The Pitch That Killed

[Mr Baseball World]

I stopped at B & N for a few minutes at lunch and saw a boof about Koufax but not sure of the author. Hope to spend some time going through their "Bargain Books" and Used Books to hopefully find a gem or two.

There was another book by Kinsella in the fiction section about baseball I think the title was "The smell(?) of the Grass" Any good?

[Sneezedoc]

Speaking of "mean" guys, Richard Ben Kramers' book on DiMaggio shows him for the real SOB he was...some of those stories (how he took $ from Rizzuto, ridiculed Berra) show his true colors... even how he handled the '89 SF earthquake

My FAVORITE baseball book BY FAR though is THE BOYS OF SUMMER...what a read! you really know what it was like to be part of the 52-53 Dodgers and how it was to be around Jackie Robinson...beautiful segment about my man Pee Wee Reese (who was from the south (Kentucky I believe)...to paraphrase...he was in the army when Robinson was signed and he was told by some of his army bretheren that some "n" was going to take his job and he said "if he is better than me, he deserves it"....

[Mr Baseball World]

Had to get the 2004 baseball prospectus in the bargain section. Skimmed and was ready to put it aside when I saw their top 50 prospects and thought I might at least skim to see if there was a Brewer or two. They had Fielder #4, Weeks #9, Hardy #20, Bush and Gross(both acquired from the Blue Jays) around #40. Had to buy it.

Also got a DiMaggio bio(by a friend of his), another Yankee book(not a Yankee fan but it was too cheap to pass up), "Shoeless Joe" , The Teammates and a fantasy baseball magazine.

Koufax book and "Only the Ball was White" will be next on the agenda. That may ba awhile though because while my intentions to read are always good somehow they don't seem to translate to action.

[Sneezedoc]

MR. BBW, if you haven't read BOYS of SUMMER, you are missing an unbelievable book

[Mr Baseball World]

I have not and will make it a priority. Thanks.

[bkoron]

The best fantasy baseball novel: "The Universal Baseball Association, J. Henry Waugh, Prop.", by Robert Coover.

Others for your reading list:

Anything by Bill James - a better writer than a statistician
"The Great American Novel" by Philip Roth
"The Natural" by Bernard Malamud
"The Celebrant" by Eric Rolfe Greenberg
"If I Never Get Back" and "Havana Heat" by Darryl Brock
And for fun, the Mickey Rawlings series of mystery novels by Troy Soos

8)

[baracus68]

[quote:f4ee1d980a]The best fantasy baseball novel: "The Universal Baseball Association, J. Henry Waugh, Prop.", by Robert Coover.[/quote:f4ee1d980a]

I couldn't agree more. Every Strat player owes it to him- or her- (ah, who am I kidding?) self to read the story of the quiet nobody whose sole joy in life is being the god of his own make believe dice-centered baseball universe.

Also, there are several sections near the beginning of Jack Kerouac's Desolation Angels in which he gleefully describes playing his own made up Strat-type game while spending an entire summer in a fire lookout cabin on top of a mountain. A few years ago there was a Kerouac exhibit at the New York Public Library and they displayed some of the playing cards he made himself when he was a kid as well as some fake newspapers he'd created to describe the action.

That said, my favorite baseball fiction is The Southpaw by Mark Harris. And Donald Honig's oral histories are incredibly enjoyable and can stand alongside Ritter's The Glory of Their Times, I think.

[MICHAELEVANS]

I read the Mickey Rawlins mystery series (baseball in the 1912-1920 era) and started an email correspondence with Troy Soos. He is an incredibly nice guy who loves old time baseball as much as any of us. In fact, I would not be surprised to see him as a ATGII player. I read the Koufax book and loved it. I am currently reading an old one, "Eight Men Out"