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Baseball Books for Baseball Fans PLEASE READ BEFORE POSTING! THANK YOU. AUTHORS: I guarantee to read and post a review of any baseball-related book that you send to me.

This group is for dedicated baseball fans who love baseball, baseball history and love reading books, articles, and stories about baseball, baseball history, and biographies of baseball players. I keep the book, but if your book is on any aspect of baseball — history, a biography, etc. — I will guarantee a review on this page if you send me the book.

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This is a Facebook group for those who love baseball and have a true appreciation for baseball history and who love to read good books about the game. The purpose of the page is to provide a forum where we can share our thoughts on good baseball books and recommend them to others in this group. A FEW RULES: Questions about books are fine, but PLEASE ONLY RECOMMEND YOUR FAVORITE BASEBALL BOOKS THAT YOU HAVE ACTUALLY READ YOURSELF, not just "heard" about. Plugging a book that you have authored is okay, unless you go too much "over the top" about it, and I reserve the right to remove any post I feel is too commercial. Preferably, include a photo of the book you are recommending, with of course the title and author and a short annotation that summarizes the book and why you liked it. AUTHORS: If you have written a baseball book and would like me to post a review of it on this page, please send me a copy [that I can keep] and I will read your book and post a review on this page.

10/18/2026

Every era has a player whose greatness gets lost in the noise around him. In the early 1920s, that player was George Sisler.

In 1920, he played every inning of every game for the St. Louis Browns, hit .407, and collected 257 hits. Nobody topped that total for 84 years, and when Ichiro finally did, he had a 162-game schedule to work with. Two years later, Sisler hit .420, strung together a 41-game hitting streak, and won the American League MVP as the Browns finished one game short of the pennant.

Then, at 30 and at the very top of his game, a severe sinus infection left him seeing double. He missed all of 1923. He came back and hit .320 over his final seven seasons, the kind of number most players would build a Hall of Fame case around, but Sisler admitted he was never quite the same hitter again.

So why doesn't his name come up in the same breath as Cobb and Ruth? Part of it is the uniform. The Browns were baseball's afterthought, and Sisler never played in a World Series. Part of it is timing. He was a slashing, line-drive artist at the exact moment Babe Ruth was teaching the game to swing for the seats.

But the people who saw him knew. Ty Cobb, his longtime American League rival, called him "the nearest thing to a perfect ballplayer" he had ever seen. And when the Hall of Fame held its very first induction ceremony in 1939, Sisler was there.

This comment was left by Old Ball Game Studios fan via YouTube.

10/18/2026

This Day in the Old Ball Game: October 17

A nickname that sticks, a record set on the season's last day, a World Series moved indoors, and a number no Korean hitter had ever reached.

Home Run Baker Earns It (1911) Christy Mathewson had already beaten the A's in Game 1, and he carried a 1-0 lead into the ninth inning of Game 3 at the Polo Grounds. Then Frank Baker, who had homered against the Giants a day earlier, drove one into the right-field stands to tie it. Philadelphia won 3-2 in 11 innings. Baker had led the AL with 11 homers that year, but after two big swings in two days, the "Home Run" part of his name was never going anywhere.

One Year at the Top (1963) On the last day of Nankai's season, catcher Katsuya Nomura hit his 52nd home run, breaking the Japanese single-season record of 51 that Makoto Kozuru had held since 1950. He also led the Pacific League with 135 RBIs and won MVP. The record lasted exactly one year: Sadaharu Oh hit 55 in 1964. Nomura still finished with 657 career homers, second only to Oh. Fifty-two from a catcher is its own kind of heavy lifting.

The Series Goes Under a Roof (1987) The World Series had never been played indoors until Game 1 at Minnesota's Metrodome. A crowd of 55,171 watched the Twins score seven runs in the fourth inning and beat the Cardinals 10-1. Every game of that Series went to the home team, and the Twins, who hosted four of them, won it in seven. No rainouts, no wind, just a whole lot of noise.

Seo Reaches 200 (2014) No KBO hitter had ever collected 200 hits in a season. Seo Geon-chang, who went undrafted out of high school and was released by his first team, came into Nexen's final regular-season game with 199. He doubled in his first at-bat, then added one more for 201, all in a 128-game schedule. He was named league MVP. Others have topped 200 since, but Seo got there first.

Ed. 10.17.26

10/10/2026

ON THIS DAY IN BASEBALL: October 7

FORTY-ONE WINS IN A SEASON (1904)
Jack Chesbro beat Boston 3 to 2 for his forty-first win of the year, a modern-era record that still stands. He started 51 games, completed 48 of them and threw 454⅔ innings. Chesbro threw the spitball and had been one of the first to use it seriously. Days later he threw a wild pitch that let in the run which cost New York the pennant, and that is what he was remembered for.

THE CATCH NOBODY ELSE MOVED FOR (1952)
Game Seven at Ebbets Field, bases loaded in the seventh, and Jackie Robinson hit a high pop-up into the infield. The sun and the wind took it, the first baseman lost it entirely and nobody moved. Billy Martin sprinted in from second base and caught it low in a desperate running lunge. The catch prevented a potentially Series-turning hit. The Yankees won 4 to 2 and took their fourth World Series in a row.

TWO OUTS, TWO PINCH HITTERS (1977)
Los Angeles were two runs down with two outs in the ninth of Game Three of the Championship Series against Philadelphia. Vic Davalillo, a veteran who had been playing in Mexico that summer, beat out a drag bunt on two strikes. Manny Mota then hit a long double off the wall in left and the whole thing came apart for the Phillies, who added fielding and throwing errors, including an errant pickoff throw. The Dodgers won 6 to 5 and took the pennant the following night.

ARGUING WHILE THE RUN SCORED (1998)
Tied in the twelfth of Game Two of the Championship Series, Tino Martinez's throw struck Travis Fryman in the back following a bunt and the ball came loose near first base. Chuck Knoblauch, convinced it was interference, turned to the umpire and argued his case with his arms spread wide while the ball sat on the grass behind him. Enrique Wilson ran the whole way from first to home. Cleveland won 4 to 1, and New York supporters spent the rest of the night letting Knoblauch know what they thought of it.

10/10/2026

ON THIS DAY IN BASEBALL: October 9

SNOW AT THE WORLD SERIES (1906)
The first all-Chicago World Series opened at West Side Park with snow blowing across the ground. The Cubs had won 116 games that season, still the joint record alongside the 2001 Mariners, and were expected to brush the White Sox aside. The White Sox had hit .230 as a team and were known as the Hitless Wonders. Nick Altrock outpitched Three Finger Brown for a 2 to 1 win, and the White Sox went on to take the Series in six.

BUNTING FOR A BATTING TITLE (1910)
Nap Lajoie went into a season-ending doubleheader chasing Ty Cobb for the batting title and collected eight hits, repeatedly bunting while the St Louis third baseman stood deep in the grass. Cobb was widely disliked and the Browns had decided to help the other man. Everyone in the ground could see what was happening and nobody stopped it. Cobb was awarded the title by a fraction, though later statistical corrections put Lajoie ahead. The St Louis manager Jack O’Connor was sacked and blackballed by organised baseball.

FOURTEEN INNINGS FROM BABE RUTH (1916)
Boston’s young left-hander gave up a run in the first innings against Brooklyn and then gave up nothing at all for the next thirteen, going the full fourteen innings for a 2 to 1 win. It was the longest game in World Series history at the time, and it remains the most innings any pitcher has thrown in a single World Series game. Ruth was a pitcher first and a very good one. He began playing regularly in the field in 1918, while continuing to pitch.

THE BOY WHO REACHED OVER THE WALL (1996)
With the Yankees a run down in the eighth of Game One of the Championship Series, Derek Jeter hit a fly ball towards the right field wall. Baltimore’s Tony Tarasco settled underneath it, and twelve-year-old Jeffrey Maier reached into the field of play and deflected it into the stands. The umpire ruled a home run, the game was tied, and Bernie Williams won it in the eleventh. Baltimore protested to no effect. Maier spent the next day being photographed for the New York papers.

10/10/2026

This Day in the Old Ball Game: October 9

A ball nobody could find, a president in the stands, a photograph bigger than the game, and two juggernauts tripping on the first step.

Bill Coughlin's Disappearing Act (1907) The Cubs came into the 1907 World Series still smarting from a stunning loss the October before. In Game 2, Detroit third baseman Bill Coughlin kept the ball out of sight until Jimmy Slagle strayed off the bag, then tagged him out. It is still the only hidden ball trick in World Series history, according to the master list kept by researcher Bill Deane. The Cubs shook it off, won 3-1, and finished the Series without losing a game.

The First Fan in the Box Seats (1915) On this day at Philadelphia's Baker Bowl, Woodrow Wilson became the first president to attend a World Series game. He threw out the first pitch with his future wife, Edith Galt, alongside him. Then Red Sox right-hander George "Rube" Foster stole the show, allowing three hits and singling home the go-ahead run in the ninth of a 2-1 win. Not a bad first date with the Fall Classic.

Larry Doby and the Picture (1948) In Game 4, Larry Doby sent a Johnny Sain pitch deep to right-center for the first home run by a Black player in World Series history. It was the difference in Cleveland's 2-1 win. Afterward, Doby and winning pitcher Steve Gromek were photographed embracing cheek to cheek in the clubhouse. Gromek took heat for it from some folks back home. Doby, the American League's first Black player, said that picture meant more to him than the home run.

Same Date, Same Stumble (1906, 2001) The 1906 Cubs won 116 games, and the "Hitless Wonder" White Sox were supposed to be a speed bump. Instead, snow flurries fell on the World Series opener and Nick Altrock beat Three Finger Brown, 2-1. Ninety-five years later to the day, the Mariners, fresh off matching that 116-win mark, opened the playoffs by getting shut out 5-0 by Bartolo Colón and Cleveland. Through 2026, no team has won more. Neither one won the World Series.

Ed. 10.09.26

10/06/2026

This Day in the Old Ball Game: October 6

A one-man offense, an arm that wouldn't let a dynasty fall, the biggest crowd the Series has ever seen, and an Iron Man's last night on deck.

Pepper Martin, Party of One (1931) Pepper Martin was the whole show for St. Louis in the 1931 World Series, and this afternoon in Philadelphia proved it. A's ace George Earnshaw held the Cardinals to two hits. Martin had both of them, and stole a base just to make the point. It didn't matter: Jimmie Foxx homered, the A's won 3-0, and the Series was tied. The Cardinals got the last word anyway, winning it in seven.

Bullet Bob Saves the Season (1958) The Yankees were one loss from falling to Milwaukee for a second straight October. Bob Turley, knocked out after getting one out in Game 2, took the ball for Game 5 at Yankee Stadium and threw a five-hit shutout, 7-0. Two days later in Milwaukee he got the final out in the 10th to save Game 6. The next day he pitched 6 2/3 innings of relief to win Game 7. Two wins and a save in three games, and the Series MVP award to show for it.

92,706 (1959) Los Angeles had been a big-league town for barely two seasons, and it showed up. A crowd of 92,706 filled the Memorial Coliseum for Game 5, the third straight day the World Series attendance record fell. The White Sox, down three games to one, scratched out a single run and won 1-0. The Dodgers finished the job two days later in Chicago, but that crowd is still the largest ever to see a World Series game. In today's ballparks, it may stay that way forever.

The Iron Man, On Deck (2001) Cal Ripken Jr.'s final game was supposed to be at Yankee Stadium, but the schedule rebuilt after September 11 sent it home to Camden Yards. Baltimore lost to Boston 5-1, and Ripken went 0-for-3. In the ninth he stood in the on-deck circle while the crowd chanted "We want Cal!" and his longtime teammate struck out swinging. The man who once played 2,632 straight games ended his career one batter short of one more at-bat. Twenty-five years ago tonight.

Ed. 10.06.26

10/05/2026

This Day in the Old Ball Game: October 5

A sunny afternoon called for darkness, a slugger they wouldn't pitch to, a strike that got away, and a pitcher who met the locals.

The Day the Sun Didn't Count (1922) Game 2 of the 1922 World Series was tied 3-3 after ten innings at the Polo Grounds, with both starters still on the mound. Then umpire George Hildebrand called it for darkness while the sun was still in the sky. The crowd was furious, and plenty of people suspected baseball wanted an extra gate. Commissioner Landis answered by giving the day's receipts to charity. Nobody has played to a tie in the World Series since.

Nothing to Hit for Mel Ott (1929) Mel Ott and Chuck Klein went into a doubleheader in Philadelphia tied for the National League home run lead at 42. Klein homered in the opener. In the nightcap, Phillies pitchers walked Ott five times, once with the bases loaded, rather than give him a chance to catch up. Klein took the crown with 43. Ott took home a lesson in how far a team will go for its own guy.

One Strike Away (1941) Brooklyn led the Yankees 4-3 in Game 4 of the World Series at Ebbets Field, two outs in the ninth. Hugh Casey struck out Tommy Henrich, and the game should have been over. Instead the pitch skipped past catcher Mickey Owen and Henrich raced to first. The Yankees rallied for four runs, won 7-4, and wrapped up the Series the next afternoon. Owen caught for years, but one pitch is the one everybody remembered.

The Bug Game (2007) Rookie Joba Chamberlain had walked six batters in 24 big-league innings when he was protecting a 1-0 lead in the eighth inning of an ALDS game in Cleveland. Then the midges arrived. Drawn by the lights on a warm night, swarms of them coated his neck and arms, and bug spray didn't help. He walked the leadoff man and threw two wild pitches, and the tying run scored without a hit. Cleveland won in 11 and took the series in four.

Ed. 10.05.26

10/03/2026

The American League of the 1930s had a first base problem every other league would have traded anything for. Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, and Hank Greenberg. Three of the most dangerous hitters who ever lived, all at the same position, all in their prime at the same time.

Something had to give, and the early All-Star Games show you what. In 1935, Greenberg reached the break with 103 RBIs, a record that still stands, and wasn't even invited. Foxx, a two-time MVP, spent those midsummer afternoons at third base, a borrowed position that occasionally showed. In 1938 his wild throw on a Leo Durocher bunt helped create one of the strangest plays in All-Star history.

The All-Star Game was still new then, more exhibition than institution, and nobody was keeping track of who got squeezed out. That's how a player like Harlond Clift slips through the cracks. In 1937 he set the record for home runs by a third baseman. The next year he broke it with 34, a mark that held until Eddie Mathews in 1953. Power, patience, and a real glove, all on some truly bad Browns clubs.

The box scores from those early games are full of "did not play." Read them closely and you see just how deep the game ran in the 1930s, and how easy it was for greatness to sit unnoticed at the end of a bench.

This comment was left by Old Ball Game Studios fan via YouTube.

10/03/2026

This Day in the Old Ball Game: October 3

A twelve-inning goodbye, a shot that still echoes, a swing that waited 25 years for company, and a door that finally opened.

Monty Swartz's One Long Day (1920) The Reds kept rookie Monty Swartz around all summer without using him in a game. On the last day of the season, they finally handed him the ball against the Cardinals. He went the distance, all 12 innings, gave up 17 hits in a 6-3 loss, and went 2 for 4 at the plate. He never pitched in the majors again. Some careers are short. His was long, but only for an afternoon.

The Shot Heard 'Round the World (1951) Seventy-five years ago today, Brooklyn led 4-1 in the ninth inning of the deciding playoff game at the Polo Grounds. A Wh**ey Lockman double made it 4-2 with two aboard, and Ralph Branca came in to face Bobby Thomson. On the second pitch, Thomson drove it into the left-field seats, and the Giants won the pennant. October 3 has never been kind to the Dodgers: they also lost playoff deciders on this date in 1946 and 1962.

The Last of Their Kind (1972) In the second game of a doubleheader at Cleveland, Orioles rookie Roric Harrison took Ray Lamb deep for his first big-league homer, and Baltimore won 4-3. The designated hitter arrived the next spring, and no American League pitcher homered again for nearly 25 years, until Bobby Witt connected in an interleague game in 1997. Harrison grabbed a souvenir on his way out of a world that was about to disappear.

A Door Opens in Cleveland (1974) Two years later, Cleveland made a different kind of history. The Indians named Frank Robinson player-manager, the first Black manager in major league history. Robinson was already the first player to win MVP in both leagues. On Opening Day 1975, he put himself in the lineup as the designated hitter and homered in his first at-bat. Cleveland beat the Yankees 5-3. Some barriers fall with a swing.

Ed. 10.03.26

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