The Giants and Their City: Major League Baseball in San Francisco, 1976–1992

by Lincoln A. Mitchell

Searching for a home and a homerun―an overlooked era of Giants and San Francisco history The San Francisco Giants have been one of the most successful franchises in baseball in the twenty-first century as evidenced by the three World Series Championship flags flying in the breeze over Oracle Park, one of the most beautiful baseball venues in the world. However, the team was not always so successful on or off the field. The Giants and Their City tells the story of a Giants franchise that had no recognizable stars, was last in the league in attendance, and had more than one foot out the door on the way to Toronto when a local businessman and a brand new mayor found a way to keep the team in San Francisco. Over the next 17 years, the team had some very good years, but more than few terrible ones, while trying to find a home in a city with a unique and confounding political culture. The Giants and Their City relates how the team struggles to win ballgames, find its way back to the playoffs, but also to stay in San Francisco when, at times, it wasn’t clear the city wanted them. This book is a baseball story about beloved Giants players like Vida Blue, Willie McCovey, Kevin Mitchell, and Robby Thompson, and includes interviews with Art Agnos, Frank Jordan, Dianne Feinstein, John Montefusco, Will Clark, Kevin Mitchell, Mike Krukow, Dave Dravecky and Bob Lurie among others. The book features descriptions of important events in Giants history like the Mike Ivie grand slam, the Joe Morgan home run, the 1987 playoffs, the 1989 team, the Dave Dravecky game and the earthquake World Series. It’s also a uniquely San Francisco story that shows how sports teams and cities often have very complex relationships.

Genres: Baseball, Sports

250 pages, Paperback

Published March 2, 2021

About the author

Lincoln Mitchell is a political analyst, pundit and writer based in New York City and San Francisco. Lincoln works on democracy and governance related issues in the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, the Caribbean, the Middle East, Africa and Asia. He also works with businesses and NGOs globally, particularly in the former Soviet Union. Lincoln writes and speaks about US politics as well, and was the national political correspondent for The New York Observer from 2014-2016. Lincoln was on the faculty of Columbia University's School of International Affairs from 2006-2013 and retains an affiliation with Columbia's Arnold A. Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies. In addition, he worked for years as a political consultant advising and managing domestic political campaigns.

Dr. Mitchell is an accomplished scholar and writer whose current research includes democratic rollback in the US, US-Georgia relations, political development in the former Soviet Union, the role of democracy promotion in American foreign policy and baseball. He has written five books: first Uncertain Democracy: US Foreign Policy and Georgia’s Rose Revolution, (Penn Press 2008), The Color Revolutions, (Penn Press 2012), The Democracy Promotion Paradox (Brookings 2016), Will Big League Baseball Survive? Globalization, the End of Television, Youth Sports and the Future of Major League Baseball, (Temple University Press 2016) and Baseball Goes West: How the Dodgers and Giants Shaped the Major Leagues (Kent State University Press 2018). Dr. Mitchell has written articles on these topics in The National Interest, Orbis, The Moscow Times, the Washington Quarterly, The American Interest, The National Interest, Survival, the Central Asian Survey, World Affairs Journal, The New York Daily News and Current History as well as for numerous online publications including the online sections of The Washington Post, The New York Times. The Forward and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Eurasianet, and Transitions Online. Lincoln has been quoted extensively in most major American, Georgian and Russian newspapers and has appeared on numerous television and radio programs and podcasts including Fox and Friends, All Things Considered, Lou Dobbs, Al Jazeera English, Al Jazeera America, the Jim Lehrer Newshour, ABC Nightline, the Diane Rehm Show, Up and In: The Baseball Prospectus Podcast, the Cespedes Family Barbecast, Sports Byline and The BBC as well as in Russian and Georgian television. Lincoln also frequently blogs about American politics on several different online platforms.

Lincoln's current and recent clients include Freedom House, Democracy International, ARD/Tetratech, the Albright Stonebridge Group, the UNDP and DFID, the United Nations Democracy Fund, the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, as well as several private businesses, political interests and investors working in the former Soviet Union.

Lincoln earned his BA from UC Santa Cruz and his Ph.D from Columbia University.

Reviews

[Douglas Noakes · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent overview of the up-and-down seasons of the San Francisco Giants during the time that real-estate mogul Bob Lurie owned the team. For me, the most amazing thing about my favorite baseball team concerned how they went from losing 100 games in 1985 to completely turning the team around (thank you, General Manager Al Rosen) and in four short years getting all the way to the World Series. (They came within one game of winning the National League Pennant in 1987).

Giants fans who have memories of those years and the great and not-so-great players (Will Clark, Kevin Mitchell, Jack Clark, Mike Krucow, Johnnie LaMaster. Bob Brenly) and managers like Joe Altobelli and Roger Craig I think will love this book.

Kirkpatrick is a skilled chronicler and I hope to read more of his work. I hope he'll do a book on the World Series teams of the 2010s under the stewardship of Bruce Bochy. Go Giants!

[Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Talking about this book to a customer yesterday we were reminiscing about Candlestick Park. The cold winds, trash on the field, rowdy crowds, lousy food, the one concourse where every second person seemed to be smoking a joint. No real public transit. And all this to root for a team that often was not in contention for the playoffs, or sometimes even a 500 record. At the same moment, we looked at each other and said "good times..."

This book is a wonderful love letter to the Lurie years of SF baseball, from mid seventies to 92. It brings back a lot of great memories. HIGHLY recommended for any Giants fan.

[Dave M · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Toronto Giants? The Tampa Giants? It’s crazy to think these were close to reality for what is now one of MLB’s iconic and gold standard franchises. The book was much more enjoyable when detailing the off-field happenings that almost resulted in the Giants moving from San Francisco, and their ultimate rescues from relocation, or even the various gimmicks used to draw people to windy and frigid Candlestick Park (Croix de Candlestick, Crazy Crab). Unfortunately, the on field product was horrible for most of the period between 1976-1992 and the author’s recounting in detail doesn’t make for an interesting read (poor Johnnie LeMaster in particular takes quite a beating).

[Paul Richardson · Rating 5 out of 5]

The era of Giants baseball described in this book is the era I grew up in. Lincoln Mitchell does a great job recreating the era and helping fill in some important details. Some of these years I lived in the Bay Area and followed the team closely and in person and this book brought back some happy memories. After my family moved to the Southern U.S. my fandom did not dissipate and I followed the Giants from 2,700 miles away. What I appreciate is how this book details the off field developments that were hard to follow from the other side of the country.

[Michael Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m a lifetime Giants fan and followed the team through the many years described in this book. I attended many games and the wind and cold are no joke! I put up with the “Stick” because that’s all I knew. Rough though for casual fans. I would have rated higher but for lousy editing!