Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
NOTE: I have been posting these things long enough now that a few have commented that the introductory section isn’t necessary anymore. But I’m leaving it in because, to paraphrase Joe DiMaggio when asked why he played so hard all the time, there may be people who’ve never read the best-seller entries before. So on […]
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Several weeks ago, I posted about Pitch, a new TV show coming to FOX this fall. It’s the story about the first woman player in the Major Leagues. Well the Sonoma Stompers aren’t exactly the Show, but they are a pro outfit. They recently signed two women to their roster. Tomorrow night, Kelsie Whitmore (below, […]
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The actor Alan Young passed away at the age of 96 on Thursday. Baseball connection? Several of the Dodgers, including Sandy Koufax, John Roseboro, Willie Davis, and Moose Skowron appeared as themselves, as well as the voice of Vin Scully.
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Revised to include my oversight in omitting the Bad News Bears TV show. While baseball and TV go great together, episodic series about the national have never done well. None of the attempts have lasted more than one season. Ball Four. Based on Jim Bouton’s seminal book and starring the author as aversion of himself. […]
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Yesterday on Jeopardy: Then I sat down to do the Times‘ crossword: Crazy, man. One of my Facebook friends suggested there should be a version of Jeopardy devoted solely to the national pastime. Baseball in Jeopardy? You’re welcome.
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I am a Jeopardy nut. I try to never miss an episode, much to the occasional annoyance of my family. Naturally, I’m always stoked when there’s a baseball question. At the risk of sounding judgmental, I rarely expect the brainy contestants to have sports trivia as part of their knowledge base. And when there’s an […]
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Since I posted the first of these on a Thursday, which is known on social media as a time of reflection, I thought to make it a regular thing under this rubric. These are kind of fun; it’s like a box of chocolates — you never know what you’re gonna get. (Actually, I never understood […]
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More or less. One of my appointment podcasts is Extra Hot Great, a smart, funny, and occasionally vulgar program on pop culture. One of my appointment TV shows is Jeopardy. Last night, Mark Blankenship, one of the regular panelists on EHG, was a contestant on Jeopardy. It’s like getting peanut butter on your chocolate. Blankenship […]
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One of my new favorite TV shows is Manhattan, based (loosely, I assume) on the men and women who worked on the atomic bomb. The episode “Overlord” highlights the continuing problems caused by Robert Oppenheimer’s frequent absences from project business as he cavorts with his mistress. One of the main characters, Charlie Isaacs, himself a […]
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I have a pretty set routine with the podcasts I listen to. On my Monday commute to work, it’s always (barring repeats and clip shows) Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me. On the Friday commute home from work it’s Pop Culture Happy Hour. Many of the others regulars — WTF, The Leonard Lopate Show, Fresh Air, […]
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Any parent knows your kid will have this one TV show you absolutely cannot stand, be it Barney or in my situation, Full House. My daughter is now a college graduate and we were recently near a movie theater that was screening The Man from UNCLE. Now, I remember the original series from the mid-1960s, […]
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Look, I’m no one to complain. I’ve had my share of shameless self-promoting. But come on, when Will Ferrell pulled off his spring training stunt of playing 10 positions for 10 teams in one day, you had to know that something was up. Sure, this gig ostensibly raised money for caner awareness. But it also […]
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Picked up an audio copy of Holy Cow: A Novel by David Duchovny, a kinder, gentler answer to Orwell’s Animal Farm (as opposed to a book about Phil Rizzuto). I won’t go into a whole lot of detail about the overall premise. Suffice it to say it’s told — quite entertainingly — from a the […]
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WTF is up with that new and very creepy KFC commercial starring the resurrected Col. Sanders? “…Because if there’s two things I’m certain of, it’s that baseball will always be America’s number one sport, free from corruption, scandal, and cheating of any kind. And two, the summer meal featuring my Kentucky Fried Chicken tastes better […]
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Really looking forward to this. I just hope Harvey doesn’t turn into one of those prospects who shows great promise, only to be done in by the fickle finger of fate.
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And, let’s not forget Anthony Perkins. These three popular actors made baseball films that were memorable for one reason or another and none of them displayed an ounce of athletic talent portraying, respectively, Lou Gehrig, Babe Ruth, and Jim Piersall. Sure there were others who probably should have turned down such demanding roles, but those were […]
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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
Throwback Thursday (aka, links dump), Dec. 17, 2015
December 17, 2015
Since I posted the first of these on a Thursday, which is known on social media as a time of reflection, I thought to make it a regular thing under this rubric. These are kind of fun; it’s like a box of chocolates — you never know what you’re gonna get. (Actually, I never understood […]
Tagged as: baseball stadiums, Bill Veeck, cricket, Dock Ellis, New York Mets, New York Yankees
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