Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
Semi-shameless self promotion: this assessment was written by James Bailey and yours truly. Titles include: Heart of the Game: Life, Death and Mercy in Minor League America As They See ‘Em: A Fan’s Travels in the Land of Umpires Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend Catcher: How the Man behind the Plate […]
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by Kurt Willinger (Sabre Press, 1995) Moe Berg is certainly one of the most interesting characters to ever done baseball flannels. A mediocre player — an apocryphal story quotes Casey Stengel saying “He can speak seven languages but can’t hit in any of them — Berg played for five teams over 15 seasons. Had he […]
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From Perth to Sacramento, by Nicholas R.W. Henning (Booksurge.com, 2009) Regular readers of the Bookshelf know I rarely offer my own reviews of baseball fiction. I find it too subjective and my education and skills in critiquing the genre too inferior. But once in awhile a book will find its way here that bears some […]
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Attila the Hun and Other Yankee Stories, by Ira Berkow (Triumph) Not that anyone needs an excuse, but the Yankees winning another world championship is fodder for the book mill. There are no less than five publications in the sports magazine section of my local Barnes and Noble hoping to capitalize on the afterglow. They’re […]
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The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain, by Marty Appel (Doubleday) I doubt there’s anyone better qualified to write the biography of the late catcher than Appel, who served the Yankees for many years, first as a PR director, later in television production. The contacts he has devloped over the years would fill a […]
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A Baseball Prodigy, a World at War, and a Field of Broken Dreams, by Gary W. Moore I wanted to wait a bit after Veteran’s Day because I didn’t want this to appear as a knock against the vets. I have nothing but respect for them, their service and sacrifice. Gary Moore writes this respectful, affectionate […]
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The New York Times Book Review published this article by David Leonhardt, who writes a weekly economics column for the paper. His upshot in this full-page review: Despite its engaging moments, though, “Sixty Feet, Six Inches” is mostly unsatisfying, because Gibson and Jackson play their roles as the grizzled veterans too predictably…. The men go […]
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by Brian Biegel. Crown, 2009. Miracle Ball is at once a sweet and haunting book. The premise has the author, whose day job is that of an independent filmmaker, on an obsessive quest to find the whereabouts of an/or ownership of the ball hit by Bobby Thomson in the 1951 playoff game against the Brooklyn […]
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For all the best intentions, hopes, and excitement, the Israel Baseball League lasted just one season. Tepid responses by the media and native-born population, poor playing conditions, and questionable business practices all led to the league’s downfall after its 2007 debut. Little of that gloom, however, is evidenced in Holy Land Hardball, a documentary about […]
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Congratulations to the cast and crew of Signs of the Time, winner of the Award for Baseball Excellence at the 2009 Baseball Film Festival, held at the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. The award, “given to the film that excels in one or all of the following categories: research, historical context, appreciation of the […]
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Abrams publishers has come out with some very neat books over the last couple of years. The house, which specializes in art and photography books recently began a line of perpetual calendars on themes.The main problem reminds me of an episode from my childhood. When I was about 10, we had dinner at a local […]
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Two Baseball Legends, Two Boxing Champs, and the Unstoppable Thoroughbred Who Made History in the Shadow of War, by Mike Vacarro (Doubleday, 2006) (Note: This review originally appeared in my previous blog on baseball and books a few years back.) While he does cover other sports in his newest offering, Mike Vaccaro, New York Post […]
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With the Mets season just about over, I needed to find new ways to amuse myself. When I was a kid at day camp, we used to play this game, “initials.” One player would think of the name of some baseball player, the other would try to guess. You got a home run if you […]
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I don’t often read baseball fiction these days. I find them too hit-or-miss, pardon the metaphor. One problem is that authors often employ too much exposition, as if their readership knows nothing about the game. Those who do know a fair deal about how baseball is played or its history, might find this boring and […]
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The Mets That Were, by Leonard Shecter, Dial Press, 1970. It is generally accepted that Shea Stadium was not one of the classic ballparks in the long history of the national pastime. Yet more than 56,000 were on hand for the final game on Sept. 28, 2008. On the other hand, when the same Mets […]
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Here’s a roundup of reviews I did 10 years ago for Book Page, a “trade” publication available at libraries and bookstores: * * * Perhaps no baseball season has been as closely monitored and analyzed as 1998. Balls were rocketing out of the parks at an amazing rate, and the Yankees were leaving the competition […]
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by Robert B. Parker. Putnam, 2004. Robert B. Parker’s heroes epitomize the strong silent types. Like the cowboys of old, they are taciturn, unfailingly loyal and determined to pursue the causes of right in the face of superior numbers or disadvantageous circumstances. Joseph Burke is the latest in this mold. Parker, known primarily for his […]
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Wife and daughter are at the Sawx-Tigers game at the moment, so I thought it appropriate to haul these three reviews out of mothballs. All appeared in A Red Sox Journal, published by The Buffalo Head Society in the late 1990s. * * * Murder at Fenway Park, by Troy Soos. Kensington Publishing: NY. 1994 […]
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For me, as a freelance writer, anyway. My first major published piece was a review of Shoeless Joe and Ragtime Baseball, by Harvey Frommer for Elysian Fields Quarterly in 1993, which you’ll find after the break. I wax nostalgic because I learned at the recent SABR Convention that EFQ might be forced to ceases publication […]
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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
