Ron Kaplan’s Baseball Bookshelf — If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here — Page 2

Lest We Forget: Jim McAndrew

One of the unsung players for the World Champion Mets in 1969, pitcher Jim McAndrew has died at the age of 80. He was just 6-7 for the Amazin’s that year (37-53 over seven seasons, the last with the Padres), but he was nevertheless a part of the rotation that included Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, […]

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The Bookshelf Conversation #176: Ron Rapoport

TLDR. For those of you not up on the latest lingo, that stands for “too long, didn’t read.” One of the problems with the world today is that people are too impatient. They don’t have the time or inclination to concentrate for more than a couple of minutes . A number of outlets include a […]

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Well Alright, Okay, You Win

I bow to the inevitable. Just received the only baseball annual I could find for the new season: Lindy’s Baseball 2024 Preview. It has the usual features one has come to expect from such print publications so I won’t go into detail…again. I’ve written on this topic ad naseum. Suffice it to say that the […]

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Quote this.

Baseball in movies

Note: I started this entry quite a while ago but I doubt another story like this has been posted since then, so… It’s not enough that there are lists of the greatest baseball movies of all time. Now there’s one on “Ranking the 25 best baseball movie-quotes of all time” (my emphasis). Just like any […]

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Bits and Pieces, March 19, 2024

"Ripped from today's headlines..."

Happy Spring, everybody! ♦ Kevin Baker‘s latest book, The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City, was recently reviewed in The New York Times. Baker — who will be a guest on the “Bookshelf Conversation” in the near future — has written several novels about New York in the 19th century […]

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Baseball Best-Sellers, March 15, 2024

A reminder: The Amazon rankings are updated every hour, so these lists might not be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them (or even by the time I finish posting them). But close enough for government work, as the saying goes (see my piece on “Why Amazon’s search engine sucks“). In addition, occasionally […]

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The Bookshelf Conversation #175: Josh Wilker

"Bookshelf Conversations"

A couple of weeks ago I visited a local shop that purportedly sold comics and baseball cards. Alas, I learned that was not the case. The owner told me there was no real business for cards over the past several years. I would say that that’s a shame but the reality is there have been […]

Tagged as: Baseball Cards

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Baseball Best-Sellers, March 8, 2024

A reminder: The Amazon rankings are updated every hour, so these lists might not be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them (or even by the time I finish posting them). But close enough for government work, as the saying goes (see my piece on “Why Amazon’s search engine sucks“). In addition, […]

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Awards season, continued: The Jefferson Burdick Award

Since you can out baseball cards on your bookshelf… SABR’s Baseball Cards Research Committee has bestowed its highest honor — the Jefferson Burdick Award — to legendary artist Dick Perez. From the Committee’s announcement: While Dick is best known to many collectors for his fifteen-year run (1982-96) creating Donruss Diamond Kings, these cards only scratch […]

Tagged as: Dick Perez

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Got some spare change?

This popped up on my daily Google alerts for baseball book-related stuff from Fine Books & Collections: “Early Baseball Sheet Music, Arrowsmith’s Maps, JFK Presentation Copy: Auction Preview” Image: Potter & Potter — “The earliest known baseball lithograph, for “The Live Oak Polka,” offered at Potter & Potter this week.” According to the accompanying story […]

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Hello, Old Friend

While looking for Robert Benson’s The Game for last week’s BBS post, I found my collection of baseball annuals, specifically Street and Smith’s Official Baseball Yearbook for 1975. What a treat. The articles included profiles of Frank Robinson and designated hitters; Lou Brock’s 118 stolen bases and the impact that had on other thieves in […]

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Baseball Best-Sellers, March 1, 2024

A reminder: The Amazon rankings are updated every hour, so these lists might not be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them (or even by the time I finish posting them). But close enough for government work, as the saying goes (see my piece on “Why Amazon’s search engine sucks“). In addition, occasionally […]

Tagged as: Boston Red Sox, Pete Rose

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Awards season, continued: SABR’s Henry Chadwick Awards

"Ripped from today's headlines..."

Congrats to Larry Gerlach, Leslie Heaphy, and Sarah Langs, this year’s recipients of the Henry Chadwick Award given by the Society for American Baseball Research, “established to honor the game’s great researchers — historians, statisticians, annalists, and archivists — for their invaluable contributions to making baseball the game that links America’s present with its past.” […]

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Bits and pieces, February 27, 2024

Well, spring training is well underway. And this year, pretty much like every year, I promise myself I will keep up with every team, not just the Mets.I finally shelled out for a subscription to Baseball Prospectus, even though I consider it a bit too analytics-driven for a numbskull like me who has no interest […]

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Baseball Best-Sellers, February 23, 2024

A reminder: The Amazon rankings are updated every hour, so these lists might not be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them (or even by the time I finish posting them). But close enough for government work, as the saying goes (see my piece on “Why Amazon’s search engine sucks“). In addition, occasionally […]

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Baseball Best-Sellers, February 16, 2024

A reminder: The Amazon rankings are updated every hour, so these lists might not be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them (or even by the time I finish posting them). But close enough for government work, as the saying goes (see my piece on “Why Amazon’s search engine sucks“). In addition, occasionally […]

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Bits and Pieces, February 13, 2024

Oh, the weather outside is frightful… Funny how you never hear songs about winter after Christmas. Why is that? It’s still the season. “Walking in a Winter Wonderland” doesn’t seem to have any holiday significance. Same for “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” which has certain problems but we won’t go into that now. Moving on… ♦ […]

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Baseball Best-Sellers, February 9, 2024

A reminder: The Amazon rankings are updated every hour, so these lists might not be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them (or even by the time I finish posting them). But close enough for government work, as the saying goes (see my piece on “Why Amazon’s search engine sucks“). In addition, occasionally […]

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Bookshelf Review: The Body Scout

The Body Scout: A Novel, by Lincoln Michel I was going to hold off on this until I finished A Mound Over Hell, the first book in a trilogy by Gary Morgenstern, because both were about baseball in a dystopian world. But then I came across an article posted on The Athletic — “Why the […]

Tagged as: baseball fiction, Lincoln Michel

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National Pastime Radio: Wait, Wait… A Baseball Limerick

If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’ll know my affection for the NPR news quiz, Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me. And every now and then, they’ll throw me a bone my including some baseball content. Examples include an interview with Moose Skowron which led me down a rabbit hole when it comes […]

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