favorite baseball book

[patrickgpe]

i'm leaving on a business trip in 2 weeks to phoenix. it will be awesome because i am staying the weekend and will get to see 2 games in maryvalle. anyway i want to pick up a baseball book for the plane trip. i am thinking about the extra 2%, but was just wondering what was everyone's on this sites favorite baseball book. i have already read hardball and baseaball between the numbers as well as this years baseball prospectus and prospect handbook.

[JoeHova]

I only have 2 baseball books that I really consider classics that I like to re-read and those are Ball Four by Jim Bouton and Nine Innings by Daniel Okrent (which coincidentally takes County Stadium as its setting). The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract is also pretty interesting because it tries to rank the best players at every position and it gives a little overview of most notable players in history. The recent biographies of Sandy Koufax, Roberto Clemente, Jackie Robinson, Mickey Mantle, etc. that have been written by various acclaimed authors have been uniformly disappointing. I would give them a pass.

[brettac1]

Maybe a silly question, but have you read Moneyball? I also love Alan Schwartz's "The Numbers Game".

[EdRomero11]

I started reading asterisk---a book about Barry Bonds steroid(or non steroid use according to the book). It does have some interesting arguements. I bought it because it was two dollars at Tuesday Mornings. I got a few others, a Billy Williams bio, Tony Larussa bio, and a Yogi Berra bio, plus a book called Perfect( about baseball Perfect games).

 

Just bought the Extra 2% and the Baseball Econmist for my e reader.

 

 

I buy a lot of books I get about 70 pages into them and then something else interest me, Oh well may be someday I will have a tad more free time to get thru them.

[JimH5]

. . .The recent biographies of Sandy Koufax, Roberto Clemente, Jackie Robinson, Mickey Mantle, etc. that have been written by various acclaimed authors have been uniformly disappointing. I would give them a pass.

 

I haven't read the Koufax, Robinson & Mantle books, but I thought the Clemente book by David Maraniss was fantastic. I also loved the Leigh Montville book on Babe Ruth. I also recommend the Curt Flood book, if only for the stuff that doesn't get into the legal minutia.

 

Crazy '08, Chief Bender's Burden, and the Rube Waddell bio by Alan Levy are also quite good.

 

I'm currently reading the Effa Manley book by Bob Luke. It's also fine. There are indeed some clunkers out there, which basically re-report old box scores throughout the years, but there are also some good reads that give you a good insight on players of the past.

[patrickgpe]

yes i have, i ordered nine innings and ball four for the plane ride, thanks

 

edit: the numbers game was 5.56 on amazon so i got that one too

[milwaukeesportsfan]

Read Ball Four. That is all.

[patrickgpe]

Read Ball Four. That is all.

it has been ordered, i'll put that as #1 to read

 

still getting the extra 2% but i doubt i will have enough time to read 4 baseball books on my flight there and back, but im bringing all 4

[Bikeage77]

*MMM HMMM COUGH* Catcher In The Wry. You've probably heard some of these stories numerous times from Ueck, but there' ones I hadn't read before, and does it really matter? They're always good for a laugh.

 

I've been searching forever for Catch .222 but can't find it for the life of me.

 

(Also, you will not go wrong with Ball Four)

[EdgarDiazRocks]

I also love Alan Schwartz's "The Numbers Game".

 

Seconded. The stuff on the inception of the Baseball Encyclopedia alone is worth it.

[RockCoCougars]

I second some of the suggestions above. I have two more.

 

The Glory of Their Times: Awesome oral history on baseball from about 100 years ago.

 

Lords of the Realm: Great history of how baseball turned into the billion dollar business and the interactions with the players and owners along the way.

[WV Brew]

I know Patrick already picked his books but "The Long Season" by Jim Brosnan is very good. Follows one year with the Cincinnati Reds. I think it's available at Amazon. It's based on the 1959 season? This is less irreverent than Ball Four.

[RunaBase]

I goto

http://catalog.hathitrust.org

 

for any book from the past, ( I'm into old books)

I put in a subject/word I'm interested in reading about in the search box.

You can read "Full veiw" books .

 

Below is the link for baseball books at hathitrust.org site

You can refine your chose in the left column

You can down load the book on your computer

and Moblie Phone?

 

 

http://catalog.hathitrust.org/Search/Home?checkspelling=true&lookfor=baseball&type=all&sethtftonly=true&htftonly=true&submit=Find

[patrickgpe]

*MMM HMMM COUGH* Catcher In The Wry. You've probably heard some of these stories numerous times from Ueck, but there' ones I hadn't read before, and does it really matter? They're always good for a laugh.

 

I've been searching forever for Catch .222 but can't find it for the life of me.

 

(Also, you will not go wrong with Ball Four)

i have read that one before too,i know its a bunch of stories i have heard before, but noone tells stories like ueck. i wish i could find that book to reread it.

[homer]

Anyone read "The Art of Fielding"? It's by a Wisconsin native and earned a good review by the NY Times.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/11/books/review/the-art-of-fielding-by-chad-harbach-book-review.html

[Principessa21]

I probably posted this here before but my favorite baseball book by far is "Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig" by Jonathan Eig. My standard for baseball biographies.

[RockCoCougars]

I know Patrick already picked his books but "The Long Season" by Jim Brosnan is very good. Follows one year with the Cincinnati Reds. I think it's available at Amazon. It's based on the 1959 season? This is less irreverent than Ball Four.

 

This is a good one as well. I read it in middle school, then I read Ball Four (pretty funny that one was in the middle school library... I definitely learned some new vocabulary from that one, I borrowed Joe Schultz' favorite expletive quite often back in the day...). "The Long Season" would be rated PG, and "Ball Four" is rated R.

[kalle8]

i enjoyed reading "the boys of summer" by Roger Kahn thogh it was a bit difficult for me to fully understand the language.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boys_of_Summer_(book)

 

also liked the forementioned "the glory of their times"

 

and: "Baseball Eccentrics": A Definitive Look at the Most Entertaining, Outrageous and Unforgettable Characters in the Game by Bill "Spaceman" Lee (Author), Jim Prime (Author)

[chuckiehacks]

If you like detail, try "Pure Baseball" by Keith Hernandez. It's a batter-by-batter, pitch-by-pitch account of two MLB games.