “The following items are prohibited: Any soft-sided bag larger than 16 inches by 16 inches by 8 inches, including diaper bags, backpacks and purses Briefcases, coolers and hard-sided bags and containers Glass, cans and plastic bottles […]
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I started this blog because I have always been fascinated with the creative process. Where do and author’s ideas come from? How does he do his research? What obstacles does she have along the way? I have been remiss. It has been brought to my attention that the author is just one part of the […]
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Less and less, it seems the answer to this age-old riddle is newspapers. Speaking from personal and practical experience, we have cut the stand-alone sports section at my weekly publication; instead I write the occasional sports-related piece. One kind old soul called to complain. He suggested we ditch the obituaries and put back the sports […]
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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
What we do
January 28, 2011 · 2 comments
And by “we,” I mean book reviewers. My colleague/competitor James Bailey posted this entry about the dilemmas we face when writing about the blood, sweat, and tears of authors on his own baseball book blog: A great book will usually sink its claws into me pretty quick, pronouncing itself a cut above its peers within […]
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