Lanky, mop-topped, and nicknamed for his resemblance to Big Bird on Sesame Street, Fidrych exploded onto the national stage during the Bicentennial summer as a rookie with the Detroit Tigers. He won over fans nationwide with his wildly endearing antics, but quickly emerged as one of the best pitchers in the game. Fidrych was named starting pitcher in the All-Star Game as a rookie and became the first athlete to appear on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine. Wilson recounts Fidrych's meteoric rise, his heartbreaking fall after a torn knee ligament and then rotator cuff, and captures Fidrych's post-baseball life to his death in a freak accident in 2009.
Captain for Life offers a unique and powerful personal tale about the great joy and devastating price of playing professional football, by a legendary former NFL linebacker Harry Carson. One of the greatest linebackers to ever play professional football, Harry Carson built a reputation during his 13 years in the NFL as a fearsome, physical and passionate player who would give everything he had to win. Whether violently tackling running backs, engaging blockers with reckless abandon or ferociously attacking the line of scrimmage, Carson will always be remembered as having played the game the way it's meant to be played--all out. For the first time ever, this legendary athlete takes readers on an unlikely journey to the NFL that began in the small town of Florence, South Carolina to his days at little known South Carolina State University--and then the bright lights of professional football in New York, playing for the Giants. Carson's story of his life as a football player and after his retirement is more powerful and eye-opening than any that's come before. Within these pages, Carson reveals the startling truth behind the sacrifices these great warriors make for our entertainment, the thrill of stepping onto a field with 80,000 fans screaming your name, and the debilitating physical and mental toll this violent and uncompromising game takes. With insight into some of the game's biggest stars, from Lawrence Taylor to Bill Parcells to Phil Simms this book is a must for any NFL fan.
The first complete biography of the Baltimore Orioles' Hall of Fame baseman Brooks Robinson, the greatest defensive third baseman of all time. Finalist for the 2014 Casey Award! Selected by the National Baseball Hall of Fame for the 2014 author's series Brooks Robinson is one of baseball's most transcendent and revered players. He won a record sixteen straight Gold Gloves at third base, led one of the best teams of the era, and is often cited as the greatest fielder in baseball history. Credited with almost single-handedly winning the 1970 World Series, this MVP was immortalized in a Normal Rockwell painting. A wholesome player and role model, Brooks honored the game of baseball not only with his play but with his class and character off the field. Author of The Bird: The Life and Legacy of Mark Fidrych, Doug Wilson returns to baseball's Golden Age to detail the birth of a new franchise through the man who came to symbolize it as one of baseball's most beloved players. Through numerous interviews with people from every part of the legendary player's life, Wilson reveals never-before-reported information to illuminate Brooks's remarkable skill and warm personality. Brooks takes readers back to an era when players fought for low-paying yearly contracts, spanning the turbulent 60s and 70s and into the dawning of the free agent era. He was elected to the MLB All-Century Team and as president of the MLB Players Alumni, Brooks continues to influence today's baseball players. In the climate of astronomic salaries, steroids, off-field troubles, and heroes who let down their fans, Brooks reminds baseball fans of the honor and glory at the heart of America's favorite pastime.
Throwback offers an informative and irreverent look at the inner mechanics, strategies, secret signals, and customs of major league baseball. Ever Wonder What's Being Said at Home Plate? How a Team Silently Communicates? What Goes on in the Clubhouse Behind Closed Doors? America's pastime has always left fans and amateur players alike yearning for the answers to questions about how pros play the game. Jason Kendall is a former All-Star catcher who has seen just about everything during his years with the Pittsburgh Pirates, Oakland Athletics, Chicago Cubs, Milwaukee Brewers, and Kansas City Royals. A player's player, a guy with true grit--a throwback to another time with a unique view on the game that so many love. Jason Kendall and sportswriter Lee Judge team up to bring you the fan, player, coach, or curious statistician an insider's view of the game from a player's perspective. This is a book about pre-game rituals, what to look for when a pitcher warms up between innings, the signs a catcher uses to communicate with the pitcher, and so much more. Some of baseball wisdom you will find inside: * What to look for during batting practice. * The right way to hit a batter. * Who's a tough guy and who's just posing. * How to spot a dirty slide. * Why you don't look at the umpire while you're arguing. Based on Kendall's 15 years of professional MLB experience, Throwback is an informative, hilarious, and illuminating look into the world of professional baseball-and in a way that no one has ever seen before.
SABR 50 at 50 celebrates and highlights the Society for American Baseball Research’s wide-ranging contributions to baseball history. Established in 1971 in Cooperstown, New York, SABR has sought to foster and disseminate the research of baseball—with groundbreaking work from statisticians, historians, and independent researchers—and has published dozens of articles with far-reaching and long-lasting impact on the game. Among its current membership are many Major and Minor League Baseball officials, broadcasters, and writers as well as numerous former players. The diversity of SABR members’ interests is reflected in this fiftieth-anniversary volume—from baseball and the arts to statistical analysis to the Deadball Era to women in baseball. SABR 50 at 50 includes the most important and influential research published by members across a multitude of topics, including the sabermetric work of Dick Cramer, Pete Palmer, and Bill James, along with Jerry Malloy on the Negro Leagues, Keith Olbermann on why the shortstop position is number 6, John Thorn and Jules Tygiel on the untold story behind Jackie Robinson’s signing with the Dodgers, and Gai Berlage on the Colorado Silver Bullets women’s team in the 1990s. To provide history and context, each notable research article is accompanied by a short introduction. As SABR celebrates fifty years this collection gathers the organization’s most notable research and baseball history for the serious baseball reader.
Wilker marks the stages of his life through the baseball cards he collected as a child. He captures the experience of growing up obsessed with baseball cards and explores what it means to be a fan of the game.
An ex–Wall Street trader improved on Moneyball’s famed sabermetrics and beat the Vegas odds with his own betting methods. Here is the story of how Joe Peta turned fantasy baseball into a dream come true. Joe Peta turned his back on his Wall Street trading career to pursue an ingenious—and incredibly risky—dream. He would apply his risk-analysis skills to Major League Baseball, and treat the sport like the S&P 500. In Trading Bases, Peta takes us on his journey from the ballpark in San Francisco to the trading floors and baseball bars of New York and the sportsbooks of Las Vegas, telling the story of how he created a baseball “hedge fund” with an astounding 41 percent return in his first year. And he explains the unique methods he developed. Along the way, Peta provides insight into the Wall Street crisis he managed to escape: the fragility of the midnineties investment model; the disgraced former CEO of Lehman Brothers, who recruited Peta; and the high-adrenaline atmosphere where million-dollar sports-betting pools were common.
The rip-roaring story of baseball's most unlikely champions, featuring interviews with Henry Aaron, Bob Uecker and other members of the Milwaukee Braves, Bushville Wins! takes you to a time and place baseball and the Heartland will never forget. "Bushville hits the sweet spot of my childhood, the year my family moved to Wisconsin and the Braves won the World Series against the Yankees, a team my Brooklyn-raised dad taught us to hate. Thanks to John Klima for bringing it all back to life with such vivid detail and energetic writing." -- David Maraniss, New York Times bestselling author of Clemente and When Pride Still Mattered In the early 1950s, the New York Yankees were the biggest bullies on the block. They were invincible: they led the New York City baseball dynasty, which for eight consecutive years held an iron grip on the World Series championship. Then the Boston Braves moved to Milwaukee in 1953, becoming surprise revolutionaries. Led by visionary owner Lou Perini, the Braves formed a powerful relationship with the Miller Brewing Company and foreshadowed the Dodgers and Giants moving west, sparking continental expansion and the ballpark boom. But the rest of the country wasn't sold. Why would a major league team move to a minor league town? In big cities like New York, Milwaukee was thought to be a podunk train station stop-off where the fans were always drunk and wouldn't know a baseball from a beer. They called Milwaukee Bushville. The Braves were no bushers! Eddie Mathews was a handsome home run hitter with a rugged edge. Warren Spahn was the craftiest pitcher in the business. Lew Burdette was a sharky spitball artist. Taken together, the Braves reveled in the High Life and made Milwaukee famous, while Wisconsin fans showed the rest of the country how to crack a cold one and throw a tailgate party. And in 1954, a solemn and skinny slugger came from Mobile to Milwaukee. Henry Aaron began his march to history. With a cast of screwballs, sluggers and beer swiggers, the Braves proved the guys at the corner bar could do the impossible - topple Casey Stengel's New York baseball dynasty in a World Series for the ages.
