One of the saddest books your likely to read this year and, hopefully, for the foreseeable future, is S.L. Price’s Heart of the Game: Life, Death and Mercy in Minor League America.
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July 24, 2009 · 3 comments
One of the saddest books your likely to read this year and, hopefully, for the foreseeable future, is S.L. Price’s Heart of the Game: Life, Death and Mercy in Minor League America.
Tagged as: Mike Coolbaugh, S.L. Price
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July 18, 2009
That’s Barra, not Berra, although the confusion would be easy to understand. Barra is the author, Berra is the subject of this new biography of the Yankees’ Hall of Fame catcher. The writer — whose work has appeared in such publications as The Wall Street Journal and on-line on Salon.com, crafted this serious-yet-entertaining profile on […]
Tagged as: Allen Barra, Yogi Berra
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April 2, 2009
A veteran of the minor league beat, Lisa Winston has been a writer, reporter, columnist, and multimedia correspondent for such outlets as USA Today, Baseball/ Sports Weekly and, most recently, MLB.com. She is a frequent guest on radio and TV sports talk shows around the country, and was the original host of the Fox News […]
Tagged as: Baseball Honeymoon, Lisa Winston, minor league baseball
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March 27, 2009
Jeff Pearlman, author of the damning new biography on Roger Clemens, took a few minutes to discuss his project with The Bookshelf. Pearlman’s latest — The Rocket That Fell to Earth: Roger Clemens and the Rage for Baseball Immortality (Harper) — is a frightening tale of a man who is at once on top of […]
Tagged as: Jeff Pearlman, Roger Clemens
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March 26, 2009
Kudos to Mr. Fox. The artist received the assignment of a lifetime. His work has been selected by Topps as a special insert into their 2009 set. But not as a mere insert. Distributed among the thousands of packs are “redemption cards” which can be exchanged for one of 50 individually drawn card-size sketches. So […]
Tagged as: baseball art, Brian Fox
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March 13, 2009
It’s quite a leap from romance novels to baseball non-fiction, but Jane Heller has traversed the expanse surprisingly well. Heller, author of 13 books including Infernal Affairs and An Ex to Grind, has parlayed her life-long love for the Bronx Bombers into Confessions of a She-Fan: The Course of True Love with the New York […]
Tagged as: Jane Heller, New York Yankees
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February 7, 2009 · 4 comments
The Bookshelf is interested in all aspects of the field: writers, publishers, and those who are the last stop on the way to getting those materials into our hands. Not all of it comes from large retails outlets. In fact, some of the more interesting outlets are small merchants with a love for their product. […]
Tagged as: baseball book industry, Bobby Plapinger
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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.
In Forbes Magazine re: Baseball Business Books
On Will Carroll’s “Under the Knife” substack
Most recent books read updated 12/21/24:
Charlie Hustle: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball, by Keith O’Brien
Grade: A. The most in-depth bio to date, focusing on Rose's gambling addiction.
Sometimes You See It Coming, by Kevin Baker
Grade: B. I first read this one when it originally came out some 30 years ago. I must say I don't remember it being so raunchy in spots. Draws on lots of real-life events and characters that real fans will recognize.
The Last of His Kind: Clayton Kershaw and the Burden of Greatness, by Andy McCullough
Grade: A. I usually don't like titles with superlatives, but in this case the author might be right, although there are probably a couple of Kershaw's contemporaries (Verlander and Scherzer) who fit that description.
The Yankee Way: The Untold Inside Story of the Brian Cashman Era, by Andy Martino
Grade: B+. Even this non-Yankee fan found the deep background with its Moneyball-like machinations interesting
The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City, by Kevin Baker
Grade: A. Well-researched, well-written. What else could you ask for? Baker has a lot of street cred writing about New York as well, both in fiction and non-fiction.
The Body Scout, by Lincoln Michel
Grade: C. Perhaps the ultimate performance enhancers -- interchangeable body parts -- help major leaguers of the future. But, as with all of these things, there's a price to pay.
Cardboard Gods: An All-American Tale Told Through Baseball Cards, by Josh Wilker
Grade: A. Re-read in preparation for a Bookshelf Conversation with the author. Had a deeper meaning than when I first read it more than a decade ago.
The Bookshelf Conversation
Discussions about all things baseball with authors, journalists, filmmakers, musicians, artists, et al
Subscribe to the "Bookshelf Conversations" podcast on iTunes and please leave a rating and/or review. Gracias!
Mike Shannon on "Diamond Classics II" ( video)
Todd Radom, Ellen Linder, and Brian Kong ( video)
Rick Cerrone (Baseball Digest, video)
Kevin Baker (Sometimes You See It Coming, video)
Curtis Pride and Doug Ward (video)
Dan Epstein on James Earl Jones (video)
Jim Gilmore and Tracy Holcomb (video)
"The Lost Tapes": Conversations prior to 2011 (audio)
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


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August 4, 2009 · 4 comments
Had a good time at the SABR convention in DC. It was nice too meet so many folks who are just as nuts (if not more so) than me. Being the bookworm that I am, it was especially nice hanging out with the writers, many of whom were peddling their products in the vendors’ room. […]
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