Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, August 14. Title Rank General Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain, Appel 1 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, Lewis 2 Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, Tye 3 The Yankee Years, Torre and […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Baseball, books on language, and Roy Blount, Jr. So how cool is it to combine all three? The sportswriter and frequent panelist on one of my favorite NPR programs, Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me (so make that four things, by extension), recently published Alphabet Juice: The Energies, Gists, and Spirits of Letters, Words, and Combinations Thereof: […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
I was finishing up my run this afternoon. My thighs were clenching, still sore from yesterday’s workout. I started thinking about the latest product that Shaq endorses (the actual name of which escapes me at the moment): a combination ace bandage/heat wrap that you can cut to size. So I was thinking: if a professional […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Last week, Charles McGrath had written about “The Red Sox Nation, Betrayed.” This week, In The Public Editor column in Sunday’s Week in Review section, Clark Hoyt seeks to explain how the Times did the correct thing in its reporting that David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez were part of the 2003 list of players that […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, August 7. Title Rank General Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain, Appel 1 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, Lewis 2 Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, Tye 3 The Yankee Years, Torre and […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
This one is a toughie. Omar Minaya took time out in yesterday’s press conference announcing the firing of Tony Bernazard to point an accusing finger at NY Daily News sportswriter Adam Rubin. Aaccording to Minaya, Rubin had perhaps politicked (my phrase) for a player development job some time back and was therefore somewhat predisposed to […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
This two-page overview of three Yankees titles — The Yankees Years, by Joe Torre and Tom Verducci; A-Rod: The Many Lives of Alex Rodriguez, by Selena Roberts; and American Icon: The Fall of Roger Clemens and the Rise of Steroids in America’s Pastime, by Thompson, Vinton, O’Keeffe and Red — appears in this weeks New […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
I participated in a survey of the “best” baseball fiction and non-fiction books from the Hardball Cooperative site. It was an honor to be included with such learned contributors. Of course, one person’s meat is another’s poison; the comment’s made to the Baseball Think Factory, to which a link was posted, indicates that quite clearly. […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, June 19. Title Rank General Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, Tye 1 The Yankee Years, Torre and Verducci 2 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, Lewis 3 The Science of Hitting, Williams 4 As They See […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
From the MLB portion of Fanhouse.com, this piece on Zev Chafets‘ new and controversial book on the Hall of Fame. And another from The Hardball Times. Upshot: Chafets doesn’t portray himself as a baseball expert, a la Bill James. He clearly is a fan of the game—and a passionate one—make no mistake about it, but […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Bobby Feller’s generation complained about the high salaries of the players that came after them. Now Wade Boggs speaks for the players from his era on the steroiders and their possible entry into the Hall of Fame. Can chicken be considered a performance enhancing food? Come to think of it what about that? Why are […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, June 19. Title Rank General The Yankee Years, Torre and Verducci 1 As They See ‘Em: A Fan’s Travels in the Land of Umpires, Weber 2 Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, Tye 3 Moneyball: The Art of Winning […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Keith Olberman writes the “Baseball Nerd” under the MLB.blogs banner. In this entry, he takes Curt Smith to task for an error in Pull Up a Chair, his new biography of legendary Dodgers announcer Vin Scully. Olberman, who makes his living being contrary, used to be a baseball book reviewer in a former life. “[O]ne […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Loathe as I am to get dirty with the A-Rod book, I feel I would be derelict in my “duty” to ignore it. So we’ll try to make this as painless as possible. I’m still waiting for my copy, so I’m just passing along what I’ve read. The news falls into three basic camps: those […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Charles McGrath penned this interesting comparison of good v. evil, aka Yankees v. Red Sox in today’s Week in Review section in the Sunday Times. Specifically, he talks about the differences in the ballparks. The New Yankees home, “with its vast, mall-like spaces, its temples of conspicuous consumption, feels like something the ancient Romans might […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
One of the things I liked most about working for STATS Inc. was going to the ballpark, having a seat waiting for me in the press box, and being treated (almost) like any veteran member of the media. That included perks such as all matter of printed material, including media guides. For those who may […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
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
* TWIBB — Aug. 21
August 22, 2009
This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, August 21. Title Rank General Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, Lewis 1 Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain, Appel 2 The Yankee Years, Torre and Verducci 3 Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend, […]
Tagged as: baseball books
{ Comments on this entry are closed }