Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
Who would have thunk it? The co-author of the printed version of Ken Burns’ Baseball documentary claims he was never much of a baseball fan, prior to the project. The reason is reminiscent of Ray Kinsella’s rationale in Field of Dreams: I’ve never liked baseball much, in part because my father has always loved it […]
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In honor of St. Patrick’s Day, here are some items that consider the contributions of the Irish in the establishment of the national pastime. Ed Delehanty in the Emerald Age of Baseball, by Jerrold Casway (University of Notre Dame Press, 2004) One of the charming qualities about baseball is that a fan from a hundred […]
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<p><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=350,height=277,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0’); return false” href=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/kuhn_williams_nixon_top.jpg”><img title=”Kuhn_williams_nixon_top” height=”118″ alt=”Kuhn_williams_nixon_top” src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/kuhn_williams_nixon_top.jpg” width=”149″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a><a href=”http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/16/sports/baseball/16kuhn.html”> Bowie Kuhn</a> passed away yesterday at the age of 80. For some reason, he makes me think of Richard Nixon. Probably because he held office at the same time as the President and […]
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by Kerry Yo Nakagawa. Rudi Publishing, 2002. Since Horace Wilson, an American schoolteacher in the “land of the rising sun,” introduced baseball to his students in 1872, Japanese have been mad for the game. The author, a writer, actor, filmmaker, and director of the Nisei Baseball Research Project, chronicles this fervor. Like their European counterparts, […]
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by William C. Kashatus. Penn State Press, 2006. Albert Charles “Chief” Bender was one of the best pitchers of the early 20th century, a stalwart for Connie Mack Philadelphia Athletics from 1903-17. During that time (with a one-game comeback in 1925 with the Chicago White Sox) he won more than 210 games and compiled an […]
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by Doug Feldman. Unversity of Nebraska Press, 2006. Fans of a certain age will recall some of the great collective let-downs in the game ‘s history: After cruising for most of the 1951 season, the Brooklyn Dodgers let the New York Giants catch them. The Philadelphia Phillies were running away with the pennant in 1964 […]
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<p>In this corner, wearing a red cover, <em>Who’s Who in Baseball. </em>In the other corner, changing many times over the years, <em>The Baseball Register</em> published by <em>The Sporting News.</em></p> <p><em><strong><span style=”font-size: 1.2em;”>Who’s Who in Baseball</span></strong></em></p> <p><em><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=800,height=979,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0’); return false” href=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/kentwwib_2.JPG”></a><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=800,height=979,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0’); return false” href=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/kentwwib_3.JPG”><img title=”Kentwwib_3″ height=”306″ alt=”Kentwwib_3″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/kentwwib_3.JPG” width=”250″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: […]
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The New Ballgame: Understanding Baseball Statistics for the Casual Fan, by Glenn Guzzo (ACTA Sports). A brief review of a brief book. Guzzo does a nice job explaining the key stats to newcomers to the game who want to enhance their experience by adding that numerical component, rather than “just watching.” He also offers an […]
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<p><strong><span style=”font-size: 0.8em;”>(<em>This article appeared on Purebaseball.com Oct. 3, 2001)</em></span></strong></p> <p><em><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=145,height=216,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0’); return false” href=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/1951.jpg”><img title=”1951″ height=”223″ alt=”1951″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/1951.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 5px 5px 0px” /></a> 1951: When Giants Played the Game</em>, by Kerry Keene. Sports Publishing Inc., $16.95.</p> <p>…to paraphrase from the Beatles. </p> <p>One of the classic confrontations […]
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The Baseball Timeline, by Burt Solomon (Dorling Kindersley Publishing). The Chronicle of Baseball: A Century of Major League Action, by John Mehno (Carlton Books). A Stitch in Time: A Baseball Chronology, 1845-2000. by Gene Elston (Halcyon Press). Day-by-Day in Baseball History, by Carl R. Moesche (McFarland). Baseball Extra: A Newspaper History of the Glorious Game […]
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Minor League Baseball: Community Building through Hometown Sports By Rebecca S. Kraus. New York: Haworth Press, 2002. Followers of minor-league baseball don’t have it easy. In the best of circumstances, their favorite players won’t be with the local team for long, since this is just a stopover, a tune-up before heading to “the Show.” […]
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(A version of this review appeared on Purebaseball.com in Oct. 2005) The Road to Cooperstown: A Critical History of Baseball?s Hall of Fame Selection Process, by James F. Vail (McFarland, 2001, $29.95) Whatever Happened to the Hall of Fame? Baseball, Cooperstown, and the Politics of Glory, by Bill James (Fireside Books, 1995). In recent years, […]
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If you’re going to give a book, give big, I always say. Coffee table editions are especially welcome and if the topic happens to be baseball, so much the better. It sometimes seems unfair that publications like Sports Illustrated can simply reach into 50 years-worth of archives at any time and pull a gem out […]
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The Improbable Birth of Baseball’s Hall of Fame, by Jim Reisler (Caroll & Graf, 2006) Conspiracy theories aside, there were those who would have loved to attribute the creation of baseball to Abner Doubleday in the bucolic town of Cooperstown, NY. Committees were created to establish the “true origins” of the national pastime, but facts […]
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<p>This review appeared on Purebaseball.com in 2002. </p> <ul><li><em>Ted Williams: The Pursuit of Perfection </em>by Jim Prime and Bill Nowlin </li> <li><em>I Remember Ted Williams</em>, by David Caetano </li></ul> <p><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=367,height=475,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0’); return false” href=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/williams1.jpg”><img title=”Williams1″ height=”226″ alt=”Williams1″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/williams1.jpg” width=”175″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 5px 5px 0px” /></a> Ted Williams would have turned […]
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The Big R: An Internal Auditing Action Adventure, by D. Larry Crumbley, Douglass E. Ziegenfuss and John J. O’Shaunessy. Academic Press. $25. There is an old cartoon of a person with a cartful of groceries on a supermarket checkout line under a sign that reads “10 items or less.” The person behind him asks, “Are […]
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<p>One might get the impression from reading <em>Amazin’ Met Memories</em> (by Howard Blatt, Albion Press) that winning is the only thing. </p> <p><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=500,height=500,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0’); return false” href=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/metmemories.jpg”><img title=”Metmemories” height=”150″ alt=”Metmemories” src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/metmemories.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a> Howard Blatt, a former reporter with the <em>New York Daily News</em>, begins […]
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This review originally appeared in January Magazine It’s been some time since W.P. Kinsella has come out with new baseball fiction. The author of such memorable novels as Shoeless Joe, Box Socials and The Iowa Baseball Confederacy and shorter works, The Thrill of the Grass, The Dixon Cornbelt League and Other Baseball Stories, reminds us […]
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(The following appeared on Bookreporter.com in October, 2002) Baseball dodged a bullet when players and owners came to their senses and decided to sign the labor agreement that will calm fans’ shaky nerves for the next few years. As the season winds down to the World Series, the media reminds us, through flowery prose, dramatic […]
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(This review first appeared on Purebaseball.com in 2002) Depending on whom you listen to, pitching is anywhere from 50 to 100 percent of the game — even more for the math-challenged. Christy Mathewson is credited with authoring one of the first treatises on that position with Pitching in a Pinch, first released in 1912. Of […]
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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
