Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
Bobby Valentine — How has this guy not written a book yet? Between his time as manager for the Texas Rangers and New York Mets after a promising but ultimately injury-aborted playing career, plus his time in Japan, you’d think someone would have published one. There was a cool documentary — The Zen of Bobby […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
By the way, it’s still winter so why aren’t we hearing snow-themed songs anymore? “Winter Wonderland” and “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” among others, are not “holiday” songs, per se, so they’d still be valid. Just sayin’. Thought I saw my first “annual” at the bookstore last week, but it was a fantasy publication, so it […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
to Ozzie Guillen, who turns 47 today. I know. I found it surprising that there are two books by/about him: The Wit And Wisdom of Ozzie Guillen and A Passion for the Game: Ozzie Guillen’s Insights, Outbursts, Kudos, and Comebacks.
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Walter Alston was born this date in 1911. He struck out in his only at bat: Sept. 27, 1936 as member of the St. Louis Cardinals against the Chicago Cubs. But he more than made up for that as a Hall of Fame manager for the Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers. Alston was inducted into the Hall […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Sports Illustrated‘s Tom Verducci considers one of the questions I’ve been wondering about for a long time: Why do teams keep hiring the same old managers rather than give someone new a chance? I’ve often thought of baseball in terms of television shows: you keep getting the same actors in different roles though similar roles. […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Baseball lifer George “Birdie” Tebbetts was born on this date in 1912. A catcher, he spent 14 seasons as an active player before taking of the managerial reins of the Cincinnati Redlegs, as they were called in the early 1950s during the Communist scare, as per this Wikipedia entry: “Twice in the 1950s (the McCarthy […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, Nov. 5 at Noon. Title Rank General The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the End of America’s Childhood, by Jane Leavy 1 Beyond Belief: Finding the Strength to Come Back, by Josh Hamilton and Tim Keown 2 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, July 16. Title Rank General Steinbrenner: The Last Lion of Baseball, by Bill Madden 1 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis 2 The Baseball Codes: Beanballs, Sign Stealing, and Bench-Clearing Brawls: The Unwritten Rules of America’s Pastime, by Scott Turbow […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
(Got it in under the wire) Born on the Fourth of July 80 years ago. Here’s a review of Bill Madden’s new bio from WasWatching.com. Other titles featuring Steinbrenner include: George: The Poor Little Rich Boy Who Built the Yankee Empire, by Peter Golenbock The Ballad of Billy and George: The Tempestuous Baseball Marriage of […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
This week’s best-selling baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, April 23. 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 […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
A History and Analysis of Performance in the Major Leagues, 1876-2008, by Chris Jaffe (McFarland). A review of the book appears on Amazin’ Avenue (“an unofficial New York Mets blog”). Upshot: It all makes for a very interesting read, especially considering how tragically ignored managers are in most baseball literature and analysis. If the Mets […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Jon Weisman, who blogs about the Dodgers for the Los Angeles Times, gives a sample of Chris Jaffe’s Evaluating Baseball Managers: A Comprehensive History and Performance Analysis, 1876-2008 (McFarland) as it pertains to his home team. Upshot: The book, as a whole, “is going to be as big as it sounds.”
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
This week in baseball books, featuring the best-sellers according to Amazon.com on Friday, November 6. Title Rank General The Bill James Handbook 2010 (Ranks 613 in books) 1 The Machine: A Hot Team, a Legendary Season, and a Heart-stopping World Series: The Story of the 1975 Cincinnati Reds, by Joe Posnanski (709) 2 Moneyball: The […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Tis the season. As the summer game segues into fall’s finales, no less than five titles deal with the World Series, including two about the 1975 games between the Red Sox and Reds, one about Don Larsen’s 1956 perfect game against the Brooklyn Dodgers, and But the one that goes back the furthest is The […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
I no longer subscribe to the print version of SI, but I do pick up the occasional copy (which is kind of silly since the cost of four or five newsstand editions is roughly equivalent to a deep-discount subscription). The annual “Where Are They Now” is one of them. The editors usually do a good […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Ordinarily, I wouldn’t go back to a review of The Yankee Years; that so over. But I’ll make an exception for Roger Angell. The veteran sportswriter praises the work of both Torre and Verducci (“Verducci has range and ease; he’s a shortstop on the page.”) In the book, it’s a rush when you reach those […]
{ 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 blog 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
* Back to work / Bits and pieces
September 30, 2009
The holidays are over now so let’s get back to business. More on Posnanski and his new book, The Machine, from the Wall Street Journal; Hartford Courant; Rob Neyer and ESPN (interview); Cincinnati.com (“Latest book may be the best on Reds’ dynasty”); Baseball Prospectus Radio had this interview with the author with the author (audio […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }