Top Baseball Books

A list of must-reads about our national pastime

© Stephen Ellison

Oct 24, 2008

There’s no better way to learn about and understand Major League Baseball than through the eyes and ears of those who played it, those who studied it and those who merely adored it, especially when said authors stake their reputations on truth, accuracy and an unconditional love for the game.

Baseball purists and casual fans alike should not pass on any of these must-reads:

The Non-fiction Nine

• Ball Four, by Jim Bouton and Leonard Schecter (1970). Bouton published his ground-breaking, controversial tell-all while he was still an active player, and it effectively ended his baseball career. But it remains one of the funniest, boldest and most genuine sports books ever written.
• Babe: The Legend Comes to Life, by Robert W. Creamer (1974). Creamer leaves no stone unturned in his biography of baseball’s most colorful and beloved star. George Herman “Babe” Ruth from birth to death, through good times and bad, is a veritable page-turner.
• Boys of Summer, by Roger Kahn (1971). Kahn grew up a stone’s throw from Ebbets Field and went on to cover his hometown Brooklyn Dodgers during baseball’s most pivotal era – Jackie Robinson breaking the game’s race barrier. A story of fathers and sons, friendship and heartbreak, and America’s pastime.
• Joe DiMaggio: The Hero’s Life, by Richard Ben Cramer (2000). DiMaggio’s mystique is not only defined but also diminished a bit by Cramer’s detailed account of the Yankee Clipper’s reclusive life and somewhat uninviting personality. Thoroughly researched and superbly reported.
• The Bronx Zoo, by Sparky Lyle and Peter Golenbock (1979). Lyle’s laugh-out-loud diary of the 1978 season offers a candid look at one of the most combustible clubhouses in baseball history, as well as one of the game’s most dramatic championship runs. Lyle’s own antics – not to mention his no-holds-barred depictions of George Steinbrenner, Billy Martin and Reggie Jackson – are stuff of legend.
• Eight Men Out, by Eliot Asinof (1963). A riveting account of the infamous Black Sox Scandal, in which members of the Chicago White Sox conspired with big-time gamblers to throw the 1919 World Series.
• Luckiest Man, by Jonathan Eig (2005). It’s hard not to want to read about one of baseball’s immortals and perhaps its greatest ambassador. Eig’s version of Lou Gehrig’s story is as good as it gets.
• Summer of ’49, by David Halberstam (1989). The Pulitzer Prize-winning Halberstam recounted many of the nation’s historical events of the 20th century. He is convincing, as usual, with his assertion that 1949 was the peak of the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry and thus baseball’s most memorable season.
• Moneyball, by Michael Lewis (2003). Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane’s innovative approach to talent evaluation and scouting is the focus of this intriguing take on the business side of baseball.

Fiction’s Three Strikes

• Bang the Drum Slowly, by Mark Harris (1956). Narrator Henry Wiggen, a pitcher for the New York Mammoths, puts the game in perspective through his friendship with catcher Bruce Pearson, who is dying of Hodgkin’s disease.
• The Natural, by Bernard Malamud (1952). The ultimate comeback story, featuring 35-year-old former baseball prodigy Roy Hobbs and his bat “Wonderboy."
• Blue Ruin, by Brendan Boyd (1991). A captivating spin on The Black Sox Scandal seen through the eyes of an off-field co-conspirator.

The Bullpen

• Clemente, by David Maraniss (2006).
• Cobb: A Biography, by Al Stump (1994).
• The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract (2001, revised).

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