Now THAT was a World Series!
World? Yes! The season that began in Japan ended in Canada. The players involved were born in nine different countries on three continents. The MVP was Japanese.
Series? The seven-game series covered 146 innings and came down to the final out of the eleventh inning of the seventh game. The Blue Jays scored more runs in the series, but the Dodgers won more games. It could not have been a more balanced series.
For me, it was a good season overall because my teams were interesting and successful. The Chicago Cubs were exciting and had a respectable playoff run. I attended one regular-season game and one playoff game, the wild one where they eliminated the San Diego Padres. Three Cubs players won Gold Gloves, one earned the Silver Slugger, and as I write this, one of our pitchers was a finalist for Rookie of the Year.
My independent league team is the Schaumburg Boomers. I don’t know how many Boomers games I attended. A lot. They played for the Frontier League championship that also came down to the final out in the final game.
I miss baseball already, but I’m grateful that a lot of good baseball books enhanced both my baseball experience and my reading. I’d like to tell you eleven books in this post. These include four picture books, a middle-grade title, a graphic novel, and five nonfiction books.
Call Me Roberto!: Roberto Clemente Goes to Bat for Latinos by Nathalie Alonso
Call Me Roberto!: Roberto Clemente Goes to Bat for Latinos is an important new nonfiction picture book celebrating Roberto Clemente, the inspirational Hall of Fame outfielder and Puerto Rican icon, as author Nathalie Alonso connects Clemente’s childhood passion for baseball with his stellar professional career. Alonso is a reporter and producer for LasMayores.com, the official Spanish-language website for Major League Baseball, and her baseball expertise provides authenticity in the narrative with phrases such as “ropes a single” and “pushes a run across the plate.”
The baseball action is completely satisfying, but Call Me Roberto! also covers the prejudice that Clemente endured as a Black Latino player in the minor leagues and eventually for the major league Pittsburgh Pirates. For example, early in his career, he was called “Bob” to make him seem “more American,” but Clemente insisted, “Call me Roberto.” Later, Clemente’s 1961 team held spring training in Florida where even after winning the World Series, segregation forced him to be “stuck in his room in another part of town” while his teammates enjoyed golfing and going to the beach.
Alonso’s focus is the juxtaposition of baseball, injustice, and language. Clemente’s pride in his Puerto Rican heritage is conveyed through Spanish phrases and sentences at various points in the narrative and artwork. Much of this can be understood by non-Spanish speakers through context, but the back matter features a glossary of each word or phrase used in the text.
Clemente is also remembered for his extraordinary philanthropy and tragic death at age 38 in a plane crash while delivering supplies to earthquake survivors in Nicaragua. The main narrative of Call Me Roberto! does not delve into his death or philanthropy, but they are covered in the back matter’s chronology and Alonso’s touching Author’s Note.
Alonso’s brilliant storytelling is superbly enhanced by Rudy Gutierrez’s artwork. Gutierrez uses mixed media in vivid colors that combine realistic and abstract images with words in varying typography to create captivating collage-like page spreads.
Call Me Roberto! is a perfect book for baseball fans and for celebrating Latino culture, and really for anyone who appreciates high-quality picture books. I hope Nathalie Alonso and Rudy Gutierrez team up for more baseball books like Call Me Roberto!
Swinging into History: Toni Stone: Big-League Baseball’s First Woman Player by Karen L. Swanson
Karen L. Swanson’s Swinging Into History is the picture book biography of Toni Stone, the first woman to play in the big leagues. After paying her dues in semi-professional ball, she joined Negro League team the Indianapolis Clowns when they traded Henry Aaron, becoming the first female player in the major leagues. Decades later, Major League Baseball officially recognized the Negro Leagues as major leagues, affirming the significance of Stone’s pioneering achievement that Swinging Into History proudly honors.
Like many picture book biographies, Swinging Into History begins in childhood, showing young “Tomboy” Stone defying expectations. Her parents and church community tried to steer her away from baseball, but she accepted their conditions for playing—and then surpassed them with the determination that would define her life.
As she climbed through the ranks of barnstorming and semi-professional teams, Stone faced double prejudice for both her skin color and her gender. After fifteen seasons, she finally got her chance with the Indianapolis Clowns. In her first game, Toni singled and drove in two runs.
Laura Freeman’s captivating illustrations present Toni in almost photographic realism. The images of Toni are set against colorful backdrops that convey historical and cultural information. Baseball books need to get the baseball right, and Freeman’s attention to the arm and leg musculature in the game-action pictures is authentically exact.
The life of Toni Stone is an inspiring testament to perseverance and resilience. While the book softens some of the harsher racist realities Stone faced, Swanson thoughtfully explores them in the back matter. Swinging Into History not only celebrates a sports pioneer but also offers young readers insight into American culture and progress in the twentieth century. This is a valuable addition to family, classroom, and library collections.
Hank on First! How Hank Greenberg Became a Star On and Off the Field by Stephen Krensky
Hank Greenberg (1911-1986) was the first Jewish superstar in American professional sports. As first baseman for the Detroit Tigers, he was one of the best hitters of his generation, dominating pitchers in the 1930s and 1940s while enduring anti-semitic taunts from fans and other ballplayers. Stephen Krensky’s Hank on First!: How Hank Greenberg Became a Star On and Off the Field conveys Greenberg’s enthusiasm for baseball from a young age and establishes him as an elite player, but the focus of this picture book biography is Greenberg’s courageous insistence on honoring his Jewish identity by not playing games scheduled during Yom Kippur. This angered many Tigers fans, but Greenberg stood by his convictions. Young readers seeking baseball action should probably look elsewhere, but as a story with a role model embodying integrity, religious faith, and courage, Hank on First! is inspirational.
The Hero Two Doors Down: Based on the True Story of Friendship between a Boy and a Baseball Legend by Sharon Robinson
Author Sharon Robinson, daughter of baseball and civil rights legend Jackie Robinson, tells the lightly fictionalized story of eight-year-old Brooklyn Dodgers fan Steve and his Brooklyn neighborhood. Steve’s hero is Dodgers second baseman Jackie Robinson. Steve gets in a fair amount of trouble in school and in the neighborhood, and his parents struggle to keep him in check. Then Jackie Robinson’s family moves in two doors down from Steve and his family. The two families become friends, and Jackie shares some advice with Steve that helps him rein in some of his behavioral impulses.
The Hero Two Doors Down has enough baseball lore to engage middle-grade fans, but the real value in Robinson’s book is from the life lessons about resilience, tolerance, and the value of friends, family, and community.
8-Bit Baseball by Brandon Terrell
Jared is a champion at the video game “All Star Sluggers,” but he’s never played real baseball. When he loses a match and has to follow through on a dare to try out for his school baseball team, he discovers he has no fielding skills, but he does have a blazing fastball. The plot of this fast-paced graphic novel comes down to one pitch in a championship game.
8-Bit Baseball is an excellent installment in the Sports Illustrated Kids Graphic Novels series. Unlike many sports books for kids, it gets the details right, from the terminology to the strategy. The drawings are exciting as they vividly convey Jared’s split focus on video games and real games in ways that a text-only story could not.
The back matter includes a glossary that I don’t think is too useful, but I really like the “Visual Questions” section that asks readers to ponder why the illustrator made certain choices in specific frames.
As They See ‘Em: A Fan’s Travels in the Land of Umpires by Bruce Weber
Bruce Weber’s As They See ‘Em: A Fan’s Travels in the Land of Umpires might just be the most enlightening, entertaining baseball book I’ve read. Weber’s lively book considers umpiring from every possible angle to give readers a better understanding of one of baseball’s most misunderstood and underappreciated dimensions.
What did I learn from As They See ‘Em? Well, I didn’t know that the black stripe on home plate is not part of the strike zone. I was surprised to learn that most umpires want instant replay, because accuracy is their ultimate goal—even if baseball’s higher-ups grumble about the time it takes. And those fiery on-field arguments? They might drag a game out longer than replay ever would. I was also surprised to learn that major league umpires have very little turnover, so most umpires spend at least ten years in the minor leagues before having a chance at the big leagues. Also, major-league umpires are paid very well.
Although As They See ‘Em pre-dates the pitch clock, the big changes only underscore the book’s themes, including the importance of integrity to the umpires, the tension between umpires and baseball’s front offices, and the psychological make-up necessary to be a successful umpire.
Reading this book made me a better, more observant baseball fan.
Banana Ball: The Unbelievably True Story of the Savannah Bananas by Jesse Cole
Banana Ball isn’t baseball. As Jesse Cole, creator of Banana Ball and owner of the Savannah Bananas, says of its origin, “It was equal parts chaos, sideshow, and baseball.” His goal in creating Banana Ball was to take the aspects of a baseball game that some find boring and flip them into something fun by changing baseball rules, adding dance moves, and incorporating visual stunts. Cole’s Bananas experiment has been wildly successful, and he freely admits, “We are not for most baseball purists. We are for people who want to have fun.” (Of course, this begs the question of whether “baseball purists” and “people who want to have fun” are mutually exclusive groups.) Cole’s book Banana Ball: The Unbelievably True Story of the Savannah Bananas tells his personal story, his motivation, and his business philosophy inspired by Walt Disney, P. T. Barnum, and Bill Veeck.
I picked this up because I was intrigued by the Savannah Bananas phenomenon, but to be honest, I’m less interested in it after reading Cole’s book. I love baseball; this isn’t baseball. In general, if something has to be sweetened to a point where the masses can relate to it, I tend to lose interest. Also, I’m sorry to say that Jesse Cole comes across as the kind of person that I actively try to avoid, those who are so sure of the superiority of their own opinion that they can’t stop preaching it. Even the title is hyperbolic. Why is this an “Unbelievably True Story”? A “True Story,” yes. “Unbelievably True”? No.
Even though this book turned me off, I can see why others might find it entertaining or worthwhile. No judgement from me if you read Banana Ball and come away with a completely different viewpoint.
The Boys of Summer by Roger Kahn
Some consider Roger Kahn’s The Boys of Summer to be the greatest baseball book of all time. Although that is a fair assessment, it’s not one I share even though the book is excellent, no doubt about it. How could it not be? Roger Kahn was arguably baseball’s best writer. His subject–the 1950s-era Brooklyn Dodgers–was arguably baseball’s best team. Not only does Kahn capture the athleticism and artistry of the team at its best, but The Boys of Summer also taps into baseball’s cross-generational appeal and importance. The book begins with Kahn’s baseball-obsessed childhood before delving into the Dodgers teams he covered for the New York Herald Tribune. The Boys of Summer then moves into another stratosphere in the final section when Kahn tracks down the players a decade or more after their playing days to talk about what it all meant and how their post-baseball lives turned out. Readers are left with a clear understanding that while players move on and fade, and teams and home cities come and go, the game itself remains essentially unchanged both in its day-to-day iterations and in the lush green fields of memories
Sons of Baseball: Growing Up with a Major League Dad by Mark Braff
In Sons of Baseball: Growing Up with a Major League Dad, author Mark Braff recounts the careers of eighteen major leaguers, followed by interviews focused on what it was like to be the son of a professional baseball player. Many of the sons also pursued baseball, but none of them reached the levels of their fathers, even those who made it to the big leagues, with the exception of Cal Ripken Jr. who provides the foreword. Most of the sons said that their fathers were gone for long stretches of time but made up for it when they returned home. A lot of the sons also cherished the time and experiences of hanging around ballparks and ballplayers when they were children. The honesty, sensitivity, and perceptiveness the sons brought to the discussions shed light on what it is like to live as a gifted athlete, celebrity, and parent, and how that affects a father-son relationship. I couldn’t help thinking though that this book is a bit patriarchal as it downplays the ballplayers’ daughters. They have stories too, don’t they? Some of the sons mention how their fathers interacted with daughters, but this would be a better book if the ladies were allowed to speak for themselves.
The Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O’Neil’s America by Joe Posnanski
Good teachers know that the most effective lessons are delivered wrapped in stories, with humor and a clear expression of how and why the lesson is personally relevant to the learner. Buck O’Neil knew all of that intuitively, and Joe Posnanski knows it too.
Buck O’Neil was a long-time Negro Leagues player and manager who became the first Black coach in Major League Baseball. O’Neil was also one of the best major league scouts. In his nineties, O’Neil became an ambassador for the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City, traveling all over the country telling stories and explaining the important role of the Negro Leagues in both baseball history and American history.
Author Joe Posnanski–the best baseball writer working today, in my opinion–traveled with Buck O’Neil for a year as he visited ballparks large and small, classrooms, small-town celebrations, talk shows, and dinners to raise awareness of the Negro Leagues and the nascent museum. Of course, O’Neil charmed everyone everywhere with his infinite positivity, sincerity, warmth, and baseball knowledge. The Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O’Neil’s America is the story of that year.
As Buck O’Neil signs autographs, poses for pictures, and spins his tales, he always shows how much he cares about his mission and his listeners. His listeners include shock deejays in New York, former Negro Leagues players such as Willie Mays and Lou Brock, a child meeting a Black person for the first time, and a sad-looking woman who enters an elevator and encounters Buck. O’Neil leaves each person feeling a little better about themselves and with a kernel of his wisdom that they can take forward.
The lessons delivered so effectively in The Soul of Baseball involve baseball and the Negro Leagues, but more importantly they teach about resilience, positivity, and embracing life’s obstacles as opportunities. The Soul of Baseball is now one of my favorite baseball books, and I recommend it not just to baseball fans but to anyone who enjoys inspirational, motivating books.
That’s it for now, but I have another stack ready to read this winter. Any recommendations for me? For my other baseball book posts, just click here.
What's Not Wrong? 