Wednesday, February 8, 2012

With Spring Training Just Around The Corner...

...that means it's time for new baseball books to come out.

Peter Morris sent me a link to an article that lists twenty-two new baseball books that are coming out this spring.  The article includes brief synopses of the books, release dates and prices.  There are some really great books coming out and I'm looking forward to picking up Roy Kerr's biography of Buck Ewing and Tim Wendel's Summer of '68 (as in 1968, not 1868).  I love the fact that two of my favorite annual events, spring training and the release of the new baseball books, are tied together and it makes me yearn (like Rogers Hornsby staring out a window) of the baseball season.

 

The reason Peter passed the link along was that the article contains a nice, little review of Base Ball Pioneers, which is available for pre-order.  I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to getting my hands on this book.  I was fortunate enough to get to write the chapter on St. Louis pioneer clubs and, while that's great and all, I really can't wait to read what everyone else wrote.  Also, the article has a review of The Rank and File of 19th Century Major League Baseball.  This is, essentially, the third volume of Major League Baseball Profiles, 1871-1900, and has over one thousand biographical sketches that we couldn't fit into the first two volumes.  I'm excited about this book coming out because David Nemec, who did such a fantastic job editing the books, told me that the Packy Dillon bio that I wrote would be included. It's also available for pre-order.

 

In the spirit of shameless self-promotion, I recommend you get both books (as well as the first two volumes of Profiles, if you don't have them yet).  Trust me when I say that I'll have more on both books as we get closer to the release dates.  And pitchers and catchers report in ten days.          

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