Download or read book The Baseball Whisperer written by Michael Tackett and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2016-07-05 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Field of Dreams was only superficially about baseball. It was really about life. So is The Baseball Whisperer . . . with the added advantage of being all true.” —MLB.com From an award-winning journalist, this is the story of a legendary coach and the professional-caliber baseball program he built in America's heartland, where boys would come summer after summer to be molded into ballplayers—and men. Clarinda, Iowa, population 5,000, sits two hours from anything. There, between the cornfields and hog yards, is a ball field with a bronze bust of a man named Merl Eberly, who specialized in second chances and lost causes. The statue was a gift from one of Merl’s original long-shot projects, a skinny kid from the Los Angeles ghetto who would one day become a beloved Hall-of-Fame shortstop: Ozzie Smith. The Baseball Whisperer traces the “deeply engrossing” story (Booklist, starred review) of Merl Eberly and his Clarinda A’s baseball team, which he tended over the course of five decades, transforming them from a town team to a collegiate summer league powerhouse. Along with Ozzie Smith, future manager Bud Black, and star player Von Hayes, Merl developed scores of major league players. In the process, he taught them to be men, insisting on hard work, integrity, and responsibility. More than a book about ballplayers in the nation’s agricultural heartland, The Baseball Whisperer is the story of a coach who put character and dedication first, reminding us of the best, purest form of baseball excellence. “Mike Tackett, talented journalist and baseball lover, has hit the sweet spot of the bat with his first book. The Baseball Whisperer takes one coach and one small Iowa town and illuminates both a sport and the human spirit.” —David Maraniss, New York Times-bestselling author of Clemente and When Pride Still Mattered

Download or read book Big League Dreams written by Richard Brignall and published by James Lorimer & Company. This book was released on 2013-10-30 with total page 155 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a history of black major league baseball players and the crumbling of the colour barrier in sport, and the story of how Fergie Jenkins rose to the top to become Canada's first inductee into the American Baseball Hall of Fame. Fergie Jenkins grew up in the era when Jackie Robinson became the first black man to play major league baseball, and Willie O'Ree became the first black NHL player. Inspired by these professional athletes, and with doors now opening for young men like himself, Fergie went on to have a remarkable career in major league baseball. Former sports journalist Richard Brignall traces the ups and downs in Fergie's career, from his humble roots in Chatham, Ontario, to his time with the Phillies, the Cubs, the Red Sox, and the Rangers. Along the way, Brignall examines what it meant for a man to be black in the United States versus Canada in the 1960s and 70s.

Download or read book Becoming Big League written by Bill (William) Mullins and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2013-06-18 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Becoming Big League is the story of Seattle's relationship with major league baseball from the 1962 World's Fair to the completion of the Kingdome in 1976 and beyond. Bill Mullins focuses on the acquisition and loss, after only one year, of the Seattle Pilots and documents their on-the-field exploits in lively play-by-play sections. The Pilots' underfunded ownership, led by Seattle's Dewey and Max Soriano and William Daley of Cleveland, struggled to make the team a success. They were savvy baseball men, but they made mistakes and wrangled with the city. By the end of the first season, the team was in bankruptcy. The Pilots were sold to a contingent from Milwaukee led by Bud Selig, who moved the franchise to Wisconsin and rechristened the team the Brewers. Becoming Big League describes the character of Seattle in the 1960s and 1970s, explains how the operation of a major league baseball franchise fits into the life of a city, charts Seattle's long history of fraught stadium politics, and examines the business of baseball. Watch the trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hwhl5sLoQs&list=UUge4MONgLFncQ1w1C_BnHcw&index=1&feature=plcp

Download or read book Henry Aaron s Dream written by Matt Tavares and published by Candlewick Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 41 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A picture book biography of African-American baseball player Hank Aaron.

Download or read book The Oldest Rookie written by Jim Morris and published by Little, Brown. This book was released on 2001-04-01 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents the inspirational true story of Jim Morris's departure from the minor leagues after a string of injuries, his career as a high school physics teacher, and his eventual return to the minors followed by an all-star career in the majors. 75,000 first printing.

Download or read book Out of My League written by Dirk Hayhurst and published by Citadel Press. This book was released on 2013-03-01 with total page 461 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times bestseller from the author of The Bullpen Gospels. “A humorous, candid and insightful memoir . . . Grade: Home Run.”—Cleveland Plain Dealer After six years in the minors, pitcher Dirk Hayhurst hopes 2008 is the year he breaks into the big leagues. But every time Dirk looks up, the bases are loaded with challenges—a wedding balancing on a blind hope, a family in chaos, and paychecks that beg Dirk to ask, “How long can I afford to keep doing this?” Then it finally happens—Dirk gets called up to the Majors, to play for the San Diego Padres. A dream comes true when he takes the mound against the San Francisco Giants, kicking off forty insane days and nights in the Bigs. Like the classic games of baseball’s history, Out of My League entertains from the first pitch to the last out, capturing the gritty realities of playing on the big stage, the comedy and camaraderie in the dugouts and locker rooms, and the hard-fought, personal journeys that drive our love of America’s favorite pastime. “A rare gem of a baseball book.”—Tom Verducci, Sports Illustrated “Observant, insightful, human, and hilarious.”—Bob Costas “A fun read . . . This book shows why baseball is so often used as a metaphor for life.”—Keith Olbermann “Entertaining and engaging . . . reminiscent of Jim Bouton’s Ball Four.”—Booklist “The book is a terrific read. If you loved Bullpen Gospels (I’d have a hard time believing you are a baseball fan if you didn’t) you will love Out of My League too.”—Bluebird Banter

Download or read book Chicken Soup for the Baseball Fan s Soul written by Jack Canfield and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-08-28 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Play Ball! These words resonate with special meaning in the minds of anyone who has ever enjoyed a game of baseball. Every fan will be amused and touched by stories of sportsmanship and victory gathered from the clay diamonds of America.

Download or read book Welcome to the Big Leagues written by Dan Hettinger and published by Morgan James Publishing. This book was released on 2013-09-01 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Darrel Chaney made it to the Big Leagues. He played for 7 years on one of the best teams ever to take the field, the Cincinnati Reds—the Big Red Machine. He played in 4 National League Championship Series and 3 World Series. He was in the game that the Major League Baseball Network considered the best game of the last 50 years—game 6 of the 1975 World Series. But Darrel had a nagging frustration that eroded his belief in his significance. Disappointments, setbacks and opposition attacked his dream. He was a utility player among superstars. Most men are utility players. They face the same battles that Darrel faced. They get frustrated and lose enthusiasm for work and life itself. But, when a man discovers his God given significance, he enjoys life more and does better in it. Then, whatever his game, he is in the Big Leagues.

Download or read book Bigger Than the Game written by Dirk Hayhurst and published by Kensington Books. This book was released on 2014 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The best writer in a baseball uniform." --Tyler Kepner, The New York Times After nearly a decade in the minors, Dirk Hayhurst defied the odds to climb onto the pitcher's mound for the Toronto Blue Jays. Newly married, with a big league paycheck and a brand new house, Hayhurst was ready for a great season in the Bigs. Then fate delivered a crushing hit. Hayhurst blew out his pitching shoulder in an insane off-season workout program. After surgery, rehab, and more rehab, his major-league dreams seemed more distant than ever. From there things got worse, weirder, and funnier. In a crazy world of injured athletes, autograph-seeking nuns, angry wrestlers, and trainers with a taste for torture, Hayhurst learned lessons about the game--and himself--that were not in any rulebook. Honest, soul'searching, insightful, hilarious, and moving, Dirk Hayhurst's latest memoir is an indisputable baseball classic. Praise for The Bullpen Gospels and Out of My League "Dirk Hayhurst writes about baseball in a unique way. Observant, insightful, human, and hilarious." --Bob Costas "A fun read. . .This book shows why baseball is so often used as a metaphor for life." --Keith Olbermann "Entertaining and engaging. . .reminiscent of Jim Bouton's Ball Four." --Booklist "A rare gem of a baseball book." --Tom Verducci, Sports Illustrated "A humorous, candid, and insightful memoir of Hayhurst's rookie season in the majors. . .Grade: Home Run." --Cleveland Plain Dealer

Download or read book Champions League Dreams written by Rafa Benitez and published by Headline. This book was released on 2012-09-13 with total page 215 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a stimulating and deeply insightful football narrative by Rafa Benitez which focuses on the legendary manager's dramatic six Champions League campaigns with Liverpool. Rafa expertly navigates fans through intriguing European adventures that embrace the triumph and despair of two Champions League finals, three semi-finals and five quarter-finals in what was a golden era for the Anfield club - an era that supporters felt gave them their pride back after years in the wilderness. What sets this apart is the unique ways in which Rafa allows fans into his high-pressured world, the fascinating glimpses he offers of a top manager's thought processes and decision making during the cut and thrust of a high-octane European campaign. Understand how a great manager prepares for, then executes, a master-plan for European success.

Download or read book Son of Havana written by Luis Tiant and published by Diversion Books. This book was released on 2019-05-14 with total page 510 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A memoir by the mustachioed baseball pitcher who went playing rocky, trash-ridden fields in Castro’s Cuba to becoming a Boston Red Sox legend. Luis Tiant is one of the most charismatic and accomplished players in Boston Red Sox and Major League Baseball history. With a barrel-chested physique and a Fu Manchu mustache, Tiant may not have looked like the lean, sculpted aces he usually played against, but nobody was a tougher competitor on the diamond, and few were as successful. There may be no more qualified twentieth-century pitcher not yet enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. His big-league dreams came at a price: racism in the Deep South and the Boston suburbs, and nearly fifteen years separated from a family held captive in Castro’s Cuba. But baseball also delivered World Series stardom and a heroic return to his island home after close to a half-century of forced exile. The man whose name—“El Tiante” —became a Fenway Park battle cry has never fully shared his tale in his own words, until now. In Son of Havana, Tiant puts his heart on his sleeve and describes his road from torn-up fields in Havana to the pristine lawns of major league ballparks. Readers will share Tiant’s pride when appeals by a pair of US senators to baseball-fanatic Castro secure freedom for Luis’s parents to fly to Boston and witness the 1975 World Series glory of their child. And readers will join the big-league ballplayers for their spring 2016 exhibition game in Havana, when Tiant—a living link to the earliest, scariest days of the Castro regime—threw out the first pitch.

Download or read book Big League Big Time written by Len Sherman and published by Beyond Words/Atria Books. This book was released on 1998 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tells of the birth of the Phoenix-based major-league baseball franchise from the very beginning to opening day.

Download or read book The Bullpen Gospels written by Dirk Hayhurst and published by Kensington Publishing Corp.. This book was released on 2010-04-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the humble heights of a Class-A pitcher's mound to the deflating lows of sleeping on his gun-toting grandmother's air mattress, veteran reliever Dirk Hayhurst steps out of the bullpen to deliver the best pitch of his career--a raw, unflinching and surprisingly moving account of his life in the minors. I enjoyed the visualizations, maybe a little too much, and would stop only when I felt I'd centered myself. . .or after one of my teammates hit me in the nuts with the rosin bag while my eyes were closed. Hilariously self-effacing and brutally honest, Hayhurst captures the absurdities, the grim realities, and the occasional nuggets of hard-won wisdom culled from four seasons in the minors. Whether training tarantulas to protect his room from thieving employees in a backwater hotel, watching the raging battles fought between his partially paralyzed father and his alcoholic brother, or absorbing the gentle mockery of some not-quite-starstruck schoolchildren, Dirk reveals a side of baseball, and life, rarely seen on ESPN. My career has crash-landed on the floor of my grandma's old sewing room. If this is a dream come true, then dreams smell a lot like mothballs and Bengay. Somewhere between Bull Durham and The Rookie, The Bullpen Gospels takes an unforgettable trot around the inglorious base paths of minor league baseball, where an inch separates a ball from a strike, and a razor-thin margin can be the difference between The Show or a long trip home. "It's not often that someone comes along who is a good pitcher and a good writer." --King Kaufman, Salon "After many minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years spent in the bullpen, I can verify that this is a true picture of baseball." --Tim McCarver "There are great truths within, of the kind usually unspoken. And as he expresses them, Dirk Hayhurst describes himself as 'a real person who moonlights as a baseball player.' In much the same manner, while The Bullpen Gospels chronicles how all of us face the impact when we learn reality is both far meaner and far richer than our dreams--it also moonlights as one of the best baseball books ever written." --Keith Olbermann "A bit of Jim Bouton, a bit of Jim Brosnan, a bit of Pat Jordan, a bit of crash Davis, and a whole lot of Dirk Hayhurst. Often hilarious, sometimes poignant. This is a really enjoyable baseball read." --Bob Costas "Fascinating. . .a perspective that fans rarely see." --Trevor Hoffman, pitcher for the Milwaukee Brewers "The Bullpen Gospels is a rollicking good bus ride of a book. Hayhurst illuminates a baseball life not only with wit and humor, but also with thought-provoking introspection." --Tom Verducci, Sports Illustrated "Dirk Hayhurst has written a fascinating, funny and honest account on life in the minor leagues. I loved it. Writers can't play baseball, but in this case, a player sure can write." --Tim Kurkjian, Senior Writer, ESPN The Magazine, analyst/reporter ESPN television "Bull Durham meets Ball Four in Dirk Hayhurst's hilarious and moving account of life in baseball's glamour-free bush leagues." --Rob Neyer, ESPN.com "If Holden Caulfield could dial up his fastball to 90 mph, he might have written this funny, touching memoir about a ballplayer at a career--and life--crossroads. He might have called it 'Pitcher in the Rye.' Instead, he left it to Dirk Hayhurst, the only writer in the business who can make you laugh, make you cry and strike out Ryan Howard." --King Kaufman, Salon "The Bullpen Gospels is a funny bone-tickling, tear duct-stimulating, feel-good story that will leave die-hard baseball fans--and die-hard human beings, for that matter--well, feeling good." --Bob Mitchell, author of Once Upon a Fastball

Download or read book Throwback written by Jason Kendall and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2014-05-13 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throwback offers an informative and irreverent look at the inner mechanics, strategies, secret signals, and customs of major league baseball. Ever Wonder What's Being Said at Home Plate? How a Team Silently Communicates? What Goes on in the Clubhouse Behind Closed Doors? America's pastime has always left fans and amateur players alike yearning for the answers to questions about how pros play the game. Jason Kendall is a former All-Star catcher who has seen just about everything during his years with the Pittsburgh Pirates, Oakland Athletics, Chicago Cubs, Milwaukee Brewers, and Kansas City Royals. A player's player, a guy with true grit--a throwback to another time with a unique view on the game that so many love. Jason Kendall and sportswriter Lee Judge team up to bring you the fan, player, coach, or curious statistician an insider's view of the game from a player's perspective. This is a book about pre-game rituals, what to look for when a pitcher warms up between innings, the signs a catcher uses to communicate with the pitcher, and so much more. Some of baseball wisdom you will find inside: * What to look for during batting practice. * The right way to hit a batter. * Who's a tough guy and who's just posing. * How to spot a dirty slide. * Why you don't look at the umpire while you're arguing. Based on Kendall's 15 years of professional MLB experience, Throwback is an informative, hilarious, and illuminating look into the world of professional baseball-and in a way that no one has ever seen before.

Download or read book Pete Rose written by Kostya Kennedy and published by Time Home Entertainment. This book was released on 2014-03-11 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Best-selling author Kostya Kennedy delivers evocative answers in his fascinating reexamination of Pete Rose’s life; from his cocky and charismatic early years through his storied playing career to his bitter war against baseball’s hierarchy to the man we find today—still incorrigible, still adored by many. Where has his improbable saga landed him in the redefined, post-steroid world? Do we feel any differently about Pete Rose today? Should we?

Download or read book How to Make Pro Baseball Scouts Notice You written by Al Goldis and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-06-23 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The purpose of this book is twofold: one, to give ballplayers an inside look at just what scouts are really looking for in their search for professional ballplayers; and two, to help them market and sell themselves so that scouts will know they exist and see them put their best skills on display. This book has been written with the intent of helping ballplayers keep their dreams of playing pro ball alive and flourishing. All any ballplayer wants is a shot at playing pro ball, and by reading this book, they will be that much closer to having their dreams come true.

Download or read book 101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out written by Josh Pahigian and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2015-02-10 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A brand new edition of the finalist for the 2008 Casey Award, presented annually to the best baseball book, 101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out profiles America’s greatest baseball museums, shrines, sports bars, pop culture landmarks and ballpark sites. From sandlots and skyboxes to TV rooms and sports bars, America’s love for baseball has inspired countless memories, discussions, and tributes. Josh Pahigian takes us across America to explore the places where the game’s history, culture, and lore come to life. Whether we travel by car or sit in the comfort of our favorite armchair, the book guides us to 101 amazing baseball places—including Ted Williams’ boyhood home, the Field of Dreams movie site, the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, the Chicago bar where the Cubs’ “Curse of the Billy Goat” was born, Babe Ruth’s grave, and scores of other captivating landmarks and curios. Replacing the now-extinct sites from the previous edition, updating entries for attractions that have moved, re-assigning coveted chapters to more inspiring baseball venues that have since opened, and including stunning color photos for nearly all of them, Josh Pahigian has created the perfect gift for any baseball fan.