The Southern: New York City, our baseball story is better than yours!

The wackiest “Challenge Trade” ever!

When Sesser Mayor Ned Mitchell throws out a challenge he doesn’t fool around. He sets his sights really high. Mitchell, who has served as the top elected official in Sesser (population 2,228) for more than 25 years, has declared “literary war” against Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City (population 8,143,197). Along with that, Mitchell is also leading a public relations campaign aimed at getting the attention of television megastar Oprah Winfrey.

What has Mitchell and other Sesser residents issuing a challenge to one of the world’s most powerful mayors in one of the world’s most dynamic cities and extending an invitation to one of the world’s best known celebrities is the book “Playing With the Enemy: A Baseball Prodigy, a World at War, and a Field of Broken Dreams.”

...Mitchell has challenged Bloomberg to “a fair review of each city’s hometown baseball book to let the people of America decide which is better.” In his letter Mitchell encouraged Bloomberg to fairly review “Playing with the Enemy” and he promised the same honest Southern Illinois review of “The Echoing Green.”