Stumbling Around The Bases

From the late 1950s to the 1980s, baseball’s American League mismanaged integration and expansion, allowing the National League to forge ahead in attendance and prestige. While both leagues had executive structures that presented few barriers to individual team owners acting purely in their own interests, it was the American League that succumbed to infighting—which ultimately led to its disappearance into what we now call Major League Baseball. Stumbling around the Bases is the story of how the American League fell into such a disastrous state, struggling for decades to escape its nadir and, when it finally righted itself, losing its independence. The American League’s trip to the bottom involved bad decisions by both individual teams and their owners. The key elements were a glacial approach to integration, the choice of underfinanced or disruptive new owners, and a consistent inability to choose the better markets among cities that were available for expansion. The American League wound up with less-attractive teams in the smaller markets compared to the National League—and thus fewer consumers of tickets, parking, beer, hot dogs, scorecards, and replica jerseys. The errors of the American League owners were rooted in missed cultural and demographic shifts and exacerbated by reactive decisions that hurt as much as helped their interests. Though the owners were men who were notably successful in their non-baseball business ventures, success in insurance, pizza, food processing, and real estate development, didn’t necessarily translate into running a flourishing baseball league. In the end the National League was simply better at recognizing its collective interests, screening its owners, and recognizing the markets that had long-term potential.

The New York Times bestseller. “The sprawling, brawling, no-punches-pulled narrative Martin deserves . . . one of baseball’s epic characters.”—Tom Verducci, bestselling author of The Cubs Way Even now, years after his death, Billy Martin remains one of the most intriguing and charismatic figures in baseball history. And the most misunderstood. A manager who is widely considered to have been a baseball genius, Martin is remembered more for his rabble-rousing and public brawls on the field and off. He was combative and intimidating, yet endearing and beloved. In Billy Martin, Bill Pennington resolves these contradictions and pens the definitive story of Martin’s life. From his hardscrabble youth to his days on the Yankees in the 1950s and through sixteen years of managing, Martin made sure no one ever ignored him. Drawing on exhaustive interviews and his own time covering Martin as a young sportswriter, Pennington provides an intimate, revelatory, and endlessly colorful story of a truly larger-than-life sportsman. “Enormously entertaining . . . Explores the question of whether a baseball lifer can actually be a tragic figure in the classic sense—a man destroyed by the very qualities that made him great.”—The Wall Street Journal “Bill Pennington gives long-overdue flesh to the caricature . . . Pennington savors the dirt-kicking spectacles without losing sight of the man.”—The New York Times Book Review “The hair on my forearms was standing up by the end of the fifth paragraph of this book’s introduction. I knew Billy Martin. I covered Billy Martin. But I never knew him like this.”—Dan Shaughnessy, bestselling author of Reversing the Curse

The Civil War is finally over, and the survivors have returned to their lives to try to rebuild. There was very little time for rest and relaxation. Nothing can be truer for the people of the small country town of Mystic. However, something has come to Mystic with the survivors...a game called Base Ball. For many years the people of Mystic have indulged themselves in various kinds of stick-and-ball games...everything from cricket to rounders, to something called Muffin Ball, but none of the games were ever popular enough to become organized...until Base Ball. As the residents of Mystic struggle establish their own Base Ball club, they discover that Base Ball is taking over the nation by storm. With a faithful group of town leaders, a retired Judge, and several veterans, Mystic finds that it is ahead of the storm, instead of getting caught up in it. As the town team forms, and a simple league with other small towns is established, the Mystic town folk enjoy watching their very own team playing this “city game” their way...making mistakes, fumbling over the bases, and arguing with...everyone, the people of Mystic become a true base ball town. Then when captain of the Drummers contacts the Mystic team with a request to come to Mystic to play a fun exhibition game on the Fourth of July, the initial thought was one of reservation...the Drummers were a traveling team of colored players. To the people of Mystic, a town that sided with the Northern Union forces, the prospect of playing a colored “barnstorming” team was cause to celebrate a game that changed the town of Mystic forever.

A provocative novel about the fallout from a search for truth by the author of the national bestseller The Lifeboat. For Maggie Rayburn -- wife, mother, and secretary at a munitions plant -- life is pleasant, predictable, and, she assumes, secure. When she finds proof of a high-level cover-up on her boss's desk, she impulsively takes it, an act that turns her world, and her worldview, upside down. Propelled by a desire to do good -- and also by a newfound taste for excitement -- Maggie starts to see injustice everywhere. Soon her bottom drawer is filled with what she calls "evidence," her small town has turned against her, and she must decide how far she will go for the truth. For Penn Sinclair -- Army Captain, Ivy League graduate, and reluctant heir to his family's fortune -- a hasty decision has disastrous results. Home from Iraq and eager to atone, he reunites with three survivors to expose the truth about the war. They launch a website that soon has people talking, but the more they expose, the cloudier their mission becomes. Now and Again is a blazingly original novel about the interconnectedness of lives, the limits of knowledge, and the consequences of doing the right thing.

Most Texas Rangers fans have gone to at least a game or two in Arlington and were gripped by every captivating moment of the team's 2015 postseason run. But only real fans know the significance of the numbers 8, 34, and 1972, or where to find the best Rangers bars in Texas. 100 Things Rangers Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die is the ultimate resource for true fans of the Texas Rangers, whether you cheered on the Ryan Express or are a recent supporter of the team under Jeff Bannister. From the bizarre and wonderful 1977 season to the Josh Hamilton saga and beyond, experienced sportswriter Rusty Burson has collected every essential piece of Rangers knowledge, plus must-do activities, and ranks them all from 1 to 100, providing an entertaining and easy-to-follow checklist as you progress on your way to fan superstardom. This updated edition includes the Rangers' recent memorable successes, including the push to the 2015 playoffs, and new faces like Yu Darvish and Cole Hamels.

In a world marked by an ancient, never-ending war, two boys live very different lives. Good-hearted Oren Raevin, with his mother dead and his father missing, is an outcast in his village. In contrast, Syris Ulzary is the pride of his people, although his heart is corrupted. As tensions rise in their homes, a talking bear named Ral appears to each one and spirits them away. Where the bear plans to lead them, however, is far more dangerous than they could have anticipated. Monsters, demons, and magical entities all block the way on the frightful path to their goal—to find the Goddess of Origin, the creator of the universe, before Tora, the God of Rage, breaks free of his prison and destroys everything. As Ral struggles to keep Oren and Syris alive, the secrets surrounding them threaten to pull their fragile bond apart. Events reveal both the lies and truths that have defined the boys’ lives, and they find themselves questioning their own realities. If this unlikely trio of heroes isn’t strong enough to withstand the danger, the journey could end them. In this fantasy novel, two boys join forces with a talking bear in an attempt to save their world from destruction at the hands of the God of Rage.

One of the most influential and controversial team owners in professional sports history, Walter O’Malley (1903–79) is best remembered—and still reviled by many—for moving the Dodgers from Brooklyn to Los Angeles. Yet much of the O’Malley story leading up to the Dodgers’ move is unknown or created from myth, and there is substantially more to the man. When he entered the public eye, the self-constructed family background and early life he presented was gilded. Later his personal story was distorted by some New York sportswriters, who hated him for moving the Dodgers. In Mover and Shaker Andy McCue presents for the first time an objective, complete, and nuanced account of O’Malley’s life. He also departs from the overly sentimentalized accounts of O’Malley as either villain or angel and reveals him first and foremost as a rational, hardheaded businessman, who was a major force in baseball for three decades and whose management and marketing practices radically changed the shape of the game.

Mission Road: A Journalist’s Life from Kansas to Kandahar By: Theodore Iliff In the intimidating and breathtaking Black Forest in Germany, six-year-old Ted Iliff came to a conclusion that would shape his entire adult life: He wants to explore as much of the world as he possibly can. In his gripping and highly entertaining memoir Mission Road: A Journalist’s Life from Kansas to Kandahar, Iliff shares his journey from being a young and reckless student-journalist at the University of Kansas to joining CNN during its critical developing stages. After reaching his personal goals in both print and broadcast journalism, Ted made the leap to the unlikely path of consulting and teaching, leading him to every corner of the world, from Kosova to Baghdad. Alongside the arc of his own career, Iliff gives a unique insight into the transformation of journalism at the dawn of the twenty-first century, and how it changed through major events like 9/11 and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.