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From: citrin@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU (Wayne Citrin)
Newsgroups: net.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: White stuff on the ground
Message-ID: <11220@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Thu, 12-Dec-85 16:40:50 EST
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.11220
Posted: Thu Dec 12 16:40:50 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 13-Dec-85 09:17:02 EST
References: <394@watmath.UUCP>
Reply-To: citrin@ucbvax.UUCP (Wayne Citrin)
Distribution: na
Organization: University of California at Berkeley
Lines: 46

In article <394@watmath.UUCP> credmond@watmath.UUCP (Chris Redmond) writes:
>And what is the best off-season reading material?

Here are a number of recommendations.  Unfortunately I don't have the volumes
at hand, so I can't provide publishers or, in some cases, authors:

Roger Angell's baseball essays are some of the best modern basebell writing
around.  He writes two long baseball articles for the New Yorker each
year, one after spring training, and one after the World Series.  His latest
post-season article was just published a week ago in The New Yorker.
"Late Innings" is a collection of his previous articles.  It's available
in paperback.

Roger Kahn is another author mentioned in the same breath as Angell.  His
"The Boys of Summer" is a classic, and he has a new book out, "Good Enough
to Dream," about his experiences as the owner of a minor league club.
I haven't read it, but it's gotten favorable reviews.

"The Unforgettable Season" is a collection of newspaper reports tracing
the course of the amazing 1908 National League pennant race.  It reads
like a novel, and offers fascinating insights into the sporting life
and sports journalism of the time.  It's available in paperback from
the Penguin Sports Library.

If you're looking for baseball fiction, I enthusiattically recommend
"Shoeless Joe," by W. P. Kinsella, available in paperback.  It's
impossible to describe, but wonderful.  Kinsella's collection of
baseball short stories "The Thrill of the Grass" is also good.

You might try going back to Bernard Malamud's "The Natural."  Although
Malamud's writing style and lack of baseball knowledge is infuriating
at times, the story, which is different from, and much more cynical than
that of the film, is still compelling.

If you have a rich relative, you might try asking him or her to get you
the new book of Topps baseball cards.  This book has reproductions of every
Topps' card from 1951 to the present.  It goes for $75, though.

Although I've grown tired of Bill James' Baseball Abstracts, his Historical
Abstract, which should be out soon, should be interesting.

Finally, a subscription to "The Sporting News" should keep even the most
baseball-starved fan going through the winter.

Wayne Citrin
(ucbvax!citrin)