Sports Illustrated: The Baseball Book
by Editors of Sports Illustrated
from Sports Illustrated
Continuing in the tradition of Sports Illustrateds 50th Anniversary Book and The Football Book comes a spectacular celebration of baseball that will be treasured by fans of the National Pastime.With the same kind of unforgettable photographs and award-winning writing that propelled The Football Book to surpass the sales of the 50th Anniversary Book, a New York Times best-seller, this lavish coffee-table volume brings to life the legendary players, the classic action and the great traditions of the Summer Game.In 294 oversized pages, The Baseball Book commemorates the epic teams and characters, the crucial plays and classic games, the personalities and performances and artifacts that have kept baseball at the heart of American sports for more than a century.
Ball Four
by Jim Bouton
from Wiley
As a player, former hurler Jim Bouton did nothing half-way; he threw so hard he'd lose his cap on almost every pitch. In the early '70s, he tossed off one of the funniest, most revealing, insider's takes on baseball life in Ball Four, his diary of the season he tried to pitch his way back from oblivion on the strength of a knuckler. The real curve, though, is Bouton's honesty. He carves humans out of heroes, and shines a light into the game's corners. A quarter century later, Bouton's unique baseball voice can still bring the heat.
Twentieth-anniversary edition of a baseball classic, with a new epilogue by Jim Bouton.
When first published in 1970, Ball Four stunned the sports world. The commissioner, executives, and players were shocked. Sportswriters called author Jim Bouton a traitor and "social leper." Baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn tried to force him to declare the book untrue. Fans, however, loved the book. And serious critics called it an important social document. Today, Jim Bouton is still not invited to Oldtimer's Days at Yankee Stadium. But his landmark book is still being read by people who don'tordinarily follow baseball.
Catch Every Ball: How to Handle Life's Pitches
by Johnny Bench
from Orange Frazer Pr
Johnny Bench never had it easy.
When he was 6 years old, he picked cotton for two cents a pound, to afford a pair of new blue jeans. When he was 17, the bus that carried him and his high school teammates home from a baseball game flipped over a guardrail on an Oklahoma highway. Bench escaped with a gash on his elbow. Two of his friends were killed.
In September 1972, doctors discovered a spot on Bench s lung. The former National League Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player played the rest of that season not knowing what was wrong with him. He won a second MVP Award.
Bench made Baseball s All Century Team and was the catcher on the Big Red Machine, two clubs that dominated the game in the 1970s. After his retirement, he launched a successful broadcasting career. More recently, he has made his living as a motivational speaker.
Catch Every Ball is an accumulation of wisdom gleaned from 60 years of living. Bench uses examples from his own life and playing career, as well as knowledge gathered from other successful people in all walks of life, to offer a guide to success anyone can relate to.
Follow his life through the cotton fields of Oklahoma to the Baseball Hall of Fame. Meet some of the people who have influenced him along the way: Bob Hope, Arnold Palmer, Sparky Anderson, Joe Morgan and Bob Knight, among others. Allow Bench s wisdom to help you... Catch Every Ball.
The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract
by Bill James
from Free Press
When Bill James published his original Historical Baseball Abstract in 1985, he produced an immediate classic, hailed by the Chicago Tribune as the "holy book of baseball." Now, baseball's beloved "Sultan of Stats" (The Boston Globe) is back with a fully revised and updated edition for the new millennium.
Like the original, The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract is really several books in one. The Game provides a century's worth of American baseball history, told one decade at a time, with energetic facts and figures about How, Where, and by Whom the game was played. In The Players, you'll find listings of the top 100 players at each position in the major leagues, along with James's signature stats-based ratings method called "Win Shares," a way of quantifying individual performance and calculating the offensive and defensive contributions of catchers, pitchers, infielders, and outfielders. And there's more: the Reference section covers Win Shares for each season and each player, and even offers a Win Share team comparison. A must-have for baseball fans and historians alike, The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract is as essential, entertaining, and enlightening as the sport itself.
The Yogi Book : I Really Didn't Say Everything I Said
by Yogi Berra
from Workman Publishing Company
If the subtitle of this delicious collection of Yogi-isms has you scratching your head, it has done its job as stunningly as Berra used to do his behind the plate at Yankee Stadium. The Hall of Fame MVP catcher for the pinstriped dynasties of the late 1940s through the '50s and into the '60s, Berra was about as quick with his witticisms as he was with his bat and glove. But if his observations hit the heart of the plate, his grammar tended to pop out of left field, hence the creation of a unique mode of malapropism dubbed the Yogi-ism. To truly understand the title, you need to know that not every mot ascribed to Yogi actually emanated from his mouth--they only sounded like they should have. Thus, he really didn't say everything he said, which makes The Yogi Book absolutely necessary (see page 10).
To the things that Yogi did say, The Yogi Book does both service and justice. It gathers the witticisms in a single convenient volume, adds a scrapbook of photos, then lets their progenitor riff, filling in color commentary on what was happening beyond his mind and what was going through it when the famous phrases were dispatched into the public domain. He deservedly takes credit for such immortal pronunciamentos as "Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded." (page 16); "It's deja vu all over again." (page 30); "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." (page 48); "The future ain't what it used to be." (page 118); "It gets late early out there." (page 64); and "Ninety percent of this game is half mental." (page 69). All, like the sacred texts they happen to be, are appropriately parsed for your edification, as is the greatest Yogi-ism of them all: "It ain't over 'til it's over." (page 121).
It's deja vu all over again! And just in time for Father's Day. Announcing a hardcover edition of the 300,000-plus -copy national bestseller that has baseball fans everywhere saying "It ain't over 'til it's over" and "90% of the game is half mental" and "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." A $12.95 jacketed edition that ships in time for Father's Day, The Yogi Book is a perfect gift for sports fans, quote book collectors, lovers of pop culture and Americana, and everyone who ever knew exactly what Yogi meant by You can observe a lot by watching.
Heads-Up Baseball : Playing the Game One Pitch at a Time
by Tom Hanson
from McGraw-Hill
"This book provides practical strategies for developing the mental skills which help speed you to your full potential."---Dave Winfield
What does it mean to play heads-up baseball? A heads-up player has confidence in his ability, keeps control in pressure situations, and focuses on one pitch at a time. His mental skills enable him to play consistently at or near his best despite the adversity baseball presents each day.
"My ability to fully focus on what I had to do on a daily basis was what made me the successful player I was. Sure I had some natural ability, but that only gets you so far. I think I learned how to focus; it wasn't something that I was necessarily born with." -- Hank Aaron
"Developing and refining my mental game has played a critical role in my success in baseball. For years players have had to develop these skills on their own. This book provides practical strategies for developing the mental skills that will help speed you toward your full potential." -- Dave Winfield
The Mental Keys to Hitting: A Handbook of Strategies for Performance Enhancement
by H.A. Dorfman
from Diamond Communications
This book is a must additon to every player's training and game day routines. Anyone serious about playing baseball should find this book as important as a bat or a glove.
You Can Observe A Lot By Watching: What I've Learned About Teamwork From the Yankees and Life
by Yogi Berra
from Wiley
"The most valuable team player in sports" shows you what "teamwork" really means
What does it take to be a real team player, especially in a society that glorifies selfishness and a corporate culture that often uses "team player" as a buzzword but rewards only the showboaters and prima donnas? Well, You Can Observe a Lot by Watching. In this happy and hilarious guide to teamwork, sportsmanship, and winning, Yogi Berra draws on the timeless wisdom handed down by example from ballplayers who came before him to inspire you to make the right choices and become not only a better team player--at sports, at work, and in life--but a better person.
Filled with colorful stories from his life and career, not to mention the down-to-earth wit and insight that Yogi fans love, You Can Observe a Lot by Watching shows you how to make a bad team good and a good team great.
A Home on the Field: How One Championship Soccer Team Inspires Hope for the Revival of Small Town America
by Paul Cuadros
from Harper Paperbacks
A Home on the Field is about faith, loyalty, and trust. It is a parable in the tradition of Stand and Deliver and Hoosiers—a story of one team and their accidental coach who became certain heroes to the whole community.
For the past ten years, Siler City, North Carolina, has been at the front lines of immigration in the interior portion of the United States. Like a number of small Southern towns, workers come from traditional Latino enclaves across the United States, as well as from Latin American countries, to work in what is considered the home of industrial-scale poultry processing. At enormous risk, these people have come with the hope of a better life and a chance to realize their portion of the American Dream.
But it isn't always easy. Assimilation into the South is fraught with struggles, and in no place is this more poignant than in the schools. When Paul Cuadros packed his bags and moved south to study the impact of the burgeoning Latino community, he encountered a culture clash between the long-time residents and the newcomers that eventually boiled over into an anti-immigrant rally featuring former Klansman David Duke.
It became Paul's goal to show the growing numbers of Latino youth that their lives could be more than the cutting line at the poultry plants, that finishing high school and heading to college could be a reality. He needed to find something that the boys could commit to passionately, knowing that devotion to something bigger than them would be the key to helping the boys find where they fit in the world. The answer was soccer.
But Siler City, like so many other small rural communities, was a football town, and long-time residents saw soccer as a foreign sport and yet another accommodation to the newcomers. After an uphill battle, the Jets soccer team at Jordan-Matthews High School was born. Suffering setbacks and heartbreak, the majority Latino team, in only three seasons and against all odds, emerged poised to win the state championship.
Sports Illustrated: The Basketball Book (Sports Illustrated)
by Editors of Sports Illustrated
from Sports Illustrated
Continuing Sports Illustrated's tradition of producing best-selling coffee-table books for the holiday season, SI presents The Basketball Book, a lavish celebration of the athleticism and pageantry of both the college and professional game. With the same kind of unforgettable photographs and award-winning writing that propelled The Baseball Book, The Football Book and The Anniversary Book to The New York Times best-seller list over the past three years, this volume brings to life the legendary players, the classic action and the great rivalries of the court. In 294 oversized pages, The Basketball Book commemorates the epic teams and characters, the personalities and performances and artifacts that have created legions of passionate fans since Dr. James Naismith nailed up a peach basket and devised the Original 13 Rules of the game more than 100 years ago.
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