Baseball Books

i read this book cover to cover and it just arrived yesterday.
i could not put it down. being to young to actualy have any rememberance of the acual event, this book takes you and puts you there, giving you a great feeling of what it must have been like, for the fans & the players. i have read bums, boys of summer, the last good season & this book here. they are all great and i would have to give this book 5 stars..it is a little on the expensive side now that it is out of print and in such high demand but it is definitley worth every penny.
i have added this to my collection and it is a perfect complement to my magazine "who's a bum" the 40th anniversary of the 1955 brooklyn dodgers"..you get that magazine and this book and you got it all!! BUY IT IF YOU CAN!!!!

In 2004, the Boston Red Sox finally broke their long standing curse and won the World Series. In 1955, a similar event occurred. The Brooklyn Dodgers, who had won many more pennants than the Red Sox, finally defeated their longtime nemesis, the New York Yankees, in the World Series. It was a time of enormous rejoicing in Brooklyn, but in many ways it was the last hurrah. Changing demographic patterns had led to a consistent decline in attendance at Ebbets field, and in a few years, they were the Los Angeles Dodgers. Furthermore, Ebbets field had been leveled, so both aspects of the team in Brooklyn were nothing but memories.
This book is an account of that wonderful season, where all of the memories of previous defeats were erased. It starts with a recapitulation of the failures, the greatest of which was the collapse in 1951, where the Dodgers led the Giants by 13 ½ games in the early part of August. They ended the season in a tie and in the third playoff game, Bobby Thompson hit a home run to send the Dodgers home for the winter.
It is also an account of how the Brooklyn people felt about the Dodgers. When I watched the fine Ken Burns video on baseball, some of the interviews were with people who grew up in Brooklyn and worshipped the Dodgers. This book captures the passion that those people felt for their team, and how in many ways, it was also America's team. When Jackie Robinson became the first black to play in the major leagues, it was for the Dodgers. For years after the color barrier was broken, the Dodgers continued to lead in having black players, so blacks all over the country considered the Dodgers to be their team.
There are some events in baseball that will stand forever, and the Red Sox victory in 2004 will be one of them. However, given the number of times they had played in the World Series and lost, the Dodger victory in 1955 probably surpasses the Red Sox in terms of breaking the pattern of failure. This is especially true when you factor in the fact that it was truly a climax, as shortly after, the Brooklyn Dodgers and their stadium were no more. But, it was truly a joy ride while it lasted, and this book is a wonderful description of an extraordinary season. It is a classic in the history of baseball.

The Mom's Choice Awards® honors excellence in family-friendly media, products and services. An esteemed panel of judges includes education, media and other experts as well as parents, children, librarians, performing artists, producers, medical and business professionals, authors, scientists and others. A sampling of the panel members includes: Dr. Twila C. Liggett, Ten-time Emmy-winner, professor and founder of Reading Rainbow; Julie Aigner-Clark, Creator of Baby Einstein and The Safe Side Project; Jodee Blanco, New York Times Best-Selling Author; LeAnn Thieman, Motivational speaker and coauthor of seven Chicken Soup For The Soul books; Tara Paterson, Certified Parent Coach, and founder of The Just For Mom Foundation(tm) and the Mom's Choice Awards®. Parents and educators look for the Mom's Choice Awards® seal in selecting quality materials and products for children and families. This book has been honored by this distinguished award.

Greetings from the city with the greatest baseball fans in the world (Go ahead, look it up in the Sporting News). Baseball is, at the very earliest stage in a boy's life, the most innocent of times for them to challenge and learn about themselves and how to relate to others.

Any book about baseball is valuable for my 6 yr-old Grandson who is, aside from his Dad and Grandpa, the biggest Cardinal fan around. He just can't wait to come over to read about Bur Bur getting to throw out the 1st pitch and he dreams of those "Boys of Summer" and someday joining them as well.

I highly recommend getting all the Bur Bur books. They will be treasured by your kids or grandkids for many generations to come.

I read this through in the bookstore, and was pretty impressed. In almost a children's version of "The Only Way I Know," Cal uses examples throughout his childhood and his baseball career to demonstrate how determination pays off, and how good character counts. For example, Cal tells about how, as a boy, he used to cheat his friends and brothers in board games, because he wanted to win so badly. The events that result from his cheating genuinely teach him that "cheating only cheats yourself." Cal had long since stood as a symbol of the American work ethic, for his 2632 cinsecutive game streak, not to mention his good sportsmanship and genuine love for baseball. This book might be a little too long or difficult to read for younger children to tackle by themselves, but it's a great choice for any family in which Ripken's image plays a central part. Young baseball fans and older Ripken fans alike will find something to enjoy here.

This book is a great book.Anyone could read it.It tells about Cal Ripken Jr.'s life and he does a great job putting in in a smaller form.I read this book and now I want to read his other book. A simply great book.

You have to love Cam Jansen. When you're a kid, you read all of these stories about magic powers, mystery, and adventure. But everyone tells you magic can't exist. Cam Jansen manages to solve every case without the use of magic... she's a real girl. That's what makes her special and what makes you want to read more and more. Cam Jansen is a real kid superhero, and the thought that a person like her could actually exist... makes her the best kid detective ever! Our family loves Cam Jansen!

Hi tI am an 8-year old boy and I am writing this for the people. What I is going to do is try to convince you to buy this book . Now I will tell you what I want to say. I think this was a great and wonderful book. David A. Alder is a kids books kind of person. The illustrations are great and pretty. I recommend anyone to read and buy this book Because it is a great and wonderful book, full of surprises and mysteries of all sorts that is only eight chapters long. Thank you and goodbye.

Pete Michel's well written baseball memoir is so engrossing that I read it in one sitting. Inherent in the passionate embrace of the wonderful game of baseball, is that one will inevitably experience both triumph and despair. Forged in this setting, Pete developed an indomitable spirit that served him well in his ensuing years. The book reveals with courageous candor the serious challenges that life presented and the difficulties endured in his ordeal to overcome them. I strongly recommend this book.
Constantine Ricci,
Retired educator

This book is a must read for any baseball fan. Coach Michel is a dedicated baseball person with a passion for the game and his players like no other. I was fortunate to be Coach Michel's Bench Coach at UNH from 2002-2006 and without doubt he was my mentor. I wish him all the happiness in the world with this book and hope there are many more to follow.

I found this book while researching my own book (The Cheater's Guide to Baseball) which includes a chapter on McGraw, and it entirely changed the way I went about writing it.

The figures of this era have been romanticized and turned into villains to the point where there are many contemporary accounts that are entirely wrong. They rely on myth, circulated rumor, and easily discredited accounts.

Rosenberg tells the story of baseball largely by using newspaper accounts from the time and using his discoveries to make larger conclusions about how the game was played, and how often players engaged in dirty play. He finds surprising and often-overlooked stories, and forces a reconsideration of popular myths. It's a huge eye-opener.

Read this book if
- you want to read a meticulously detailed account of how things really were, drawn from reliable sources
- you love coming across long-forgotten anecdotes that will amuse and enlighten you
- you're doing any kind of research on baseball in the 1890s

Don't read this book if
- you want a whimsical narrative
- you'd prefer to cherish myths about the era
- you're going to be annoyed about organization

A word on the last one - the book isn't something that you might pick up, starting at a point of time, and which then moves forward to end at another year, steadily progressing in an easy-to-follow way.

A limitation of the way it's written is that it's not strongly organized, and because it's part of a much larger series following Cap Anson's career and times, it doesn't have a strong narrative drive through each book in the way you might expect. Instead, it moves back and forth as Rosenberg discovers interesting things and traces a particular myth, or tracks the history of a rivalry forward. This can be hard to follow sometimes.

That said, even as casual reading, it has its merits - you can pick it up, read it for a while, finding interesting accounts of crazy things that went on, and return to it later.

And if you want a sense of how things really were, how it was to play in those times, this would be my first recommendation. It's clearly the product of long, hard research, and absolutely worth the time to read for any fan of baseball's history.

Impeccably researched, Mr. Rosenberg provides an invaluable overview of baseball as it was truly played in the 19th Century. As someone who has a more than casual interest in the "original" Baltimore Orioles, even my eyebrows were raised as I thumbed through the pages. The antics of John McGraw, Hughey Jennings and their cohorts are presented so that the reader has a clear understanding that winning was foremost in their minds and at almost any cost. Despite an unabashed bending of the rules, these characters developed the strategies that have shaped the way the game is played to this very day. I highly recommendd this book to anyone who has even the most casual interest in the history of baseball.

Rebeccasreads highly recommends this Visions in Poetry version of the beloved poem vividly & thrillingly illustrated by Joe Morse.

This time we see a youth, lean & tall, with earphones attached to his CD player, watching an urban baseball game & the fans as the poem, set in cartoon clouds, plays out, just as the game does.

This is for everyone who loves baseball & the poem, which will, in its turn, become a classic.

Canadians. Is there anything they can't do? The publishing house of Kids Can Press has given the world all sorts of interesting titles, but perhaps none so interesting as those from KCP Poetry, a small poetry-laden division. Reinterpreting classic poems like "The Lady of Shalott" and "The Highwayman", someone along the way must have suggested "Casey At the Bat". But not in an old-timey handlebar moustached way. More of an inner city struggle to leave the streets behind kind of way. It doesn't sound very good, does it? I personally found it a tepid idea at best. The crazy thing is, it works. Works like gangbusters. I never really realized it, but Thayer's poem is remarkably elastic, allowing it all kinds of interesting interpretations. Take into account the beautiful binding and you've got yourself a classic work of poetry that's been reinterpreted by artist Joe Morse into an entirely original beast.

Do I really have to summarize it? The story's exactly as we've always known it. Heck, my own father has it memorized. "The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville Nine that day". Mudville is down and unless Casey can get to bat everything shall truly be lost. Fortunately Flynn and Jimmy Blake manage to get on base and Casey's up. He's up and he's hot. Heck, he even misses the first two balls for the fun of it. Then the moment comes, everyone's ready, and Casey swings like he's never swung before. "But there is no joy in Mudville - Mighty Casey has struck out". The last shot is of a dejected Casey, brought to his knees, the stands around him abandoned.

In my travels around New York, the Bronx, and Brooklyn I've never stumbled across an inner city baseball game. But in the conteest of this story, it works and I'm sure that there are some somewhere. Now the illustrations themselves are not my style, but this isn't to say that they aren't well done. First of all, you have to respect an artist who paints outside in a gas mask because his materials are so very very toxic. THAT is dedication, ladies and gentlemen. The oil and acrylic used on the paper gives Joe Morse's black a blueish tinge. Figures are exaggerated for the sake of the narrative. The pages are even occasionally split into comic book panels to sometimes allow the story the feel of a graphic novel. How well the poem adapted to its new setting is sometimes shocking. When we read that, "From the benches, black with people, there went up a muffled roar", we wonder how else it could be taken. Ditto the surreal moment when we learn that two other ballplayers, the much maligned Flynn and Jimmy Blake are, respectively, a hoodoo and a cake. The words "hoodoo" and "cake" are written in graffiti under their headshots, giving these once archaic terms a kind of contemporary cache.

Rarely have I ever read a children's book that praised its own illustrator so highly at the story's end, by the way. Here's a bit of it: "More's images paint a compelling portrait of human nature, particularly the psychology of the hero and the crowd. Indeed, this interpretation of `Casey' transforms Thayer's caricatures into flesh-and-blood people with real hopes and dreams - and real vulnerability". The book goes on to describe how in this particular version we see Casey "ultimately confined by the batting cage and the concrete boxes of his surroundings, deserted by even his most ardent fans". Couldn't have said it better myself (and it looks as if I don't have to). Suddenly this isn't a story about a guy so full of himself that he causes his own downfall. It's about a kid who's pride gets the better of him and who ends up bitter and alone without any recourse or escape at the end of his day. Cheery.

One of the libraries in which I worked had low shelves for easy child access. At this branch I would continually display Christopher Bing's illustrated version of the Thayer poem standing on top of the shelves in the hope that someone would give it a glance. I must have put that puppy out for maybe five or six months and not ONCE did it ever get checked out. Holding Joe Morse's new version, I feel confident that if I put his book out for people to look at, it would disappear instantaneously. It's even beautifully bound. A lot of the smaller presses are favoring simple bindings without covers these days. The Vision In Poetry series, to which this book belongs, also has a lovely format with silver piped words along the spine. Classy city.

So let's sum up. You want to get your kids interested in some classic poetry but you don't know how? Hello, answer to your prayers! I may not have mentioned this before, but not a single word in this book has been changed to suit its new station. It's the classic poem in its original form and done in such a way that it reads like it was made yesterday. Poetry has never been better packaged for the kiddies. This is a poem that has a lot going for it. Even if you're not a fan of the art or the format, you have to respect its energy. An amazing idea and an even better result.

My oldest son loves to lay in his bed and read stories with Daddy just before lights out. I found this book for them when they'd just started their nighttime ritual and knew my husband would love it. He's always loved to play sports and is very excited about sharing that love with his sons. This version of Casey at the bat is so beautifully illustrated - it really takes you back in time. Turns out that I enjoy listening and looking at the pictures just as much as my two year old. It's the kind of book you know will be saved and handed down. My husband loves it so much that when we were recently invited to a birthday party he suggested it as our gift. You can't go wrong with this version, it's great.

When you can take a classic and apply it 100 years after it was written, then you know you've truly written a piece of art. This is by far one of the best illustrated books for this poem that I've ever seen. It's partially a cartoon, but partially real life so it really makes for a great story and not just a poem. I've read this over and over again and my little one wonders why on earth Casey let the first two balls get by without even trying. What an educational little poem for little ones and even adults. The illustrations alone are worth the cost of this book, especially when they show smoke coming from Casey's ears! Since it is a classic, I think this should be in every little one's library and what a great way to introduce some education without them even knowing it. I didn't study this poem until the 6th grade, but with publications such as this, little guys and gals can get ahold of it much earlier. If you have a little leaguer in your life, this book would be a fabulous gift. Even mighty Casey, talent and all can strike out! Highly recommend!

I loved this book and thought it was very interesting. I have been a Cincinnati fan since the 70s!

One of the greatest sports biographies of the later half of the 20th century. This book is a personal diary of the entire 1974 (Big Red machine) season... The book gives a fascinating inside look into the game of baseball by one of its most controversial, famous and accomplished players.

I read this book several years ago and found it quite enjoyable. I like to read about baseball pennant races and this one was an unforgettable one. Very thorough and readable!

During the summer of 1962 I was 11 years old, and baseball was the most important thing in my life. That summer I listened to every Dodger game and lived and died with every pitch. I knew all the players in both major leagues, but the Dodgers were my life. I can still remember the Koufax no-hitter against the Mets, the sweep of the Giants in L.A., and getting swept by them in S.F., and the September swoon by the Dodgers was epic (leading by 4.5 games with 7 to play!).
The 9th inning of the 3rd playoff game was a trauma that took weeks to recover from (no, I'm not a hopeless case like Red Sox fans!), but something that I still vividly recall today. David Plaut's book brings 1962 back in narrative, chronological form, and while I knew most of the things noted from the Dodgers' perspectives, I gained new insight into what the Giants clubhouse went through, and what their great players thought of the Dodgers, and the pennant race.
This was a classic pennant dogfight with two evenly matched teams going down to the final pitch of the year. Sandy Koufax's ailment can't be used as an excuse - the Giants played better when it counted, as no one remembers who finished second, except for broken-hearted Dodger fans, and David Plaut, who has put together a wonderful reminiscence of that magical summer of 1962.
I highly recommend this book to baseball fans of any age.