Mud, Sweat and Tears


Bear Grylls - 2011
    After leaving school, he spent months hiking in the Himalayas as he considered joining the Indian Army. Upon his return to England after a change of heart, he passed SAS selection and served with 21 SAS for three years. During this time, he broke his back in several places in a free-fall parachuting accident and it was questionable whether he would ever walk again. However, after months of rehabilitation, focusing always on his childhood dream of climbing Everest, he slowly became strong enough to attempt the ultimate ascent of the world's highest peak. At 7.22 a.m. on 26 May 1998, Bear entered the Guinness Book of Records as the youngest Briton to have successfully climbed Everest and returned alive. He was only twenty-three years old and this was only the beginning of his extreme adventures...Known and admired by millions - whether from his prime-time TV adventures, as a bestselling author or as a world-class motivational speaker - Bear has been there and done it all. Now, for the first time and in his own words, this is the story of his action-packed life

Watching Baseball, updated & revised: Discovering the Game within the Game


Jerry Remy - 2004
    Jerry Remy's name and face are already known to millions of fans. Every night during the baseball season, 400,000 or more households tune in to listen to his broadcast of the Red Sox game. But fans learned to love him years ago, when he was traded to the Red Sox in 1978, earning a trip to the All-Star Game in his first year with the team; Remy hit .278, scored eighty-seven runs, and stole thirty bases. Injured in 1984, Remy never played another game. In 1988, he began his work as an announcer, working color commentary for Red Sox broadcasts on NESN, which is a basic cable channel throughout New England and available by satellite across the country. He covers more than 150 games per season for NESN and broadcast television, plus regular assignments on the national Fox Game of the Week. But the best part of Jerry Remy is his easy style: listeners feel like they're having a beer with a friend while they're watching the game.If spectators just follow the ball, they are missing much of the game. Baseball is a lot more complex than that. Everyone talks about second-guessing the manager; and there's a lot of fun in that for everyone except the manager. Those opinions can be heard all day on the sports talk shows and read in the newspaper columns. But if the people are really going to get into the game, they need to start first-guessing. That's what this book is all about.

Egghead; or, You Can't Survive on Ideas Alone


Bo Burnham - 2013
    100 million people viewed those videos, turning Bo into an online sensation with a huge and dedicated following. Bo taped his first of two Comedy Central specials four days after his 18th birthday, making him the youngest to do so in the channel's history. Now Bo is a rising star in the comedy world, revered for his utterly original and intelligent voice. And, he can SIIIIIIIIING!In EGGHEAD, Bo brings his brand of brainy, emotional comedy to the page in the form of off-kilter poems, thoughts, and more. Teaming up with his longtime friend, artist, and illustrator Chance Bone, Bo takes on everything from death to farts in this weird book that will make you think, laugh and think, "why did I just laugh?"

Honus Wagner: A Biography


Dennis DeValeria - 1996
    Barriers of communication and transportation were being overcome and giants such as Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, and William Randolph Hearst walked the land. The nation’s game was baseball, and its giant was Honus Wagner. In 1996, a baseball card depicting Honus Wagner sold for $640,500 - the largest sum ever paid at auction for a sports artifact. What could possibly make that piece of cardboard, approximately one-and-a-half by two-and-a-half inches, worth more than half a million dollars? The DeValerias tell the unique story behind this now-famous baseball card and the man depicted on it. In doing so, they accurately present the local, regional, and national context so readers gain a thorough understanding of Wagner’s times.Wagner’s gradual emergence from the pack into stardom and popularity is described here in rich detail, but the book also reveals much of Wagner’s family and personal life - his minor leauge career, his values, his failed business ventures during the Depression, and his later years. Neither the “rowdy-ball” ruffian nor the teetotal saint constructed of legend, Wagner is presented here in a complete portrait - one that offers a vivid impression of the era when baseball was America’s game and the nation was evolving into the world’s industrial leader.

Forever Blue: The True Story of Walter O'Malley, Baseball's Most Controversial Owner, and the Dodgers of Brooklyn and Los Angeles


Michael D'Antonio - 2009
    Criticized in New York and beloved in Los Angeles, O’Malley is one of the most controversial owners in the history of American sports. He remade the major leagues and altered the course of history in both Brooklyn and Los Angeles when he moved the Dodgers to California. But while many New York critics attacked him, O’Malley looked to the future, declining to argue his case. As a result, fans across the nation have been unable to stop arguing about him—until now. Using never-before-seen documents and candid interviews with O’Malley’s players, associates, and relatives, Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Michael D’Antonio finally reveals this complex sportsman and industry pioneer. Born into Tammany Hall connections, O’Malley used political contacts to grow wealthy during the Great Depression, and then maneuvered to take control of the formerly downtrodden Dodgers. After his defeat in a war of wills with the famed power broker, Robert Moses, O’Malley uprooted the borough’s team and transplanted them to Los Angeles. Once in Los Angeles, O’Malley overcame opponents of his stadium and helped define the city. Other owners came to regard him as their guide—almost an unofficial commissioner—and he worked behind the scenes to usher in the age of the players’ union and free agency. Filled with new revelations about O’Malley’s battle with Moses, his pioneering business strategies, and his relationship with Jackie Robinson, Forever Blue is a uniquely intimate portrait of a man who changed America’s pastime forever. His fascinating story is fundamental to the history of sports, business, and the American West.

Bouton: The Life of a Baseball Original


Mitchell Nathanson - 2020
    Underneath the crew cut and behind the all-American boy-next-door good looks lurked a maverick with a signature style. Whether it was his frank talk about player salaries and mistreatment by management, his passionate advocacy of progressive politics, or his efforts to convince the United States to boycott the 1968 Olympics, Bouton confronted the conservative sports world and compelled it to catch up with a rapidly changing American society.                Bouton defied tremendous odds to make the majors, won two games for the Yankees in the 1964 World Series, and staged an improbable comeback with the Braves as a thirty-nine-year-old. But it was his fateful 1969 season with the Seattle Pilots and his resulting insider’s account, Ball Four, that did nothing less than reintroduce America to its national pastime in a lasting, profound way. In Bouton: The Life of a Baseball Original, Mitchell Nathanson gives readers a look at Bouton’s remarkable life. He tells the unlikely story of how Bouton’s Ball Four, perhaps the greatest baseball book of all time, came into being, how it was received, and how it forever changed the way we view not only sports books but professional sports as a whole. Based on wide-ranging interviews Nathanson conducted with Bouton, family, friends, and others, he provides an intimate, inside account of Bouton’s life. Nathanson provides insight as to why Bouton saw the world the way he did, why he was so different than the thousands of players who came before him, and how, in the cliquey, cold, bottom‑line world of professional baseball, Bouton managed to be both an insider and an outsider all at once.

For the Good of the Game: The Inside Story of the Surprising and Dramatic Transformation of Major League Baseball


Bud Selig - 2019
    More than a century old, the game of baseball is resistant to change—owners, managers, players, and fans all hate it. Yet, now more than ever, baseball needs to evolve—to compete with other professional sports, stay relevant, and remain America’s Pastime it must adapt. Perhaps no one knows this better than Bud Selig who, as the head of MLB for more than twenty years, ushered in some of the most important, and controversial, changes in the game’s history—modernizing a sport that had remained unchanged since the 1960s.In this enlightening and surprising book, Selig goes inside the most difficult decisions and moments of his career, looking at how he worked to balance baseball’s storied history with the pressures of the twenty-first century to ensure its future. Part baseball story, part business saga, and part memoir, For the Good of the Game chronicles Selig’s career, takes fans inside locker rooms and board rooms, and offers an intimate, fascinating account of the frequently messy process involved in transforming an American institution. Featuring an all-star lineup of the biggest names from the last forty years of baseball, Selig recalls the vital games, private moments, and tense conversations he’s shared with Hall of Fame players and managers and the contentious calls he’s made. He also speaks candidly about hot-button issues the steroid scandal that threatened to destroy the game, telling his side of the story in full and for the first time.As he looks back and forward, Selig outlines the stakes for baseball’s continued transformation—and why the changes he helped usher in must only be the beginning.Illustrated with sixteen pages of photographs.

One Last Strike


Tony La Russa - 2012
    Down ten and a half games with little more than a month to play, the Cardinals had long been ruled out as serious postseason contenders. Yet in the face of those steep odds, this team mounted one of the most dramatic and impressive comebacks in baseball history, making the playoffs on the night of the final game of the season and going on to win the World Series despite being down to their last strike—twice.Now La Russa gives the inside story behind this astonishing comeback and his remarkable career, explaining how a team with so much against it was able to succeed on baseball's biggest stage. Opening up about the devastating injuries, the bullpen struggles, the crucial games, and the players who made it all possible, he reveals how the team's character shaped its accomplishments, demonstrating how this group came together in good times and in bad to become that rarest of things: a team that actually enjoyed it when the odds were against them.But this story is much more than that of a single season. As La Russa, the third-winningest manager in baseball history, explains, their season was the culmination of a lifetime spent studying the game. Laying bare his often scrutinized and frequently misunderstood approach to managing, he explains his counterintuitive belief in process over result, present moments over statistics, and team unity over individual talent. Along the way he shares the stories from throughout his career that shaped his outlook—from his first days managing the Chicago White Sox to his championship years with the Oakland A's, to his triumphant tenure as St. Louis's longest-serving manager. Setting the record straight on his famously intense style, he explores the vital yet overlooked role that his personal relationships with his players have contributed to his victories, ultimately showing how, in a sport often governed by cold, hard numbers, the secret to his success has been surprisingly human.Speaking candidly about his decision to retire, La Russa discusses the changes that he'd observed both in the game and in himself that told him, despite his success, it was time to hang up his spikes. The end result is a passionate, insightful, and remarkable look at our national pastime that takes you behind the scenes of the comeback that no one thought possible and inside the mind of one of the game's greatest managers.

Gretzky's Tears: Hockey, Canada, and the Day Everything Changed


Stephen Brunt - 2009
    Wayne Gretzky’s tears, unlike Orr’s, announced not an ending but another beginning. Gretzky’s Edmonton Oilers had four Stanley Cup victories, but Gretzky may then have had other goals in mind.Beginning with his dad, Walter, and continuing with Nelson Skalbania, Peter Pocklington, Bruce McNall, Jerry Buss — and with the CBC’s Peter Gzowski as chronicler for the eager masses — the enormity of Gretzky’s talent attracted all sorts of people who were after a variety of vicarious thrills.

Yogi Berra: Eternal Yankee


Allen Barra - 2009
    Part comedian, part feisty competitor, Berra is also the winningest player (fourteen pennants, ten World Series, three MVPs) in baseball history. In this revelatory biography, Allen Barra presents Yogi's remarkable life as never seen before, from his childhood in "Dago Hill," the Italian-American neighborhood in St. Louis, to his leading role on the 1949-53 Yankees, the only team to win five consecutive World Series, to the travails of the '64 pennant race, through his epic battles and final peace with George Steinbrenner. This biography, replete with nearly one hundred photos and countless "Yogi-isms," offers hilarious insights into many of baseball's greatest moments. From calling Don Larsen's perfect game to managing the 1973 "You Gotta Believe" New York Mets, Yogi's life and career are a virtual cutaway view of our national pastime in the twentieth century. 98 photographs

The Wrong Stuff


Bill Lee - 1984
    Whether walking out on the Montreal Expos to protest the release of a valued teammate or telling sportswriters eager for candid and offbeat comments more about the game than his bosses wanted anyone to know, pitcher Bill “Spaceman” Lee became celebrated as much for his rebellious personality as for his remarkable talent. Add to the mix his affinity for Eastern religions and controversial causes, and you can see why Lee infuriated the establishment while entertaining his legion of fans. In this wildly funny memoir that became a massive bestseller in the United States and Canada when it was first published, Lee recounts the colorful story of his life—from the drugged-out antics of his college days at USC (where he learned that “marijuana never hammered me like a good Camel”) to his post–World Series travels with a group of liberal long-distance runners through Red China (where he discovered that conservatives don’t like marathons because “it’s much easier to climb into a Rolls-Royce”). Lee also describes his minor league days, joining the Reserves during the Vietnam War, his time with the Red Sox, and the 1975 World Series. He spares no detail while recalling his infamous falling-out with Red Sox management that led to his trade to Montreal. Full of irreverent wit, and an inherent love of the game, The Wrong Stuff is a sports classic for a new generation.From the Trade Paperback edition.

So Many Ways to Lose: The Amazin’ True Story of the New York Mets—the Best Worst Team in Sports


Devin Gordon - 2021
    They win when they should lose. And when it comes to being the worst, no team in sports has ever done it better than the Mets. In So Many Ways to Lose, author and lifelong Mets fan Devin Gordon sifts through the detritus of Queens for a baseball history like no other. Remember the time the Mets lost an All-Star after he got charged by a wild boar? Or the time they blew a six-run ninth-inning lead at the peak of a pennant race? Or the time they fired their manager before he ever managed a game? Sure you do. It was only two years ago, and it was all in the same season. The Mets have an unrivaled gift for getting it backward, doing the impossible, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat, and then snatching defeat right back again. And yet, just ask any Mets fan: amazing and/or miraculous postseason runs are as much a part of our team's identity as losing 120 games in 1962. The DNA of seasons like 1969, the original Miracle Mets, and the 1973 “Ya Gotta Believe” Mets, who went from last place to Game 7 of the World Series in two months, and the powerhouse 1986 Mets, has encoded in us this hapless instinct that a reversal of fortune is always possible. It’s happened before. It’s kind of our thing. And now we've got Steve Cohen's hedge-fund billions to play with! What could go wrong?In this hilarious history of the Mets and love letter to the art of disaster, Devin Gordon presents baseball the way it really is, not in the wistful sepia tones we've come to expect from other sportswriters. Along the way, he explains the difference between being bad and being gifted at losing, and why this distinction holds the key to understanding the true amazin’ magic of the New York Mets.

Girls of Summer: In Their Own League


Lois Browne - 1992
    Wrigley, the great chewing-gum mogul and owner of the Chicago Cubs, who feared the effect of WWII on the major leagues, many of whose players weren't waiting to be drafted before joining up.Women answered the recruiters' call from all over the U.S. and Canada.They were drawn by the lure of bankable money and an escape from dead-end jobs and small towns.- Mary "Bonnie" Baker - the well-groomed stylish player from Regina, Saskatchewan who embodied the virtues of the All-American girl- Alma "Gabby" Ziegler - the great morale booster and captain of the Grand Rapids Chicks- Dorothy "Kammie" Kamenshek - rated the best all-round player in the League- Dorothy Schroeder - she lied about her age to join in the league's first year and played every year until the league ended 12 years laterThey were all superb athletes, but they also had to be perfect ladies.Chaperones directed their every move. Feminine uniforms included a knee-length skirt, and Charm School to teach them everything they needed to know about how to dress and act like a lady.Through all this, the All-American was a magnificent success.In its heyday, stadiums packed in fans and players were shipped off to spring training in Cuba and Florida. The All-American League teams played their first game in 1943 and their last game in 1954.

Cobb: A Biography


Al Stump - 1994
    Now in paperback, the biography that baseball fans all across the country have been talking about. Al Stump redefined America's perception of one of its most famous sports heroes with this gripping look at a man who walked the line between greatness and psychosis. Based on Stump's interviews with Ty Cobb while ghostwriting the Hall-of-Famer's 1961 autobiography, this award-winning new account of Cobb's life and times reveals both the darkness and the brilliance of the "Georgia Peach." "The most powerful baseball biography I have read."--Roger Kahn, author of THE BOYS OF SUMMER

Nobody's Perfect: Two Men, One Call, and a Game for Baseball History


Armando Galarraga - 2011
    No hits, no walks, no men reaching base. In nearly four hundred thousand contests in more than 130 years of Major League Baseball, it has only happened twenty times. On June 2, 2010, Armando Galarraga threw baseball’s twenty-first perfect game. Except that’s not how it entered the record books.That’s because Jim Joyce, a veteran umpire with more than twenty years of big league experience, the man voted the best umpire in the game in 2010 by baseball’s players, missed the call on the final out at first base. “No, I did not get the call correct,” Joyce said after seeing a replay. But rather than throw a tantrum, Galarraga simply turned and smiled, went back to the mound and took care of business. “Nobody’s perfect,” he said later in the locker room.In Nobody’s Perfect, Galarraga and Joyce come together to tell the personal story of a remarkable game that will live forever in baseball lore, and to trace their fascinating lives in sports up until this pivotal moment. It is an absorbing insider’s look at two lives in baseball, a tremendous achievement, and an enduring moment of sportsmanship.