I've heard lot of good things about Evaluating Baseball's Managers, 1876-2008.

The advance buzz about this one is just tremendous. Ahem.

Very much looking forward to Martha Ackmann (author of "The Mercury 13") on Toni Stone.

Will the genius behind Old Hoss on Twitter finally be exposed? A love interest in 1884? Can't wait for that.

I'm working on Satchel right now.

Dayn, your author's bio leaves me wanting more.

I've read Dirk Hayhurst's book, "Bullpen Gospels," and I liked it a lot. I was asked to blurb it and I did. I have heard that some people will blurb anything because they like to see their name on a book cover, but I only do it, on the rare occasions I'm asked, if I have actually read and liked the book. As with Hayhurst's online writing, it's funny but also at times touching, with a good mix of high-larious bullpen/clubhouse/busride hi-jinx and his trademark "there isn't any magic in this uniform if you're a sick kid" theme. Also some funny-with-pathos stuff about his, shall we say, picturesque family.

I'm also reading a book that was mentioned here, "Top of the Order." Full disclosure: I'm one of the 25 writers who wrote about our favorite players. But even ignoring my chapter (it's the best one of course), it's a really fun book. Pat Jordan on his pal Tom Seaver ("You're just jealous because I threw harder than you," Jordan has been telling Seaver for 30 years), Roger Kahn on Jackie Robinson, Steve Almond on Rickey, Craig Finn (of the Hold Steady) on Kirby Puckett. There's a lot of fun stuff. It could have been a bunch of dewy, green green grass remembrances of childhood heroes crap, but at least in the 15 or so I've read so far, there's none of that.

In case you need to know: I have no stake in this book's sales. I got a flat fee. I get not a penny more if it sells a million.

Dayn, your author's bio leaves me wanting more.

There's just not much to me.

Dayn, your author's bio leaves me wanting more.

but the picture looks exactly like ya

I'm reading the Jaffe book right now, and working on the Bill James Gold Mine. Chris' book is very good, I'm learning a lot about even the most recent managers.

John Sickels latest book came in the mail this week, Autographed Copy!

I just read Doyle Brunson's new biography. Very entertaining book, passed it to my dad and he read it pretty quickly too.

I'm going to try and re-read the first Percy Jackson book this week before I take the kids to the movies.

I recently finished Badass by Ben Thompson. Sadly, it did not include Bob Gibson, Ichiro or Albert Pujols.

Anybody read anything good lately?

Yeah, Let the Great World Spin. But it's not about baseball, so . . . catch-22. Oh! A House for Mr Biswas. No baseball in that one, either. Nope, sorry, I got nothin'.

Outside of baseball, I have been reading a binch of James Burke.

Outside of baseball, I have been reading a binch of James Burke.

Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend ...

Inside a dog, you're like, throw the ball! Throw the ball! Throw the ball!

I'm fishing around for a Next Big Project Book. Last year: Proust. This year: The Magic Mountain?

I'm fishing around for a Next Big Project Book.

I really can't recommend Infinite Jest strongly enough.

I'm reading Once More Around the Park by Roger Angell. This might say something about me :) but it is almost too literate for a baseball book. I am feeling that the sparkling prose is getting in the way of the stories.
I just finished another book of stories, albeit on a different topic. Peter Guralnick's Lost Highway was a wonderful book of stories from the mid to late 70s about the lives of musicians. Guralnick gathered his stories from both interviews and hanging on tour. The four sections are about old country guys, hillbilly/rockabilly, then modern country outlaws and blues artists. The author had a way of getting inside most of his subjects.

Says here that Angell was a protoblogger.

I'm just beginning the final volume ("The Third Reich At War") of Richard J. Wilson's trilogy on Nazi Germany. Great writing, but, man, is it ever depressing. Unspeakable savagery. I don't think I could finish it if I didn't already know the Nazis would lose at the end.

Then again, having Zooey Deschanel staring at me from that Netflix ad makes everything all better.

Baseball? Nothing lately. Otherwise, at the moment I'm reading nonfiction volumes on, let's see, avian flu, an 1860 murder case in the UK & the Morro Castle fire.

I don't think I could finish it if I didn't already know the Nazis would lose at the end.

Just because they did in the movie is no guarantee that it'll happen the same way in real life.

Repoz's wet dream book---sure to be at least 20 pinata posts in here, since the standards for selection probably don't include WARP and EqA numbers:

Top of the Order: 25 Writers Pick Their Favorite Baseball Players of All-Time. Da Capo. Apr. 2010. c.288p. ed. by Sean Manning. ISBN 978-0-306-81855-4. pap. $15.95.

I read "Bobby Fischer Goes to War" not long ago. I don't know a thing about chess, but it was a pretty fascinating look at the '72 match with Spassky and all the related subplots. Recommended.

Repoz's wet dream book---sure to be at least 20 pinata posts in here, since the standards for selection probably don't include WARP and EqA numbers:

Top of the Order: 25 Writers Pick Their Favorite Baseball Players of All-Time.

I don't know that I would use WARP or EqA to pick my favorite players, either, and if someone did, I'd think they were pretty strange.

Slightly off topic but I have read a number of great books about polar explorer Ernest Shackleton and today the BBC is reporting that five crates of his Scotch whisky and brandy have been found in the ice in Antarctica. From the BBC, "Given the original recipe no longer exists this may open a door into history."

Every one of these books gets a highly recommended review. Where are the crappy baseball books?

C'mon, Andy. The blurb says favorite and not best. There is a difference. That said, that book sounds like it is write up my alley. I've beeen musing about stuff like that lately, trying to come up with a team of unique players like Mark Fidrych, Manny, etc cetera.

I've beeen musing about stuff like that lately, trying to come up with a team of unique players like Mark Fidrych, Manny, etc cetera.

Arlie Latham.

Slightly off topic but I have read a number of great books about polar explorer Ernest Shackleton and today the BBC is reporting that five crates of his Scotch whisky and brandy have been found in the ice in Antarctica.

This is the type of ridiculous thing I would try and buy if I were a billionaire.

Arlie Latham.

I'm sort of a 19th Century baseball guy, but those guys like him and King Kelly are on their own planet.

Repoz's wet dream book---sure to be at least 20 pinata posts in here, since the standards for selection probably don't include WARP and EqA numbers:

C'mon, Andy. The blurb says favorite and not best. There is a difference.

You're probably right, but I guess my mind has been numbed into cynicism by too many threads where Player X or Writer Y expresses a subjective opinion about some player or some trend in baseball, only to be met with a firestorm of statistical objections that have nothing to do with the point that was being made. It's a Take No Prisoners mentality that won't recognize any sort of value that can't be quantified, and won't let go of the subject until the point of unconditional surrender. Perhaps they'll lay off this book, but I wouldn't bet too much on it.

That said, that book sounds like it is write up my alley. I've beeen musing about stuff like that lately, trying to come up with a team of unique players like Mark Fidrych, Manny, etc cetera.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it as well, although like most of these books, it'll wind up on Amazon at about $3.98 before the year is up. And as usual, I'll have totally conflicted feelings about this.

Now here's the book that really caught my attention. Hopefully it'll use John Holway's research as a starting point for the backstories:

Gay, Timothy M. Satch, Dizzy, and Rapid Robert: The Wild Saga of Interracial Baseball Before Jackie Robinson. S. & S. Mar. 2010. c.384p. photogs. ISBN 978-1-4165-4798-3. $26.

Jackie Robinson integrated the major leagues in 1947, but off-season "barnstorming" games by pro players were integrated before World War II. The larger-than-life Satchel Paige and Dizzy Dean played, one black, one white, both possessed of unequaled skill, panache, and an innate sense of marketing. Imagine a country fighting economic upheaval and starved for heroes and entertainment. Add the precocious Bob Feller, whose fastball was measured at better than 104 miles per hour, and you have a new classic baseball book. Gay (Tris Speaker) shows these men bringing integrated competition to baseball fans far from big league stadiums, from Cuba to the Pacific coast. With events that defy the imagination. Highly recommended.

The only problem I can see with it is that well over 90% of the participants in those games are likely to be dead by now. I'd hate to see all the stories come from just Bob Feller.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it as well, although like most of these books, it'll wind up on Amazon at about $3.98 before the year is up. And as usual, I'll have totally conflicted feelings about this.

I'm just hoping it winds up at a local library.

Some great stuff on that list. I want to read the story of the epic playoff clash between the Yankees and Mariners in 1995, for instance. Thank god some able historian was able to dig deep into forgotten archives to resuscitate this piece of the distant past. But what's up with this:

Cameron, Mike. Public Bonehead, Private Hero: The Real Legacy of Baseball’s Fred Merkle. Sporting Chance Press. Mar. 2010. c.184p. photogs. bibliog. index. ISBN 978-0-9819-3421-1. $20. pap.

Chicago sportswriter Cameron [I was really hoping this was by the center fielder] presents a flavorful and entirely enjoyable history, not only of the unfortunate Fred Merkle, but of the deadball era, which was livelier than any ever known. ["Livelier"--I see what you did there] But it’s poor Merkle whom history remembers, because his failure to touch second base when his Giants got a walk-off homer meant he’d been technically forced out there (Rule 59), The Cubs haven’t won a series since that year, the “Merkle Curse.” Highly recommended for baseball fans young and old.—Margaret Heilbrun (MH), Library Journal

Walk-off homer? I hope that's the reviewers glitch and not the author's.

C'mon, Andy. The blurb says favorite and not best. There is a difference. That said, that book sounds like it is write up my alley. I've beeen musing about stuff like that lately, trying to come up with a team of unique players like Mark Fidrych, Manny, etc cetera.

One of my favorite baseball books is Danny Peary's CULT BASEBALL PLAYERS. Each chapter is written by various people (baseball writers, fiction writers, ballplayers, actors, etc.) who write about their favorite players. I can't imagine the 25 baseball writers talking about their faves will touch this book.

Who could top:

John Sayles on Dick Stuart
Ron Shelton on Steve Dalkowski
Tony Kubek on Mickey Mantle
Joe Magtegna on Ernie Banks
Jim Kaat on Dick Allen
Lawrence Ritter on Chief Myers

There is also chapters on Mark Fidrych, Luis Tiant, Bill Lee, Vic Power, George Kell, Moe Berg, Joe Charboneau, Dusty Rhodes, Ted Kluzewski. I am sure there is over 50 chapters.

My local library supposedly has that book and I could find it. I settled for Odddballs which was fun, but ultimately not that satisfying.

Cult Baseball Players is a good one. I was once buying it from a used book merchant and someone swiped it out of my stack pre-register.

Third the recommendation for "Cult Baseball Players."

And if anybody's interested, Shackleton's own account, "My South Polar Expedition," is available for download at the UC Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project:
http://cylinders.library.ucsb.edu/

It's less than four minutes, but still: it's Shackleton talking! They also have William Jennings Bryan, Sophie Tucker, and Edward M. Favor (with one of the early baseball tunes, "The Umpire Is a Most Unhappy Man"), among many others.