Batter Up: A Look at Spring Baseball Titles

In honor of today’s Major League Baseball Opening Day festivities, we’ve compiled a list of some of this spring’s baseball titles with the help of Above the Treeline’s Edelweiss Interactive Publisher Catalog program and a few bookseller recommendations. The 25-plus titles on the list encompass everything from great players and magical seasons to Major League parks and the game’s unwritten rules.

Among this season’s highlights for Stan Hynds at Northshire Bookstore in Manchester Center, Vermont, is Bottom of the 33rd: Hope, Redemption, and Baseball’s Longest Game, by Dan Barry (Harper). It’s “a deft weaving of rising careers (Ripken, Boggs), faltering major league dreams, and the heart and soul of a former New England mill town,” said Hynds.

“Serious baseball fans will want to grab The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron, by Howard Bryant (Anchor),” said Hynds, who wondered “how the Major League leader in career runs batted in” and “one of the greatest home run hitters in the history of the game (#2 on the career list)” could be under-appreciated. “Bryant’s book is a comprehensive look at the life of a man and a ball player who may just deserve the designation of hero,” he said.

Colorado’s Boulder Book Store plans to feature Hank Greenberg, by Mark Kurlansky (Yale University Press). “It’s a great story about overcoming bigotry and breaking down stereotypes,” said Arsen Kashkashian. “Greenberg was a great Jewish slugger for the Detroit Tigers in the 1930s. He was often the victim of anti-Semitic taunts from the fans and opposing players.” Although Greenberg took umbrage at first, “in time he learned to ignore the slurs,” said Kashkashian. “He gave Jackie Robinson the template for how to deal with the much greater racial discrimination that he had to deal with a decade later…. Kurlansky does a great job in bringing Greenberg’s personality to life and placing him in the context of his times.”

There are many baseball titles publishing this spring. Here’s a look of some of them.

A Partial List of Spring 2011 Baseball Books

(Arranged by publication date)

Fifty-nine in ‘84: Old Hoss Radbourn, Barehanded Baseball, and the Greatest Season a Pitcher Ever Had, by Edward Achorn
(Harper Paperbacks, $15.99, 9780061825873, February 22, 2011)

56: Joe DiMaggio and the Last Magic Number in Sports, by Kostya Kennedy
(Sports Illustrated, $26.95, 9781603201773, March 8, 2011)

The Baseball: Stunts, Scandals, and Secrets Beneath the Stitches, by Zack Hample
(Anchor, $14.95 paper, 9780307475459, March 8, 2011)

The Extra 2%: How Wall Street Strategies Took a Major League Baseball Team from Worst to First, by Jonah Keri
(ESPN, $26, 9780345517654, March 8, 2011)

Harry the K: The Remarkable Life of Harry Kalas, by Randy Miller
(Running Press, $15 paper, 9780762441105, March 8, 2011)

Baseball Miscellany: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Baseball, by Matthew Silverman
(Skyhorse Publishing, $14.95, 9781616081966, March 9, 2011)

New York Mets: The Complete Illustrated History, by Matthew Silverman
(MVP Books, $30, 9780760339602, March 16, 2011)

The Baseball Codes: Beanballs, Sign Stealing, and Bench-Clearing Brawls: The Unwritten Rules of America’s Pastime, by Jason Turbow, Michael Duca
(Anchor, $15, paper, 9780307278623, March 22, 2011)

High Heat: The Secret History of the Fastball and the Improbable Search for the Fastest Pitcher of All Time, by Tim Wendel
(Da Capo Press, $15 paper, 9780306819704, March 22, 2011)

Take Me Out to the Ballpark Revised and Updated: An Illustrated Tour of Baseball Parks Past and Present Featuring Every Major League Park, Plus Minor League and Negro League Parks, by Josh Leventhal
(Black Dog & Leventhal, $17.95 paper, 9781579128661, March 23, 2011)

Hank Greenberg: The Hero Who Didn’t Want to Be One, by Mark Kurlansky
(Yale University Press, $25, 9780300136609, March 29, 2011)

The Game From Where I Stand: From Batting Practice to the Clubhouse to the Best Breakfast on the Road, An Inside View of a Ballplayer’s Life, by Doug Glanville
(St. Martin’s Griffin, $14.99 paper, 9780312573096, March 29, 2011)

Uppity: My Untold Story About The Games People Play, by Willie Mays, Gordon Dillow, Bill White
(Grand Central Publishing, $26.99, 9780446555258, April 2011)

The House That Ruth Built: A New Stadium, the First Yankees Championship, and the Redemption of 1923, by Robert Weintraub
(Little, Brown, $26.99, 9780316086073, April 4, 2011)

The Eastern Stars: How Baseball Changed the Dominican Town of San Pedro de Macoris, by Mark Kurlansky
(Riverhead Trade, $16 paper, 9781594485053, April 5, 2011)

Las Estrellas Orientales: Como el beisbol cambio el pueblo dominicano de San Pedro de Macoris, by Mark Kurlansky
(Riverhead Trade, $16 paper, 9781594485145, April 5, 2011)

Great Baseball Feats, Facts & Firsts (2011 Edition), by David Nemec, Scott Flatow, Dave Zeman
(Signet, $7.99 paper, 9780451232960, April 5, 2011)

Sixty Feet, Six Inches: A Hall of Fame Pitcher & A Hall of Fame Hitter Talk About How the Game Is Played, by Bob Gibson, Reggie Jackson, Lonnie Wheeler
(Anchor, $15.95 paper, 9780767931106, April 5, 2011)

Knuckler: My Life With Baseball’s Most Confounding Pitch, by Tim Wakefield, Tony Massarotti
(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $26, 9780547517698, April 6, 2011)

The Cambridge Companion to Baseball, by Leonard Cassuto, Stephen Partridge
(Cambridge University Press, $24.99, 9780521145756, April 11, 2011)

Bottom of the 33rd: Hope, Redemption, and Baseball’s Longest Game, by Dan Barry
(Harper, $26.99, 9780062014481, April 12, 2011)

Mint Condition: How Baseball Cards Became an American Obsession, by Dave Jamieson
(Grove Press, $15.95, 9780802145321, April 12, 2011)

The Yankees Baseball Reader: A Collection of Writings on the Game’s Greatest Dynasty, by Adam Brunner, Josh Leventhal
(MVP Books, $25, 9780760340615, April 15, 2011)

The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron, by Howard Bryant
(Anchor, $16.95 paper, 9780307279927, May 3, 2011)

The Captain: The Journey of Derek Jeter, by Ian O’Connor
(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $26, 9780547327938, May 16, 2011)

Giants Past & Present, by Dan Fost
(MVP Books, $25, 9780760342183, May 22, 2011)

The Dickson Baseball Dictionary, by Paul Dickson
(W.W. Norton, $24.95 paper, 9780393340082, June 13, 2011)