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Total Baseball: The Ultimate Baseball Encyclopedia
The most comprehensive reference to baseball available features biographies of the top one hundred players in the game as well as 150 black-and-white photographs and detailed career records of every player in major league history.
2676 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 1989
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
January 4, 2010
This is a wonderful book for baseball fans who like detail, context, and statistics.
One of the greatest features of this volume is the year-by-year starting lineups for all major league teams since their origin. What about Altoona's starting lineup in 1884? Baltimore's lineup in 1893? John McGraw at 3rd base. Chicago Cubs in 1876? Cal McVey at 1st base; Cap Anson at 3rd base; Al Spalding as pitcher. Chicago White Sox in 1987? Greg Walker at 1st base; Carlton Fisk at catcher; Harold Baines at DH. What a resource! This may be my favorite part of the book.
Of course, the statistics for every player who has ever stepped onto the diamond during a game is presented. Bill Leinhauser played one game during Ty Cobb's suspension in 1912; his statistics are here. So, too, Eddie Gaedel's stats from his one game as a pinch hitter for Bill Veeck in 1951.
This massive (over 2500 extremely thin pages long) book contains data on the game's history (including team histories), the players (including such gems as members of families who played, such as the Alous, the Boones, the DiMaggios, the Mathewsons, et al.), great streaks (such as hitting and pitching streaks), All-Star Game data, postseason records, a roster of coaches and managers from Day One of major leaguer baseball, a listing of all umpires, an enumeration of owners (e.g., the eccentric Chis Von der Ahe of the St. Louis Cardinals from the 1890s) and executives , even a listing of baseball announcers, great quotations (e.g., Frank Robinson on his role as manager saying that: "I had no trouble communicating. The players just didn't like what I had to say"; or Willie Stargell speaking of Steve Carlton: "Sometimes I hit him like I used to hit Koufax, and that's like drinking coffee with a fork"), and so on. A treasure trove of data on baseball, from its origins to the present.
If you don't like numbers, don't look at this book. For baseball fans, this is a must acquire volume. . . . You can spend hours with fellow fans just rifling through the pages and sharing trivia and minutiae that are fodder for Hot Stove League discussion.
One of the greatest features of this volume is the year-by-year starting lineups for all major league teams since their origin. What about Altoona's starting lineup in 1884? Baltimore's lineup in 1893? John McGraw at 3rd base. Chicago Cubs in 1876? Cal McVey at 1st base; Cap Anson at 3rd base; Al Spalding as pitcher. Chicago White Sox in 1987? Greg Walker at 1st base; Carlton Fisk at catcher; Harold Baines at DH. What a resource! This may be my favorite part of the book.
Of course, the statistics for every player who has ever stepped onto the diamond during a game is presented. Bill Leinhauser played one game during Ty Cobb's suspension in 1912; his statistics are here. So, too, Eddie Gaedel's stats from his one game as a pinch hitter for Bill Veeck in 1951.
This massive (over 2500 extremely thin pages long) book contains data on the game's history (including team histories), the players (including such gems as members of families who played, such as the Alous, the Boones, the DiMaggios, the Mathewsons, et al.), great streaks (such as hitting and pitching streaks), All-Star Game data, postseason records, a roster of coaches and managers from Day One of major leaguer baseball, a listing of all umpires, an enumeration of owners (e.g., the eccentric Chis Von der Ahe of the St. Louis Cardinals from the 1890s) and executives , even a listing of baseball announcers, great quotations (e.g., Frank Robinson on his role as manager saying that: "I had no trouble communicating. The players just didn't like what I had to say"; or Willie Stargell speaking of Steve Carlton: "Sometimes I hit him like I used to hit Koufax, and that's like drinking coffee with a fork"), and so on. A treasure trove of data on baseball, from its origins to the present.
If you don't like numbers, don't look at this book. For baseball fans, this is a must acquire volume. . . . You can spend hours with fellow fans just rifling through the pages and sharing trivia and minutiae that are fodder for Hot Stove League discussion.
Displaying 1 of 1 review