Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
by Jimmy Piersall with Al Hirshberg. Atlantic Monthly Press/Little, Brown and Company, 1955. Jimmy Piersall was a two-time All-Star who sent 17 seasons in the Majors…and one summer in a mental institution. That’s the crux of this underrated autobiography from the mid-50s, well ahead of its time in discussing the issue of mental illness. Piersall’s […]
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Sometimes I wonder, with all the new books coming out every year, why anyone would want to read something they’ve already read before. So many books, so little time. But while working on the 501 Book project I came across several titles in my library that I had never read, which no doubt led to […]
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I was doing some research for the 501 project and thought I’d take a look at what eBay has to offer. Turns out, it’s a lot. More than 4,000 items came up for the search term “baseball books” and it was interesting to see the make-up. Although I didn’t take a deliberate count, the vast […]
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The good news: More than half way to the goal of 501 books. The bad news: it takes me away from the blog. Oh well, hang around. It will be worth it in the end. In the meantime, here are a few items for your consideration: Out of Left Field, Rebecca Alpert’s history of Jewish […]
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While doing research for my project, I came across this list, published in 2002, of the 100 top sports books of all time as chosen by the editors of Sports Illustrated. Of those 100, “only” 32 were about baseball. The nerve. Anyway, here’s the SI piece, trimmed to just baseball titles, with commentary from the […]
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Dickson, author of several outstanding books on the game, not the least of which is his eponymous Baseball Dictionary, was recently honored at an event sponsored by the Baseball Reliquary. While Robert Alomar, Bert Blyleven, and Pat Gillick were in Cooperstown last weekend, the Reliquary was having an “induction day” of its own in southern […]
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By Christy Mathewson, 1912 A “pinch” is a tight spot, when one is expected to suck it up and give it that extra 10 percent; Mathewson had to do that a time or two in an era when starting pitchers were expected to go the distance. Hard to believe that Mathewson, one of the original […]
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On this date: In 1941 at the All-Star Game at Briggs Stadium, Ted Williams, hitting .405 at the break, homers off Chicago Cubs P Claude Passeau with two out and two on in the ninth inning to give the American League a dramatic 7 – 5 victory. (Relevant title: The Midsummer Classic: The Complete History […]
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Welcome to a new feature celebrating some of the great moments in the game. On this date in 1963, Jimmy Piersall, then a member of the Mets, hit his 100th home run and marked the occasion by running the bases backwards. You’d think his manager, Casey Stengel, would appreciate the creativity, but apparently he did […]
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Werber, who died in 2009 at the age of 100, was the last link to the 1927 NY Yankees, having spent a week on their bench while a freshman attending Duke. He played for five teams over 11 seasons, leading the Al in runs once and stolen bases three times. The Society for American Baseball […]
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Time once again for a major links dump to make up for bad behavior. Warning: some of these links go back to March. Just sayin’. * A member of Red Sox Nation pays tribute to a “mortal enemy” by giving the NY Times photo book on Derek Jeter the thumbs up. * The Wall Street […]
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The Red Sox Hall of Fame second baseman turns 93 today. As my people say, ken ahora. Doeer was a nine-time All Star and one of the subjects of the late Dave Halberstam’s 2003 bittersweet book, The Teammates: A Portrait of a Friendship. Also born this date, John McGraw — the Billy Martin of his […]
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The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, March 18, at 4 p.m. Title Rank General Baseball in the Garden of Eden: The Secret History of the Early Game, by John Thorn 1 The Extra 2%: How Wall Street Strategies Took a Major League Baseball Team from Worst to First, by Jonah Keri […]
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The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, Feb 25, at 1:30 p.m. Title Rank General Baseball Prospectus 2011 1 Baseball America 2011 Prospect Handbook: The 2011 Expert Guide to Baseball Prospects and MLB Organization Rankings 2 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis (Kindle version) 3 Moneyball: The […]
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I don’t know, what name would you suggest for an award to honor the best baseball performances? At Oscar time, Jim Caple of ESPN’s Page 2 offers his take on “Academy Awards for Baseball Movies” (he dubbed his awards the “Oscar Madisons”). No real surprises here, although I would have selected Costner over Matthau, Davis […]
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Intro: As previously stated, the recent election of Robert Alomar and Bert Blyleven got me to thinking: how many Hall of Famers have had books written about them or penned their own stories. Here are the results. Again, this is not an all-inclusive list; almost all juvenile titles have been omitted. * * * “M” […]
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The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, Feb 25, at 1:30 p.m. Title Rank General Baseball Prospectus 2011 1 Baseball America 2011 Prospect Handbook: The 2011 Expert Guide to Baseball Prospects and MLB Organization Rankings 2 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis (Kindle version) 3 The Last […]
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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
Bookshelf review: Woman Characters in Baseball Literature
September 2, 2011
A Critical Study, by Kathleen Sullivan. McFarland, 2005. Novels and feature films tend to find comfort in stock characters. Stories about celebrities in particular focus on two or three types of women. You have your temptress who, for various reasons, wants to keep the protagonist from succeeding at his mission. For baseball materials you have […]
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