Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
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I’ve decided to bow to the times and include separate lists for e-books and audio books. Be aware that while many titles also appear in print versions, pretty much anyone can produce an e-book these days, so I’m not going to comment at all about the quality. As far as the audio goes, I’m a […]
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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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Editor’s note: It’s always great to be able to provide a guest column. This one comes from Thomas Danielson, a freelance writer who has loved baseball ever since he went to his first live game at Fenway Park. It’s especially timely given the previous entry on the Bookshelf. * * * * * In 2004, […]
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Five new baseball titles from the University of Nebraska Press (“home” of 501 Baseball Books Fans Must Read before They Die) in their Spring & Summer 2016 catalog, including: Hairs vs. Squares: The Mustache Gang, the Big Red Machine, and the Tumultuous Summer of ’72, by Ed Gruver Dodgerland: Decadent Los Angeles and the 1977–-78 […]
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Very little grass grows under Lonnie Wheeler’s feet. His second-most recent title, Intangiball: The Subtle Things That Win Baseball Games, was released on August 11 and less than two months later we have Pitch by Pitch: My View of One Unforgettable Game, the third book he has done with Hall of Famer Bob Gibson. (Actually, […]
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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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I still have a few of these hanging around the house. MLB has decided to eliminate the paper ballots available at ballparks (and retail outlets? Have they still been doing that over the past few years?) and have fans vote for their favorite All Stars via electronic devices. Perhaps they were worried about hanging chads? […]
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Among the other things I’ve neglected to post recently was the cornucopia of recent NPR programs featuring baseball, in one form or another. On All-Star Game Tuesday (July 15) Leonard Lopate interviewed Ken Griffey Sr., author of Big Red: Baseball, Fatherhood, and My Life in the Big Red Machine You can listen to that segment […]
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All of these came in this week from my “alma mater,” the University of Nebraska Press. So many books, so little time.
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We have reached the time of the year where everyone (players, managers, sports media, fans) grouse about the All-Star game. Primarily it’s because their favorite player was snubbed, or that some standout veteran on his way to retirement should get one last hurrah on the national stage. The debates are (seemingly) endless. Just to point […]
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The top baseball books, according to Amazon.com as of Friday, Nov. 5 at Noon. Title Rank General The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the End of America’s Childhood, by Jane Leavy 1 Beyond Belief: Finding the Strength to Come Back, by Josh Hamilton and Tim Keown 2 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, […]
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Several new titles consider World Series past. Two — by Joe Posnanski and Mark Frost — deal with the 1975 Red Sox-Reds contest, which was highlighted by Carlton Fisk’s game-winner in the sixth game, the closest to that point Boston had come to winning a title since 1918. The next most recent is Perfect, by […]
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Joe Posnanski’s new book, The Machine, is getting a lot of buzz these days, including: A brief note from the RedlegNation blog A little mutual admiration from his former employer, the Kansas City Star A review from Letters on Pages, which claims to offer “The Best Non-Fiction Book Reviews…Ever.” Unless the writer of this piece […]
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The cover story is Insane Bolt and his record-breaking performances. As far as baseball goes: MLB Poll: Who’s the biggest Chatty Kathy on the field? With the final month of the season about to begin, Tom Verducci looks at those players that might make the difference between the post-season and the off-season for some teams, […]
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The two-time NL batting champion and Hall of Fame inductee (1962), was born this date in 1893. Roush was a member of the Cincinnati Reds that faced the White Sox in the 1919 World Series. The Amazon Report on Edd Roush: Red Legs and Black Sox: Edd Roush and the Untold Story of the 1919 […]
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The former general manager of the Cincinnati Reds of the Big Red Machine era, died at the age of 89. Howsam was also GM for the St. Louis Cardinals, from 1964-66, right before the team won back-to-back pennants.
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is available on Amazon.com,
In my most recent "day job," I was the sports and features editor for a weekly New Jersey newspaper, where I hosted another blog. Busy, busy, busy.
I did a profile piece on the award-winning cartoonist Arnold Roth and he was nice enough to "immortalize" me.
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
