Review by Ron Kaplan

The following appeared in American Book Review, November/December 2001. It has been estimated that more words have been written about baseball than all other sports combined. Such quantity obviously leads to widely-ranging quality. Cutting through the chafe – the juvenile literature, the statistical analyses – the persistent and curious fan can find those fine stalks […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

The following appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, May 9, 2004. Looking back at Cleveland Indians Baseball

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

This review appears in American Book Review, March-April 2003. And so it begins anew. Opening Day. The teams take to unblemished green fields in dazzlingly clean uniforms amid much pomp and ceremony. Fans on the East Coast shake off the early spring chill, even some leftover snow, warmed by the thrills they’ve been awaiting since […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

This review appears on JanuaryMagazine.com. Memory plays tricks on us. You and I could see the same thing, but years later recall it differently. Can we both be right? Yes, as Danny Gallagher and Bill Young prove in their nostalgic recollection Remembering the Montreal Expos. Read the full review on JanuaryMagazine.com.

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p><span style=”color: #000000;”>This review appeared in <em>ForeWord Magazine</em>, May/June 2003.</span></p> <p><span style=”color: #000000;”>Ever since academicians and historians such as Harold Seymour, David Q. Voigt, and Jules Tygiel began to make &quot;serious&quot; examinations of the national p</span><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=211,height=300,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/0786412720.jpg”><span style=”color: #000000;”><img title=”0786412720″ height=”213″ alt=”0786412720″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/0786412720.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p>This review appeared in <em>BookPage</em>, May 2001. </p> <p>To watch our children playing together nowadays, it’s difficult to conceive of a <a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=318,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/owens_1.jpg”><img title=”Owens_1″ height=”224″ alt=”Owens_1″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/owens_1.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a> time when it was taboo for blacks and whites to join in a […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

Appeared in ForeWord Magazine, May/June 2002. The sub-genre of baseball-related poetry is probably one of the most under-appreciated in the great tradition of poetry and literature. “No matter how good a baseball poem is,” the editors write in the introduction, “some will always feel that baseball as subject matter relegates a poem to also-ran status.” […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p>Appeared on Bookreporter.com in 2005</p> <p><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=476,height=695,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/faithful.jpg”><img title=”Faithful” height=”219″ alt=”Faithful” src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/faithful.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a> Michael Kun, co-author of <em>The Baseball Uncyclopedia</em>, made a particularly astute observation about the state of baseball literature over the last few years. Go into a bookstore, he writes, […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p>Apperaed on BookReporter.com, Oct. 20, 2006<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/sibbbook_1.jpg”><img title=”Sibbbook_1″ height=”150″ alt=”Sibbbook_1″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/sibbbook_1.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a><em> </em></p> <p>&quot;Baseball books are divided into several subgenres: team histories, overall histories, biographies, statistical analyses, etc. Each year offers one from each group that stands apart from the rest. […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<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/rise.jpg”></a><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/rise_1.jpg”><img title=”Rise_1″ height=”175″ alt=”Rise_1″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/rise_1.jpg” width=”175″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a>Appeared on JanuaryMagazine.com in Nov. 2003</p> <p>&quot;When Leonard Koppett died earlier this year, he left a tremendous void in the world of sports journalism. </p> <p>&quot;Koppett, who was named […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

Appeared on JanuaryMagazine.com, Summer 2005. “For the second consecutive year, Maple Ridge’s own Larry Walker helped his St. Louis Cardinals vie for the National League pennant. Although Walker is in the twilight of his career, his legacy as one of Canada’s favorite baseball sons, having spent his salad days with the now-defunct Montreal Expos….” Read […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

Originally appeared in Elysian Fields Quarterly, 2003. “One of the reasons baseball fans remain so steadfast in their devotion to the game is a sense of tradition. During interminable rain delays and constant pitching changes, broadcasters often wax nostalgic about constancy: for over a hundred years there have been nine men on the field, bases […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

As former professional athletes move deeper and deeper into senior citizen status, it becomes increasingly interesting, akin to listening to our grandparents discuss what life was like “in the day.” Baseball has always “enjoyed” a reputation that is almost a necessity, given its relatively slow pace. There is plenty of time to think, to talk. […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

While Barry Bonds and his home-run hitting brethren have followed the “better living through science” route to fame, Babe Ruth did things the old-fashioned way: booze, babes and BAM! It seems every time a contemporary baseballist threatens to bypass Ruth’s 714 home runs, someone comes out with a new book in an attempt to a) […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p><span face=”Verdana”><em><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/shadows.jpg”><img title=”Shadows” height=”150″ alt=”Shadows” src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/shadows.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a> Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal</em>, </span><span face=”Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif”>by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams</span></p> <p><span face=”Verdana”>&quot;Shortly after Jose Canseco’s tell-all Juiced came out in 2005, with allegations […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p>Spring 2006 Roundup Review on Bookreproter.com, including:<a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=336,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/believe.jpg”><img title=”Believe” height=”223″ alt=”Believe” src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/believe.jpg” width=”150″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 5px 5px” /></a> </p> <ul><li><em>The Baseball Uncyclopedia</em> </li> <li><em>The Mind of Bill James: How a Complete Outsider Changed Baseball</em> </li> <li><em>Call the Yankees My Daddy: Reflections on Baseball, Race, and Family</em> […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p>Since Michael Lewis’s <em>Moneyball</em> — the behind-the-scenes story of how general <a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=458,height=700,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/11590329.jpg”><img title=”11590329″ height=”152″ alt=”11590329″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/11590329.jpg” width=”100″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 5px 5px 0px” /></a> manager Billy Beane assembled the Oakland Athletics — hit the bookstores in 2003, several authors have attempted to copy the behind-the-scenes formula.</p> <p><a […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

<p></p> <p>Appeared in ForeWord Magazine, July/August 2001</p> <p><a onclick=”window.open(this.href, ‘_blank’, ‘width=150,height=223,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/65607638.jpg”><img title=”65607638″ height=”148″ alt=”65607638″ src=”http://baseballbookshelf.mlblogs.com/my_weblog/images/65607638.jpg” width=”100″ border=”0″ style=”FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 5px 5px 0px” /></a> &quot;In his preface to <em>Baseball and the American Dream: Race, Class, Gender and the National Pastime</em>, editor Robert Elias notes that baseball ‘offers a common denominator that […]

{ Comments on this entry are closed }