World Baseball

The New York Yankees. The Boston Red Sox. For a hundred years, no two teams have locked horns as fiercely or as frequently, and no two seasons frame the colossal battle more perfectly than 2003 and 2004. Now, with incredible energy and access, leading sports columnist Mike Vaccaro chronicles the history of the greatest rivalry in sports, and the two stunning American League Championship Series that define a century of baseball.

When Christine, an idealistic young American teacher, meets and marries Hideki Yamada, an aspiring Japanese high school baseball coach, she believes that their love with be enough to sustain them as they deal with cultural differences. However, Hideki's duties, and the team of fit, obedient boys whom he begins to think of as a surrogate family, take up more and more of his time, just as Christine is struggling to manage the needs of their multiply-disabled daughter and their sensitive son. Things come to a head when their son is the victim of bullies.

In time for the 50th anniversary of the Mets' miraculous 1969 World Series win, right fielder Ron Swoboda tells the story of that amazing season, the people he played with and against (sometimes at the same time), and what life was like as an "Every Man" ballplayer. Ron Swoboda wasn't the greatest player the Mets ever had, but he made the greatest catch in Met history, saving a game in the 1969 World Series, and his RBI clinched the final game. By Met standards that makes him legend.

The 1951 regular season was as good as over. The Brooklyn Dodgers led the New York Giants by three runs with just three outs to go in their third and final playoff game. And not once in Major League Baseball's 278 preceding playoff and World Series games had a team overcome a three-run deficit in the ninth inning. But New York rallied, and at 3:58 p.m. on October 3, 1951, Bobby Thomson hit a home run off Ralph Branca. The Giants won the pennant.

In the aftermath of the global conflict of World War II, few events in the United States were as eagerly awaited as baseball's spring training. But the national pastime was as unsettled as the rest of the country. Had some of the stars seen their careers ended by their service? How would wartime players fare against returning veterans?

Pitching Perfection and Glove-Tastic Plays: Baseball Trivia for 9-12 Year-Olds is the perfect audiobook for any young fan who loves baseball. Whether they're watching games on TV or playing catch in the backyard, this audiobook is sure to become a favorite in their collection. So get ready to hit a home run with this exciting baseball trivia book for 9- to 12-year-olds!

October 3, 1951. Giants third baseman Bobby Thomson hit the most dramatic home run in the history of baseball. The moment occurred in the bottom of the ninth inning of a sudden-death playoff game between the New York Giants and their arch rivals from Brooklyn, the Dodgers. People across the nation watched on their new TV sets, and the home run became known as “the Shot Heard ’Round the World.” But after clearing the left-field wall, the central artifact of the play - the ball itself - inexplicably went missing.

Are the 1932 Yankees the greatest team of all time? This is the story of their remarkable season, led by Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, toward one of the most lopsided and talked-about World Series in baseball history. At the outset of the Great Depression, as FDR campaigned to replace Herbert Hoover, a baseball season was played across America.

The 1947 World Series was "the most exciting ever" in the words of Joe DiMaggio, with a decade's worth of drama packed into seven games between the mighty New York Yankees and underdog Brooklyn Dodgers. It was Jackie Robinson's first Series, a postwar spectacle featuring Frank Sinatra, Ernest Hemingway, and President Harry Truman in supporting roles. It was also the first televised World Series - sportswriters called it "Electric October".

Critically acclaimed writer Tom Adelman is hailed as a renegade by the Village Voice Literary Supplement for his aggressive, no-holds-barred style. The Long Ball is his dynamic re-telling of baseball's thrilling 1975 season.

In these essays, written between 1954 and 1990, bestselling author Roger Kahn touches on locker-room controversies and politics, while inviting readers to share in the passion, grace, energy, and intense concentration involved in playing sports. Kahn pays warm tribute to his special heroes, Jackie Robinson, Roger Maris and Carl Furillo, along with those he particularly admired in the press box, John Lardner and Red Smith. Kahn also esteems football lineman Merlin Olsen, hockey goalie Glenn Hall, cager Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, outfielder Mickey Mantle, boxing promoter Don King, and Pete Rose.

Never in baseball history had a team ranked last rebounded to take the pennant the following season. Yet, in 1991, lightning struck twice as the Minnesota Twins and the Atlanta Braves, a pair of cellar dwellers the year before, faced each other in an unforgettable World Series. When the final out was recorded, the cover headline in Baseball Weekly read: Best World Series ever.”

As Donald Honig points out in his introduction, "Every World Series in itself is a tale with beginning, middle, and end, and because there must be a winner, there must be a hero." Tales of Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Grover Cleveland Alexander, Sandy Koufax, and Willie Mays are related by the star players who knew them. Those players recall vivid moments from their World Series games, stretching from 1912 to 1974.

Love them or hate them, the New York Yankees have been an American institution for nearly a century. With their rich history and colorful cast of characters, the Yankees never fail to inspire or provoke. In this exciting compendium, some of today's most acclaimed writers - including Pete Dexter, Colum McCann, Roy Blount, Jr., Dan Barry, Jane Leavy, Charles P. Pierce, J. R. Moehringer, Daniel Okrent, Frank Deford, Bill James, and many more - step up to the plate to take their cuts. The result is a collection of original essays as idiosyncratic and expansive as the team that has inspired them.

This is the story of the Houston Astros winning their first World Series in team history. In their 56th year, they ended their drought in the same year that the city of Houston was besieged with devastating flooding from Hurricane Harvey. It became the story of a team linked closely with a city.

How many 14-year-old boys would turn down an offer of time travel to any baseball game in history? Certainly not die-hard New York Yankees fan Matt Collier. Accompanied by the Time Keeper, guardian of Time throughout the universe, Matt becomes the batboy for his beloved team and tries to change the outcome of the 1960 World Series, the first ever to end with a home run.

Mike and Kate are in for an extra special treat! Two hometown baseball teams in one city! A Subway Series is when the New York Mets play the New York Yankees, and Mike and Kate can't wait to watch all the action! But someone is playing pranks at both ballparks! And when Mike and Kate hear mysterious mumblings at the famous Whispering Gallery at Grand Central Terminal, they just might be able to catch the culprit before the series ends.

The A-team takes A-Town! Mike and Kate are in Atlanta, where Hammerin' Hank hit his legendary 715th home run. But Hank's historic bat and ball, which he used to break Babe Ruth's record, have been stolen! Good thing Mike and Kate are sleuthing pros. Can the cousins track down Hank Aaron's missing treasurs...before it's gone forever?

Jessica Song is tired of being a good girl, staying in a relationship well past closing time. Fresh from a breakup, she takes a walk on the wild side as a sports events intern. Baseball rookie Jay Pak Ahn has been burned one too many times by good girls, especially his cheating ex-fiancée. When he meets wild Jessica, he throws away all caution to enjoy her to the fullest.

Thanks to Kate's mom, a sports reporter, cousins Mike Walsh and Kate Hopkins have tickets to the Red Sox game and All Access passes to Fenway Park. But as they're watching batting practice before the game, the lucky bat of Red Sox star slugger Big D is stolen...right in front of dozens of people. Without the bat, Big D can't seem to hit a thing. Can Kate and Mike figure out who pinched the bat before Big D and the Sox chalk up a loss? The Fenway Foul-Up includes a fun fact section about Boston's Fenway Park.