Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
Sal Yvars, the catcher for the New York Giants who spilled the beans about sign stealing during the famous playoff game against the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1951, died Dec. 10 at the age of 84. Richard Goldstein does his usual excellent job in the NY Times‘ obituary. Yvars, the Giants’ back-up receiver from 1957-53 (with […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Congratulations to Joe Gordon, the only player elected by the Veteran’s Committee for induction into the Hall of Fame. Any volunteers?
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
It’s quite appropriate that baseball’s winter meetings are held around the holidays. If your team’s front office guys are good, you can get a swell present of a 40-home run slugger or Cy Young-caliber pitcher. Or you can get a lump of coal. It’s way too early to report on anything major, so in the […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Greg Maddux, perhaps this generation’s greatest pitcher, announced that he will officially retire at the upcoming winter meetings. We’ve heard an awful lot about Roger Clemens, recently for all the wrong reasons. I’m willing to bet that Maddux is no choir boy, but he went about his work without the bluster and bravado of a […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Rather than giving Jerry Manuel another shot at the helm of the disappointing Mets, whose collapse over the last two season borders on the epic, the front office announced there will be a new sheriff in town as the Mets move into their new home. The new manager, identified only as “Wally,” appears with new […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
The Hall of Fame veterans Committee will announce any decision on Monday, Dec. 8. Players who are under consideration include: SINCE 1943 • Dick Allen • Gil Hodges • Jim Kaat • Tony Oliva • Al Oliver • Vada Pinson • Ron Santo • Luis Tiant • Joe Torre • Maury Wills PRE-1943 • Bill […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
The Arizona Diamondbacks’ pitcher got involved in a literacy program in his hometown. Qualls, a Narbonne High graduate who is spending the off-season in Redondo Beach, helped pass out free books as part of a school spirit day focused on encouraging students to start reading.
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
“…Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has asked its editors to stop buying books.” Look for other publishers to follow suit. And we all know where baseball/sports books fall on the foot chain.
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Cubs’ skipper Lou Pienlla and Tampa Bay Rays manager Joe Maddon were named managers of the year for 2008. Pinella published Sweet Lou, written with Maury Allen in 1986. He’s got a new one coming out next year from St. Martin’s/Thomas Dunne. So can it be long before Maddon has one, too? Managers whose teams […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
From Triumph Books. I guess Three Nights in August doesn’t qualify as an actual biography: Two-time World Series champion Tony La Russa has been one of the most important figures in baseball for the past 30 years, but he has never been the subject of a biography before. Tony La Russa: Man on a Mission […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
I was surprised to see this notice in the Publishers Weekly e-mail, until I saw the context: There probably has never been a better baseball book than Roger Kahn’s The Boys of Summer, which was a paean to the Brooklyn Dodgers of the 1950s. With Roe’s death there are only a few left, Carl Erskine, […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
According to a report in today’s Publishers Weekly e-mail: Mike Piazza, a 12-time All Star for the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Mets, has signed a deal to write his autobiography for Simon & Schuster. V-p and senior editor Bob Bender acquired world rights from David Black, CEO of Black Inc., and Dan […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
So just who did create the ubiquitous MLB logo? Jerry Dior, as per The Wall Street Journal? Or James Sherman, as in this ESPN piece? Seems like a no-brainer after this exchange between Sherman and ESPN’s Paul Lucas, who writes the always-entertaining and observant Uniwatch blog. Then I asked an innocuous question that changed everything: […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Jane Austen wrote about baseball 40 years before it was ‘invented’ A headline in the London Telegraph. Jane Austen wrote about baseball 40 years before its official invention, according to a new book. But evidence of the game’s British origins was erased from history by the American sports magnate Albert Spalding, according to the book’s […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
from the Urbana, IL, News-Gazette.
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
Baseball is a Funny Game was one of the first books written by a former player that I recall reading. Joe Garagiola’s self-deprecating humor came out at a time when he was very much in the spotlight, between his announcing, Today Show gig, and game show hosting. He fell out of prominence in recent years, […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
The eulogies keep pouring in about this marvelous writer and raconteur. This one, from Maggie Hendricks of NBC Chicago, specifically speaks to Terkel as a baseball fan. This one from NPR.org isn’t baseball-centric, but he deserves the recognition.
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
According to this item from Publisher’s Weekly by Jim Milliot: Sports Publishing, which filed for Chatper 11 in late October, has released the names of its largest unsecured creditors. Along with the usual suspects of printers, manufacturers and various financial institutions, Sports Publishing owes Olympic champ Michael Phelps $57,578.08. The company released Michael Phelps: Beneath […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }
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
* "One must be frugal," he said, lighting his $10 cigar with a $100 bill.
December 10, 2008
You have to either be a small child or living with your head in the sand not to know what’s going on in the economy these days. Jobs lost, stocks plunging, parents wondering how they’ll send their kids to college or pay the mortgage. Those who think sports will provide a diversion might be in […]
{ Comments on this entry are closed }