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Lion of the League: Bob Emslie and the Evolution of the Baseball Umpire
Par Larry R. Gerlach. 2024
Robert Dean Emslie (1859–1943) spent fifty-six of his eighty-four years in professional baseball—eight as a player and forty-nine as an…
umpire. When arm problems ended his career as a Major League pitcher, he turned to umpiring, serving in that capacity for thirty-five seasons, then as an umpire supervisor for thirteen years. His longevity is all the more remarkable considering he toiled during the three most contentious and difficult decades umpires ever faced: the years from 1890 to 1920, when baseball transitioned from amateur to professional sport and from regional business to commercial entertainment industry. Emslie endured the rough-and-tumble umpire-baiting 1890s, the Deadball era, injuries from thrown and batted balls, physical and verbal assaults from players and fans, and criticism in the press. Among his most notable games, he called four no-hitters and worked as the base umpire in the famous Merkle&’s Boner game between the New York Giants and the Chicago Cubs at the Polo Grounds in 1908. He often clashed with Giants manager John McGraw, who nicknamed him &“Blind Bob.&” Yet he was widely praised by players and his peers. Honus Wagner, the great Pittsburgh shortstop, ranked Emslie the best National League umpire he had seen during his twenty-year career. Umpires Bill McGowan and Billy Evans respectively regarded him as &“the greatest base umpire of all time&” and &“one of the greatest umpires the game ever produced.&” Emslie was also the acknowledged master of baseball&’s rules such that National League presidents regularly consulted with him on controversial calls and protests. Emslie accepted a position as the chief of National League umpires, serving as an adviser to the National League president.Lion of the League is the biography of an umpire whose career spanned the formative years of modern baseball.Perfect Eloquence: An Appreciation of Vin Scully
Par Ron Rapoport. 2024
When Vin Scully passed away in 2022, the city of Los Angeles lost its soundtrack. If you were able to…
deliver a eulogy for him, what might it include? What impact did he have on you? What do you carry forward from his legacy? Sixty-seven essayists—one representing each season of his career calling games for the Los Angeles Dodgers, from 1950 through 2016—reflect on the ways his professional and private life influenced them. The contributions include a range of stories and remembrances from those who knew and followed him. The consensus of the contributions is that Scully&’s actions spoke louder than his well-recognized words. This collection includes fellow broadcasters as well as historians, players, journalists, celebrities, and others connected to the game of baseball, with each piece introduced by sports journalist Tom Hoffarth. Readers can consider Scully&’s life through common themes: his sincerity, his humility, his professionalism, his passion for his faith, his devotion to his family, his insistence on remembering and giving context to important moments in the history of not just the game but the world in general, all wrapped up in a gift for weaving storytelling with accurate reporting, fellowship with performance art, humor, and connection.Game 7, 1986: Failure and Triumph in the Biggest Game of My Life
Par Ron Darling, Daniel Paisner. 2016
New York Times BestsellerAn inside look at one of the most famous baseball games of all time, game seven of…
the 1986 World Series from Emmy-winning baseball analyst Ron Darling, the METS' starting pitcher, in his words.Every little kid who's ever taken the mound in Little League dreams of someday getting the ball for Game Seven of the World Series. Ron Darling got to live that dream - only it didn't go exactly as planned. In New York Times bestselling Game 7, 1986, the award-winning baseball analyst looks back at what might have been a signature moment in his career, and reflects on the ways professional athletes must sometimes shoulder a personal disappointment as their teams find a way to win.Published to coincide with the anniversary of the 1986 New York Mets championship season, Darling's book breaks down one of baseball's great "forgotten" games - a game that stands as a thrilling, telling, and tantalizing exclamation point to one of the best-remembered seasons in Major League Baseball history.Working once again with bestselling collaborator Daniel Paisner, who teamed with the former All-Star pitcher on his acclaimed 2009 memoir, The Complete Game, Darling offers a book for the thinking baseball fan, a chance to reflect on what it means to compete at the game's highest level, with everything on the line.Praying for Gil Hodges: A Memoir of the 1955 World Series and One Family's Love of the Brooklyn Dodgers
Par Thomas Oliphant. 2005
Thomas Oliphant's Praying for Gil Hodges is a brilliant work capturing the majesty of baseball, the issue of race in…
America, and the love that one young boy, his parents, and the borough of Brooklyn had for their team. On a steamy hot Sunday, the Reverend Herbert Redmond was celebrating Mass at a church in Brooklyn, when he startled his congregation thus: "It's far too hot for a sermon. Keep the Commandments and say a prayer for Gil Hodges."Praying for Gil Hodges is built around a detailed reconstruction of the seventh game of the 1955 World Series, which has always been on the short list of great moments in baseball history. On a sunny, breezy October afternoon, something happened in New York City that had never happened before and never would again: the Brooklyn Dodgers won the world championship of baseball. For one hour and forty-four minutes, behind a gutsy, twenty-three-year-old kid left-hander from the iron-mining region of upstate New York named Johnny Podres, everything that had gone wrong before went gloriously right for a change. Until that afternoon, leaving out the war years, the Dodgers and their legions of fans had endured ten seasons during which they lost the World Series to the New York Yankees five times and lost the National League pennant on the final day of the season three times--facts of history that give the famous cry of "Wait Till Next Year!" its defiant meaning. Pitch by pitch and inning by inning, Thomas Oliphant re-creates a relentless melodrama that shows this final game in its true glory. As we move through the game, he builds a remarkable history of the hapless "Bums," exploring the Dodgers' status as a national team, based on their fabled history of near-triumphs and disasters that made them classic underdogs. He weaves into this brilliant recounting a winning memoir of his own family's story and their time together on that fateful day that the final game was played.This victory thrilled the national African-American community, still mired in the evils of segregation, who had erupted in joy at the arrival of Jackie Robinson eight years earlier and rooted unabashedly for this integrated team at a time when the country was thoroughly segregated.And it also thrilled a nine-year-old boy on the East Side of Manhattan in a loving, struggling family for whom the Dodgers were a rare source of the joys and symbols that bring families together through tough times.Clubhouse Confidential: A Yankee Bat Boy's Insider Tale of Wild Nights, Gambling, and Good Times with Modern Baseball's Greatest Team
Par Luis Castillo, William Cane. 2011
Clubhouse Confidential is the explosive, inside story of Yankees players and managers by a bat boy who saw it allYou…
are invited to come behind the closed doors of the Yankees' clubhouse for the ride of your life in this intimate memoir about the team's glorious years and the superstars who made it all possible.For the first time ever, Luis "Squeegee" Castillo, bat boy and clubbie for the Yankees from 1998 to 2005, talks about working with Derek Jeter, Andy Pettitte, Jorge Posada, Mariano Rivera, Joe Girardi, Bernie Williams, Roger Clemens, Joe Torre, and many other modern-day Yankee greats. Luis saw and heard what really happened in the privacy of the clubhouse, at parties, and in hotel rooms, bar fights, and secret meetings from Miami to St. Louis, from Detroit to Arizona, and from Toronto to New York. He even vacationed with some players and got to know them like family, discovering their pitching and hitting secrets, joining them in all-nighters, and learning their often hilarious methods of meeting girls and having fun on the road.Like a fly on the wall, Luis takes you backstage to show you how A-Rod's bragging when he hits home runs annoys teammates. Discover how manager Joe Torre checks racing results during games. Hear what happens inside the sanctity of the clubhouse after Roger Clemens beans Mets catcher Mike Piazza and then-a few months later during the 2000 World Series-throws a bat at him. Find out how Mariano Rivera eats junk food during games, why Posada routinely fights with El Duque, what Jeter is really saying to players on other teams as he rounds the bases, and so much more. Everyone knows what happened on the field. Now pull up a chair and enjoy the secret stories that only Luis can tell about what really happened behind the scenes-and why.How to Speak Baseball: An Illustrated Guide to Ballpark Banter
Par James Charlton, Sally Cook. 2014
This handsome guide to the language of baseball decodes the amusing, clever phrases that pepper commentary about the sport. Packed…
with witty explanations of everything from "duster" and "rubber arm" to "up the elevator," this ballpark lexicon plays on a nostalgic love for the national pastime while covering ground from baseball's beginnings to today. This humorous mix of definitions and anecdotes is the perfect gift for both lifelong baseball fans and rookies working up the ranks.