Try to keep up crest. I don’t care what the history is

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Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

Where Nobody Knows Your Name: Life In the Minor Leagues of Baseball, by John Feinstein.

Dull book. It focuses on Triple A. Not really about life in the minors, but about several players (including Scotty Pods) who went back and forth or were trying to re-start stalled careers, a few career-minor leaguers, and two coaches, and an ump. Like his sixty second opinions on the radio, Feinstein goes into little depth. The stories are not really compelling because they are all kind of the same. Plus, the details are repetitive af.

His book on Bobby Knight was good, but anything else I've read by Feinstein has been a waste of time.

I picked this one up but haven't gotten to it yet. I guess Okrent from the Burns doc was urged to read it by a friend. He was so surprised by what he was reading he looked into some of the allegations himself and found them to be true. It sounds like Cobb wasn't the evil person he was portrayed to be in Ken Burns doc but more like a Jordan/Bird/Senna ultra-competitive type guy that rubbed people the wrong way.

Can't recommend the book any higher. It's a big chunk of book, but very thorough and well-researched. And when the writer is offering interpretations, he lets you know.

Those are good comps.

Interview with the author here : https://baseballbythebook.libsyn.com/ep ... ble-beauty

btw I love baseball by the book (https://baseballbythebook.libsyn.com) - great podcasts on baseball books

I just finished this one. A lot of good content from the underappreciated pre-Ruthian era. However, it's just dripping in Deford. It took me a while to get into his grandiose style, but once you get on his wavelength, it's an enjoyable read.

Yes, very Deford, but great fun!

I love that pre-Ruthian era, too.

A friend of mine's grandfather pitched for McGraw's Giants. I believe he is the last guy- maybe the only guy?- to be the winning pitcher in the World Series clincher two years in a row. He was never on a team with Mathewson though.

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Communists are just people who are terrible at capitalism.

I just downloaded the Cobb: A Terrible Beauty audiobook. Is it good? I'm fascinated by Cobb

That was one of the interesting parts of the book. They had more World Series success after Matthewson was gone, than they did when he was pitching for them.

Oh yeah. Fantastic book.

If You Build It...: A book about Fathers, Fate and Field of Dreams, by Dwier Brown.

I sent this to a board member and figured I'd post it on this awful day.

Anyway, this is a decent little book written by the guy who played Ray Kinsella's dad in Field of Dreams. The book is about Brown's experience making the film, his relationship with his father, and the people who were touched by the film's final scene and approached Brown over the past few decades to tell him about it. Get the Kindle version for $8, because it is short (you'll read it in one or two days).

It's not necessarily a well-written book--Brown is not a writer--but it is a pleasant enough journey. It's pretty sentimental, but sometimes, sentimental is ok. If you were close with your dad, or if you are a dad now, it would be worth the read. Fans of the Field of Dreams might like it, too, because it offers some background into the making of the film, including the poignant final scene. I've read the book twice, and it occurs to me that it might be a good Father's Day gift--even if it is your Father's Day gift to yourself. (It's definitely about fathers and sons and how men, according to Brown, communicate.)

Upon finishing the book, I went directly to my DVD player and watched the last twenty minutes of the film. And then I watched it from the beginning. It was cool to sort of be in that universe for a while, and then to contemplate my own relationship with my kids.

So, I listened to the Cobb audiobook. Pretty insane that Ken Burns didn't even bother to get the facts straight. What celebrity or athlete would you compare Cobb too? He's very complex. Smart, insecure, bad temper, good businessman.

That's a great question--who Cobb is like. He's complex for sure. He's as competitive as MJ is supposed to be....but there must be better comparisons. Being complex doesn't sell well today, unless you're one of the lucky celebs who get a pass.

No surprise about the Ken Burns film. I watched it once and thought, why am I watching a commercial for NY city?

Maybe a little Barry Bonds?

John McEnroe.

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Communists are just people who are terrible at capitalism.

Steve Carlton? A non sociopathic Sandy Koufax?

Maybe Jackie Robinson.

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

Crazy '08.

The title ain't kidding. Shit was nuts back then.

This list just came out:

https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/b ... ooks-ever/

I was pleased to see that The MVP Machine that Bernstein was pushing so hard a while back did not make the cut, but I think Men At Work by George Will should have made the list. The Glory of Their Times winds up on all these lists. I picked it up based on Tommy's recommendation, but have yet to read it.

This is cool...

The Glory of Their Times is so much fun. You can listen to the actual players, too.

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Anyone ever read this? Black Ball: A Negro Leagues Journal. I happened to read one article once (I was talking about it in some other thread), and the series looks interesting. Supposed to be peer-reviewed. It's a little pricey, though, even for the Kindle version.

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I finally got around to reading it. It's solid, but it's a lot of the same thing. It's the type of book that you should probably read while you're reading something else, so you can break it up a little bit.

A handful of observations:

1. There's some "old man yelling at cloud" stuff in here vis a vis modern baseball (baseball as of the mid 60's, when the book was written), but not a lot of it;
2. Almost all of them went out of their way to praise Willie Mays;
3. It's pretty startling how player development has changed over the last 100 years. Almost everyone interviewed told a story of playing in some podunk league, having a scout happen by who watched one or two games, and then being in the majors within one or two years;
4. I think Willie Kamm was the only guy interviewed who spent the majority of his career with the White Sox; and
5. Hank Greenberg shared the following thought: "I've always believed that the most important aspect of hitting is driving in runs. Runs batted in are more important than batting average, more important than home runs, more important than anything. That's what wins ball games: driving runs across the plate." If he called into WSCR and shared that thought in 2022, he'd probably get hung up on.

Warren Newson's post reminded me of this video by Jean Shepherd about the South Side and North Side and, especially, how his dad cost the Sox a game against Gehrig's Yankees:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2e3Ov1 ... spshellnut

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Communists are just people who are terrible at capitalism.

He was a winner.

Had that TWTW.

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https://twitter.com/DrKenCast

I just finished Billy Martin: Baseball's Flawed Genius by Bill Pennington. I was too young to experience much of Martin's exploits in real time. As a kid, I just knew he was the guy that Steinbrenner kept hiring and firing but, good lord, was this guy a piece of work. He was too intense for the 70's. If he were hired now, he would be fired and canceled about two weeks into spring training. All that being said, it was probably the most entertaining baseball book I've ever read.

Rodman? KD? Vick? Komlo? Bauer?

One Shot at Forever: A Small Town, an Unlikely Coach, and a Magical Baseball Season, by Chris Bllard. WOW! One of my favorite experiences reading a book EVER!! A small-town Illinois team with barely enough players and not enough uniforms gets a new coach who shakes up the classrooms with his hippie ideas and leads the team to the brink of the state championship. Kind of like Hoosiers for baseball. Reading this was like having a three-way (with the other two being women, I mean

I just finished this one. You're right, Tommy. It was absolutely delightful. My brother-in-law's grandfather also made a cameo.

Really? That's cool!

Yeah, this one has stayed with me.

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He was a guy who lived in the town that was mentioned once in the book. He wasn't affiliated with the baseball team.