Best of 2019 BASEBALL BOOKS
For baseball fans, the offseason doesn’t have to be the offseason. In fact, winter is the best time to catch up with the good memories, good pictures, and good ideas captured in books.
Even more than baseball cards or ballpark giveaways, books are collectibles. They are not only the primary ingredient of home libraries but also repositories of information, from stories to stats, and invaluable research and reference tools. The best part? They don’t take up too much space.
This year’s bumper crop of books documents the 50 th anniversary of the 1969 Miracle Mets, the great Cubs teams led by Ernie Banks, plus the perennial powers residing in the Bronx and Southern California. David Cone, Pete Rose, and even Bud Selig add autobiographies to the must-read list, while a host of history volumes cover everything from black baseball to the Federal League, baseball in wartime, and the evolution of the game.
Anyone who thinks Tip O’Neill was Speaker of the House will discover his baseball namesake. Also on this year’s literary list are Pud Galvin, the first 300-game winner; Luis Tiant, who should join him in Cooperstown; Rocky Colavito, the only home run king traded for a batting champ; and Early Wynn, who lost a bid for his 300 th win when a rookie named Bill Monbouquette beat him 1-0 with a no-hitter.
For the first time in recent memory, we even have two books with the same title. As Banks used to say, “Let’s Play Two!”
So sit back, pick up one of the terrific 2019 baseball tomes, and enjoy the crackle of the fire instead of the crack of the bat. These are the
