Writers who accept tough challenges fascinate me. I admire their determination in bringing some clarity to a murky subject.
Robert F. Garratt admits up front that writing about the life of Charles Stoneham, who owned the New York Giants baseball team from 1919 until his death in 1936 at the age of 59, was “a distinct challenge.”
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That is an understatement. Stoneham, who bought the New York Giants from the Brush family with partners Francis X. McQuade and Giants manager John J. McGraw, formed the National Exhibition Company.

McGraw, the face of the Giants since 1902, would win four consecutive National League pennants and two World Series titles in the early 1920s. Stoneham, meanwhile, was a shadowy figure at best, content to stay in the background. The Stoneham family would own the franchise for nearly 58 years, moving it west to San Francisco after the 1957 season before selling it to Bob Lurie in 1976.
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Stoneham was a complicated figure, and Garratt makes a strong attempt at sharpening the hazy perception of the franchise owner in Jazz Age Giant: Charles A. Stoneham & New York City Baseball in the Roaring Twenties (University of Nebraska Press; $29.95; hardback; 215 pages).

​Garratt does not succeed completely, but his work is definitely the most thorough look at Stoneham to date. Stoneham had a shadowy past and became wealthy through his Wall Street business dealings because “he had an uncommon talent for the ‘Street,’” the Brooklyn Daily Eagle wrote in his obituary.
Garratt, an emeritus professor of English and humanities at the University of Puget Sound, grew up in the San Francisco area and was a fan of the Giants. He initially researched the Giants’ move from New York to San Francisco and its impact on the Bay Area.
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That resulted in his 2017 book, Home Team: The Turbulent History of the San Francisco Giants. The book, which examined the Giants’ relationship with San Francisco, the legacy of treacherous Candlestick and the team’s success during the 2010s, earned him finalist honors for the Seymour Medal.
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He was pitted against some stiff competition for the 2018, award, including winner Jerald Podair (City of Dreams) and finalists Marty Appel (Casey Stengel), John Eisenberg (The Streak) and Debra Shattuck (Bloomer Girls).

It is interesting to note that Steven Treder’s 2021 biography of Stoneham’s son, Forty Years a Giant: The Life of Horace Stoneham, won the Seymour Medal in 2022. There is something about the Stoneham family that intrigues baseball history lovers.
 
Garratt takes an interesting approach to Charles Stoneham’s life, suggesting that there was a parallel between the Giants owner and Jay Gatsby, the main character in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel, The Great Gatsby. And he hammers the comparison home in every chapter, with a lead-in that contains a quote from the novel.
 
Stoneham’s lavish parties and love for the night life gave the New York tabloids ample fodder during the Prohibition Era. The fact that he had two distinct families at the same time also had tongues wagging, even during the hedonistic Roaring Twenties.

Very Gatsby-esque.

Stoneham got rich through the stock market during the first quarter of the 20th century, running “bucket shops.”
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According to the Cornell Law School, bucket shops in the early 1900s were gambling operations that permitted “common people” to bet on stocks and other markets. Ordinary citizens were able to invest in markets, but their purchases were highly speculative and businessmen like Stoneham were easily able to turn a profit.

Stoneham began his career as a board boy in a brokerage firm but eventually formed his own company. When he took over the Giants, his Wall Street background was a major topic.

“Curb broker to be president,” the New York Tribune wrote in January 1919.

But Stoneham got out of the brokerage business by 1921, because he wanted to devote “full-time attention” to the sporting life, and specifically, the Giants, Garratt writes. The other reason was more in tune to Stoneham’s business acumen.

He realized that because the stock market was “heating up,” it would no longer favor his “bucket shop” style of investing.

“Stoneham’s company depended on a falling market to maximize its profits,” Garratt writes.

Stoneham made no secret of his relationship to men like Arnold Rothstein, the man credited as the mastermind behind the 1919 World Series Black Sox scandal. Stoneham would be indicted three times, tried for perjury and acquitted. His battles for control of the Giants with McQuade, and lawsuits over his connections to various brokerage firms that had failed, would sap the joy of winning four pennants from 1921 to 1924.

In 1924, Stoneham was indicted for mail fraud in the transfer of accounts to E.D. Dier and Company. Two years earlier, he was awash in legal battles with the firm of E.M. Fuller and Company, a business that had filed for bankruptcy and claimed that Stoneham was a silent partner.

“For the foreseeable future, Stoneham would find his world turned upside down,” Garratt writes.

The Fuller-McGee case (named for owners Edward M. Fuller and William McGee) took four years to resolve, and Stoneham would be indicted for perjury in August 1923. On the positive side, Stoneham was acquitted of mail fraud charges stemming from the Dier case in February 1925. Stoneham’s indictment for perjury in the Fuller case was dismissed in early 1927.

For those reasons, baseball executives like American League President Ban Johnson never hid his distaste for Stoneham. As a possible gambling scandal loomed on the eve of the 1924 World Series, Johnson blasted the Giants owner as “the worst influence we have in organized baseball,” according to the New York Daily News. “He and John McGraw must be driven from the game.”

Garratt notes that Stoneham and McGraw were “Jazz Age dreamers,” and the move that typified their pie-in-the-sky hopes to bring the Giants back to prominence in the late 1920s was the trade that brought Rogers Hornsby to New York.
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The Giants were looking for a player to match the star power of Babe Ruth in New York, and while Hornsby could hit, his demeanor and penchant for bluntness made him few friends — if he cursed, the Rajah’s favorite four-letter word was not “tact.”

The experiment lasted a year, until Stoneham traded Hornsby in a ridiculously one-sided deal that favored the Boston Braves — on paper, at least. Hornsby would wear out his welcome in Boston as well before landing with the Chicago Cubs.

Stoneham’s squabbles with McQuade, which simmered during the early 1920s, boiled over in 1928 when the owner got enough votes to remove McQuade as team treasurer.

While McQuade’s removal was “personally satisfying” for Stoneham, the legal entanglements over the next six years would be a “continuing distraction” for the Giants, Garratt writes. Stoneham would prevail after appealing a lower court ruling against him as McQuade’s complaint was dismissed by the New York State Supreme Court.

On the field, Stoneham would have one final year of glory when the Giants won the 1922 N.L. pennant and then rolled past the Washington Senators in the World Series.

Stoneham also finally received some respect from his fellow owners as a “wise senior counselor,” Garratt writes. That was a far cry from his entrance into the owners’ club, where he was viewed as “an interloper, a monied, shady businessman with a fondness for horses and gambling.”

Stoneham will always remain a hazy figure, feeling no need to call attention to himself, Garratt writes. Even as his health declined, Stoneham remained a silent figure.

His business deeds, however, spoke loudly.

“As the generous host, he was often in the background,” content to let others grab the spotlight, he writes. In a city like New York, where the spotlight shone brightly on public figures, that was quite a feat.

Garratt describes Stoneham as a businessman who was “unscrupulous and ruthless,” a serial philanderer and a quasi-bigamist and a private man without a close friend.

“He was paunchily fat, and his collar met his jowls,” sportswriter Paul Gallico wrote in November 1934, comparing the Stoneham to the 1920s to a slimmer version in the 1930s.

In Garratt’s final analysis, Stoneham’s complicated and spirited life “epitomized the Jazz Age.”
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Jazz Age Giant is well-researched, complemented by plenty of notes. Garratt writes simply and smoothly, explaining complicated subjects in a clear manner.
The life of Charles Stoneham may never be crystal clear, but Garratt helps bring it into focus.

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about the 1950 Scott's Potato Chips cards and the man who desigmed them:

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/rare-minneapolis-lakers-regional-set-has-deep-history-with-artists-family/

It is mind-boggling that Fernando Valenzuela burst onto the major league baseball scene more than 40 year ago.

It seems like only yesterday that the 20-year-old left-hander from Etchohuaquila, Mexico, was baffling hitters with his screwball, looking skyward as he wheeled toward the plate.

As a young sportswriter in South Florida with The Stuart News in May 1981, I got to sit in on a national telephone conference call that included Valenzuela; his interpreter, longtime Spanish broadcaster Jaime Jarrin; Los Angeles Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda; and several members of the team.

Valenzuela had begun the 1981 season with a 7-0 record and a ridiculously low 0.29 ERA.

“To be honest with you I didn’t think I’d get that far,” Valenzuela said at the time through his interpreter. “Before the season it never came to mind.”

“You can’t do that with mirrors or with luck,” Lasorda added. “Amazingly, nothing seems to rattle him. The guy makes the right pitch at the right time.”

It was an exciting time. Valenzuela would post a 13-7 record during the strike-marred split season of 1981 and pitched to a 2.48 ERA. He would win the National League Cy Young Award and was the third consecutive Dodger to win Rookie of the Year honors (pitchers Rick Sutcliffe and Steve Howe preceded him and infielder Steve Sax would win in 1982).

Valenzuela spawned what would be known as “Fernandomania,” a baseball and cultural phenomenon. “El Toro” pitched in the majors for 17 seasons — 11 in Los Angeles — and earned 141 of his career 173 victories while wearing Dodger blue.

That is what author Erik Sherman captures so well in his latest book, Daybreak at Chavez Ravine: Fernandomania and the Remaking of the Los Angeles Dodgers (University of Nebraska Press; $32.95; hardback; 249 pages)

Baseball needed Fernandomania. And more specifically, the Dodgers needed it.

The team performed well on the field and won National League pennants in 1963, 1965, 1966, 1974, 1977 and 1978, but the franchise had never found a way to soothe the bitterness of the Mexican American community. Latinos in the Los Angeles area had never forgiven the city of Los Angeles and Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley for cutting a deal to build a stadium at Chavez Ravine, which displaced hundreds of families during the late 1950s.

During the early 1950s, the city evicted approximately 300 families so a low-income, publicly funded housing project could be built. However, Los Angeles sold the land to O’Malley and the evicted residents — who had been promised the first pick for apartments in the proposed Chavez Ravine housing projects — were left holding the bag and were not reimbursed.

It came down to a contentious referendum, called Proposition B, to build the stadium, and O’Malley — who had pulled up stakes in Brooklyn to move west — won by 24,293 votes out of a total of 666,577.

O’Malley built Dodger Stadium, a magnificent complex that opened on April 10, 1962, but Mexican American fans stayed away in droves. It did not help that in May 1959, television cameras recorded deputies carrying residents from their frame houses in Chavez Ravine as bulldozers knocked down the structures, according to Andy McCue’s 2014 book, Mover & Shaker.

Bad for public relations, although city officials blamed the media for turning the eviction into “a cartoon morality play,” McCue would write.

Despite the Dodgers winning six pennants and two World Series at Dodger Stadium, Mexican American fans were hard to find. Even the three pennants during the 1970s did not help.

Valenzuela changed that. Here was a humble man who did not seek the spotlight, yet he possessed the kind of charisma that turned Dodger Stadium into a citadel of Mexican American pride. His physique and looks reminded many Latinos of “a Mexican uncle or cousin,” Sherman writes. “But he was an everyman who was doing incredible things. And he belonged to them.”

Valenzuela’s impact on the Latinos “was more impactful and profound than any no-hitter or World Series he ever pitched,” Sherman writes.

Longtime Dodgers broadcaster Vin Scully would observe that Fernandomania looked like “an almost religious experience.”  Sportswriter Lyle Spencer told Sherman that “Fernandomania was a full-on festival every time he pitched.”

Pressed into action in 1981 when Jerry Reuss was scratched due to calf injury, Valenzuela became the first Dodgers rookie to start on Opening Day. It was also his first major-league start and he pitched a five-hit shutout.

Sherman guides the reader through Valenzuela’s blazing impact, when he first 12 starts at Dodger Stadium were sellouts. He is familiar with writing about baseball and digging nuggets out of his extensive research, which is also on display in Daybreak at Chavez Ravine.

Sherman has written books about the 1986 Mets (Kings of Queens), the 1986 Boston Red Sox (Two Sides of Glory) and co-authored autobiographies with Davey Johnson, Glenn Burke, Steve Blass and Mookie Wilson.
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Sherman’s 2019 book, After the Miracle, with Art Shamsky, was a warm and poignant look at the 1969 New York Mets.
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Valenzuela declined to participate in Sherman’s latest project, but that enabled the author, podcaster and 2023 inductee into the New York State Baseball Hall of Fame to interview former teammates and opponents. Those interviews provided a fuller, more analytical look at Valenzuela.

Sherman pulls out rich, insightful observations from a diverse group of players, including Valenzuela’s teammates — Dusty Baker, Rick Monday, Jerry Reuss and Steve Garvey, to name a few. Dodgers scout Mike Brito, Jarrin and even opponents like pitchers Bill Lee and Jeff Reardon also offer valuable perspective.

“He captured everyone’s attention,” Monday told Sherman. “Not right away, but when he did, he owned it.”

Valenzuela’s success in 1981 caught all of baseball flat-footed.

“I wasn’t thinking he was going to be the ace of the staff — that’s for sure,” former Dodgers executive Fred Claire told Sherman.
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Sherman writes about Valenzuela’s lunch with President Ronald Reagan and Mexico’s president, José López Portillo, a monumental day for a 20-year-old rookie who still took it all in stride. Valenzuela’s career was much more successful than that of Portillo, who was Mexico’s leader from 1976 to 1982. The New York Times reported in Portillo’s 2004 obituary that he brought Mexico to “the brink of economic collapse” and “was considered one of the most incompetent leaders of Mexico's modern era and his government among the most corrupt.”

Fernandomania, on the other hand, did not seem to have any limits, Sherman writes. Remember, he starred in the era before social media and modern marketing savvy, but it was not unusual to see homemade images of Valenzuela on T-shirts, posters and murals. Valenzuela was selective in what products to advertise but became wealthy.

The baseball strike certainly prevented Valenzuela from winning 20 games in 1981, but the eight-week stoppage, which forced the cancellation of 713 games, also afforded him a chance to rest and recharge. After an 8-0 start, Valenzuela was 9-4 but still led the league in complete games, innings pitched shutouts and strikeouts. The man needed a break.

The Dodgers got one too, as it was determined that teams leading their divisions when the strike began would be declared first-half champions and would earn a spot in the playoffs regardless of how they performed. It was a quirk that prevented the Cincinnati Reds, who had the league’s best record but finished second in both halves — from competing in the postseason.
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When baseball returned, Valenzuela was the starting pitcher for the N.L. in the All-Star Game. He would be named to the All-Star team six times during his career.

​As for the Dodgers, the 1981 playoffs would be a study in determination. Down 0-2 to Houston in the divisional series, Los Angeles would win the next three games at Dodger Stadium to advance. That included a Game 4 complete-game victory pitched by Valenzuela, as the left-hander had a 1.06 ERA against the Astros.

Against the Montreal Expos in the NLCS, the Dodgers prevailed in five games when Valenzuela pitched a gritty 2-1 victory that was helped by Monday’s clutch home run that snapped a 1-1 tie with two outs in the top of the ninth inning.

The Expos were managed in the playoffs by Jim Fanning, who took over for Dick Williams. Sherman described Williams as having a “vinegary personality.”
That’s an understatement.

During spring training in 1981 I approached Williams at Municipal Stadium in West Palm Beach because I was writing a story about Gary Carter, specifically about his baseball card collection. I introduced myself and started to ask if he had a minute to talk about Carter. He looked at me and asked, “Who are you with again?”

When I told him, he shook his head, turned on his heel and walked away, saying, “Nahhh.”

I must have looked shocked, since New York Yankees manager Gene Michael was standing nearby, laughing.

“Don’t worry, kid, he’s always like that,” Michael chuckled.

Well, that was a nice consolation. He certainly lived up to his name.

In the 1981 World Series, Valenzuela helped the Dodgers dig out of a 2-0 series deficit with a 5-4 victory in Game 3 against the New York Yankees. It was Valenzuela’s final appearance of the season, and while he was not sharp, he still battled with grim determination.

Reuss told Sherman that the effort was impressive because he did not have his best stuff.

“I imagine every time Van Gogh picked up a paintbrush, he didn’t create a masterpiece,” Reuss said.

Valenzuela had plenty of them in 1981, and the Dodgers would win their first World Series title since 1965.
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The losing pitcher in Game 3, George Frazier, who died on June 19 at the age of 68, became an unfortunate answer to a trivia question. He would become the first pitcher to legitimately lose three games in the World Series, as he was also saddled with losses in Games 4 and 6.
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Claude Williams, who pitched for the Chicago White Sox in the 1919 World Series, also lost three games, but the team was later found to have thrown the postseason series, according to the Society for American Baseball Research. Williams was not one of the eight “Black Sox” players implicated in the scandal, by the way.

Of course, Valenzuela’s career did not begin and end with the 1981 season. There were other seasons, other accolades and other feats — 21 wins in 1986, a no-hitter in 1990, and 13 wins in 1996 as he helped the surprising San Diego Padres win the N.L. West.

But the 1981 season was magical.
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The only glitch I saw in Sherman’s work was his statement that Hideo Nomo was the first Japanese-born player to reach the majors. That honor actually went to another pitcher, Masanori Murakami, who made his debut with the San Francisco Giants in 1964, according to MLB and documented by Robert K. Fitts in his wonderful 2015 biography, Mashi.

Sherman ends his work by wondering why Valenzuela’s No. 34 had not been retired, although no one has worn it since he has left the Dodgers. That oversight will be corrected in August, when his uniform will be retired during ceremonies and events during a three-game stretch.

Sherman’s research, coupled with his interviewing skills, makes for a compelling narrative.

Valenzuela “was like a composite of the Beatles — only in Dodger blue,” Sherman writes in his preface. “His appeal was universal. “He wasn’t just a baseball player, he was a healer in a time when, much like today, many Americans viewed Mexicans as second-class citizens.

“He was to Latinos what Jackie Robinson was to Black Americans. And their feelings for Valenzuela have only grown stronger over the years.”

“He’s for real,” teammate Davey Lopes said during that 1981 conference call.
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He still is, and remains a revered figure in Dodgers history. Sherman does a wonderful job of piercing through Valenzuela’s quiet shell to paint a complete picture of a beloved figure.

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about eBay's new Collectors Camp concept, a way for collectors to hone their skills and make better deals:

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/ebay-launches-collectors-camp-to-help-hone-skills-in-buying-selling-and-trading/

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collector about a man who was reunited after more than 50 years with a 1952 Topps card of Mickey Mantle. The card was kept safe in a Wisconsin home in a -- wait for it -- cheese box.

​www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/1952-topps-mantle-found-cheese-box-could-bring-plenty-of-jack-for-wisconsin-man/

Topps Series Two baseball has finally come to my area, and the flagship set is mostly a continuation of Series One.

On a side note, it is gratifying to walk into a Target or Walmart these days and see countless rows of blaster boxes and packs from all sports. Thank goodness. Card shortages at stores or registering to view boxes of product was an aggravating experience.

While Target still limits the number of items you can buy, Walmart does not.

I no longer chase the Topps flagship set, although I do buy a complete set when those boxes are released. Got to keep that complete set streak from 1968 intact, you know. And if not for 11 high numbers from the 1967 set and seven from 1963, I’d have every set done since 1960.

Of course, some of those cards I may never get, like the Pete Rose rookie card from 1963. But I am reconciled to that.

Anyway, the 2023 Topps Series Two set is a continuation of Series One, with 330 cards in the set. Cards are numbered from 331 to 660, featuring veterans, rookies, future stars and team cards. Series Two features the rookie cards of Kodai Senga, Anthony Volpe and Jordan Walker.

A blaster box costs $24.99 plus tax and contains seven packs with 14 cards to pack. There is also one commemorative Father’s Day Team Patch cards in each blaster. These cards have blue logo cap patches. Lucky collectors could find the signed version of the patch card, which is limited to 25 copies or less.

I do like the design that Topps has chosen for this year’s set. There is an action shot on the card front that dominates the space, with a white border and a thin line containing the primary color of the team’s uniform.

A mug shot of the player is positioned in the lower left-hand corner, with his name in white block letters below the smaller photograph. His position is anchored in the bottom right-hand corner of the card when the design is vertical, while slightly more toward the bottom center for horizontal layouts.

I have made no secret through the years that I prefer a vertical design. That goes back to when I began collecting in 1965. All of the player cards had vertical layouts, and the only exceptions were team, World Series and league leaders cards.

To me vertical always looked better in binders.
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As far as card backs go, I never minded the horizontal layout. There are columns of statistics to present to the collector, and horizontal is a much better look. Series Two follows the same pattern, highlighting the player’s vital statistics and year-by-year numbers. Where there is room, a short biography or a paragraph explaining a career highlight is included.

Just like I did when I bought my first blaster of 2023 Series One, I pulled 84 base cards from the blaster box of Series Two I bought at Target. There was also a Royal Blue parallel of Evan Longoria; the Royal Blues can be found in one of every 10 blasters. I also pulled an Orange Foilboard parallel of Orioles pitcher Keegan Akin that was numbered to 299.

The third parallel in the box was a Rainbow Foil card of Pirates pitcher Rodney Contreras.

Every pack in the blaster had a Stars of MLB insert, a 30-card set, so I pulled seven of them.

Another insert card I pulled was a World Baseball Classic card of Sandy Alcantara. There are 60 cards in this subset.

In its tribute to the 35th anniversary to the 1988 Topps design, the blaster had one of the 1988 Topps card insert and one of the 1988 Topps All-Star Baseball cards. Both insert sets contain 50 cards.
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I pulled a 1988 Topps Baseball card of Julio Rodriguez and a 1988 Topps All-Star Baseball insert of Buster Posey.

There was also one Home Run Challenge card, a promotion that features 30 of the game’s top sluggers. Each card has a scratch-off code that collectors enter on the Topps website, and contestants then pick a specific date when the player might hit a home run. If you win, you receive a Home Run Challenge Winner card.

The card I pulled was of the Mets’ Francisco Lindor, who already has 12 homers this season.

The final card I pulled was the commemorative Father’s Day Team Patch, a manufactured relic. My card featured Hunter Greene of the Cincinnati Reds, along with a blue logo against a white patch background.
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Consistency is the hallmark of Topps’ flagship set, and Series Two follows that pattern. There are few surprises that I saw, but if you are set collector, this is the must-have set. Now, collectors will await the Update set.

Here is a review I wrote for Sport in American History about Dyed in Crimson by Zev Eleff:

ussporthistory.com/2023/06/10/review-of-dyed-in-crimson/

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about a joint temporary restraining order agreed to by Panini America and Fanatics. The case involved former Panini employees starting work with Fanatics, and issues about possible trade secret violations: 

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/panini-fanatics-agree-to-temporary-restraining-order-in-employee-departure-lawsuit/

There is plenty of nostalgia for me after buying cards from the 2023 Topps Heritage set, which was released this week.

This year’s edition, which pays tribute to the 1974 Topps product, was the last set I actively collected as a youth. I had always said that when I completed an entire Topps set, I would stop. In 1973 I came within five cards of finishing the set (I have since found them), but in 1974 I managed to collect all 660 of them.

So, I decided to stop collecting.

That, and I was heading to college soon, made the decision easier. Never mind that in 1975, Topps put out one of the more memorable sets of the decade, with great rookies and colorful designs.

That’s the luck of the draw.
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I decided to collect again in 1996, in part because the death of Mickey Mantle made me revisit my collection.

The 1974 set was also the first time that Topps released its baseball card set all at once, rather than staggering it in series. It was always tough to find the high series Topps cards in 1973 and before, simply because not as many were printed and local stores selling the baseball cards shunted him aside for the football cards that were hitting the market in late summer.

Makes sense.

But here’s a look at the 2023 Topps Heritage set.
This year’s model has 400 base cards and 100 short prints. Like all Heritage sets, the design remains true to the original card set. The color scheme for the teams that were around in 1974 remains the same for the 2023 version. Naturally, the teams that have been added to MLB since 1974 have their own distinct colors.

Like the ’74 set, the card fronts have vertical and horizontal layouts. The backs are horizontal and include facts about the player when space allows.

There were 64 base cards in the blaster box I opened, plus three short prints (Matt Duffy, Mike Minor and Keegan Akin). This must have been a hotter box than usual, because I also pulled four inserts and a relic card.

There are parallels and variations in the set, but not in the retail version. Hobby boxes contain flip cards numbered to five and black border cards numbered to 50.
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The hobby set also has image variations.

The first six cards of the 1974 Topps set were a tribute to Hank Aaron, who was poised to became MLB’s all-time home run king. For the 2023 Heritage set, Topps paid special attention to Aaron Judge, who became the American League’s single-season home run record holder when he smashed 62 last year. The first four cards of this year’s set are devoted to Judge.

There is a quirk in collation this year, as card No. 100 does not exist. Meanwhile, there are two players occupying card No. 327 — Kolten Wong and Andrew Chafin.

The 2023 set does have league leaders (card Nos. 201-208) and nine All-Star cards (card Nos. 331-339), just like its 1974 counterpart. But there are no manager cards — of course, the 1974 manager cards looked kind of silly with the skipper’s photo taking up most of the card while his coaching staff was represented by cutout head shots. That was a slight improvement over the 1973 set, which had coaches featured against a brownish backdrop to the right of the manager’s photograph.
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Come to think of it, they both stunk. Perhaps it was better that Topps decided to skip the manager cards this year after all.

This year’s set has Playoff Highlights and World Series cards, but surprisingly as short prints. The playoff cards are from Nos. 434 to 441, while the World Series cards are represented from Nos. 472 to 479.

The inserts will be familiar to Heritage collectors. There is a 10-card Baseball Flashbacks subset, which features the top events on the diamond that year; News Flashbacks, a 10-card set that concentrates on major events in ’74, like Richard Nixon’s resignation from the presidency; New Age Performers, a 25-card feature that is tailored to current stars in the game; and Then and Now, a 15-card subset that pairs a top player from 1974 with a 2022 star.

A new insert is a Stamps card that features four players. If you wanted to, you could break each card into four separate stamps. There are 20 cards featuring 80 subjects.
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Heritage retail includes 1974 Deckle mini cards, which are limited to 600 copies.

The inserts I pulled from the blaster box I bought were a New Age Performers card of catcher Shea Langeliers; a Then and Now card of pitchers Steve Carlton (Phillies) and Corbin Burnes (Brewers); a News Flashbacks cards of the world topping 4 billion in population; and stamps of Atlanta Braves stars Henry Aaron, Ronald Acuna Jr., Austin Riley and Dansby Swanson.

As a bonus, I pulled a Clubhouse Collections relic card of the Phillies’ Nick Castellanos. It’s a nice powder blue swatch, although it is not necessarily game-used, as Topps writes in a disclaimer on the back of the card.

Certainly, technology has changed a great deal since 1974. It will be rare, for example, to find a miscut Heritage card — that seemed to be a thing with Topps during the 1960s and ’70s — and the card stock is firmer and the photography is sharper.
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Heritage collectors will enjoy the blast from the past and the nod toward the future.

Here is a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily previewing Series 2 of the 2023 Topps baseball set: 

​www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/2023-topps-series-2-baseball-info-checklist-buy/

Professional wrestlers tell the best stories. Been saying that for years.

It is particularly true of wrestlers who cut their teeth in the ring during the 1970s and 1980s. Mick Foley, Terry Funk and Bret Hart are a few who come to mind, and even announcers like Jim Ross know how to spin interesting tales.

Those years driving from town to town, when pro wrestling was still a sport that thrived in “territories” nationwide, gave competitors plenty of fodder to have fun, tell stories and scratch out a living.

Add Steve Keirn to the mix.
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Keirn Chronicles Volume One: The Fabulous Wrestling Life of Steve Keirn (WOHW/Darkstream Press; paperback; $24.98; 419 pages), written with Ian Douglass, is an unvarnished look at his career. Keirn is an engaging storyteller, and he is alternately funny, blunt and at times quite harsh. But there is no doubt that Keirn, now 71, is a straight shooter about his life experiences and the pro wrestling business.

Looking behind the curtain and into the booking offices always makes for fascinating reading.
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Fans of Eddie Graham’s Championship Wrestling From Florida promotion will remember Keirn as a young babyface. Later, Keirn would excel in tag team wrestling as one-half of The Fabulous Ones with Stan Lane during the 1980s.
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Douglass is no stranger to wrestling, having collaborated on autobiographies for Buggsy McGraw, B. Brian Blair and Dan Severn. He also wrote Bahamian Rhapsody, a history of pro wrestling in the Bahamas from 1960 to 2020.
The reader hears Keirn’s voice throughout Keirn Chronicles, which is the mark of a good collaborator.

Keirn had a wrestling angle that was irresistible. His father was a prisoner of war during World War II for eight months, and then for nearly eight years in North Vietnam during the late 1960s and early 1970s. It was a perfect angle because heels like Bob Roop could criticize Col. Richard Keirn for “allowing” himself to be captured, or to question his courage.

Steve Keirn would take umbrage, a fight would ensue, and grudge matches would be held. As any wrestling promoter will tell you, the bottom line is making money.

Keirn’s father was amenable, so the angle worked. It is certainly not the most tasteless wrestling angle ever, but definitely one of the edgier ones.

While Keirn was growing up, Graham would take a role in his development, turning into a “father figure.” Keirn would do odd jobs, picking up wrestlers at Tampa International Airport, serving as a ring announcer and even serving as a referee.

Years later, Keirn and Graham, along with the promoter’s son, Mike Graham, would have contentious issues over business deals. Keirn said he sank money into several ventures that left him poorer but wiser.

But Keirn and Mike Graham were friends in high school and also had some success as tag team partners in Florida before business outside of the ring got in the way.

Keirn attended Robinson High School in Tampa, the closest high school to MacDill Air Force base. He would become a member of the school’s “Junior Mafia,” which included future wrestlers Mike Graham and Dick Slater. It becomes apparent after reading some of Keirn’s stories about Slater that he was as wild and unpredictable in real life as his wrestling character was. Slater, who died in October 2018, certainly earned his nicknames of “Dirty Dick” and “Mr. Unpredictable.”
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“Slater’s got the best right hand I’ve ever seen,” fellow wrestler Ron Fuller once said. “Slater’s got the best punch I’ve ever seen.”

Another acquaintance of Slater was a young Terry Bollea, who would rise to fame as Hulk Hogan. Keirn writes that he tried to dissuade Hogan from wrestling, even when the teen would watch enthusiastically at Tampa’s steamy Sportatorium, a nondescript building where television tapings would occur. Keirn urged Hogan to stick to playing the bass guitar, but was ignored. The decision was a good one for the Hulkster.

Other wrestlers have written about Eddie Graham’s obsession with maintaining “kayfabe” —  presenting the staged wrestling matches and interviews as if they were genuine —  Keirn confirms that. Graham was a stickler for keeping the heels and babyfaces apart, even in public. For opponents to be seen together away from the ring was grounds for dismissal.

After doing the menial work for Graham, the promoter decided it was time to break Keirn into the business.

“I’m gonna break you into the business the real way,” Graham told him.

Keirn trained with Hiro Matsuda and received some sage advice from Jack Brisco — my favorite wrestler while growing up, by the way — to pay attention, watch and learn.

“You have to be like a sponge, because you’re a minnow in a sea of sharks,” Brisco told him. “And if you don’t like somebody, never let them know it. Be kind and humble.”

Wrestlers during the 1970s and '80s had to travel, usually by car. In Florida, that meant seven nights a week on the road, plus there were interviews to tape. Grueling stuff. In Georgia, Keirn would have a scary flight with fellow wrestler Ronnie Garvin piloting a small plane in southern Georgia. Years later he would have even scarier experiences with Graham piloting planes around Florida with wild abandon — and not always while sober, Keirn writes.

Competing at venues like the state mental hospital in Georgia could also be like insanity for a young wrestler.

Keirn paid his dues as a young wrestler, being a “jobber” in the early matches and traveling to Guatemala to wrestle as a masked heel. But he persevered and even was named rookie of the year by The Wrestling News in 1974.

​As a promoter, Graham “was such a genius,” Keirn writes. Meticulous to a fault, Graham was detail-oriented and adept at “creating great wrestling moments,” including the buildup to the end of the match.

When I was a young wrestling fan, main event matches in Florida always were intense, even if it was an hourlong draw between Brisco and then-world heavyweight champion Dory Funk Jr. at the West Palm Beach Auditorium. I saw plenty of those title matches at the “leaky tepee,” and was excited every time.

Keirn tells a hilarious story about  Dusty Rhodes getting a traffic ticket after bragging that “there’s not a highway patrolman, not a sheriff, and not a police officer in the state of Florida who would give the American Dream a ticket.”

Except this officer, who did not watch professional wrestling. I won’t give away the punchline, but Rhodes’ retort was priceless.

Keirn does write about wrestling territories other than Florida — Memphis and the AWA areas, for example —  but I was fascinated with the Sunshine State stories because I grew up watching many of the wrestlers and wanted to know more of the inside stuff. I was not disappointed.

At one point, Keirn said he borrowed $50,000 from his future father-in-law to buy 2.5% percent of Championship Wrestling from Florida. But when he received cash in bags after shows, he became suspicious and confronted Eddie Graham. Keirn got his initial investment back and got out of the ownership business in Florida.

Eddie Graham eventually committed suicide in early 1985. Keirn is harsh in his assessment.

“People need to come to grips with the fact that your idols and mentors will always let you down, and that’s a scenario that played out in my life,” Keirn writes.

To be fair, neither Eddie Graham, nor Mike Graham, who would also commit suicide in 2012, are unable to rebut what Keirn has written. I wrote the Mike Graham story for The Tampa Tribune in October 2012, and that was a tough one.

But I did not do business with them or were as closely aligned (I did take calls at the Tribune’s sports desk when Mike Graham called in boat racing results), so Keirn’s assessment is obviously from personal experience and perception.

Keirn also writes about wrestling in Georgia for Jim Barnett, the Mid-Atlantic territory for the Crockett family, and even throws in stories about a stint in Japan.

Keirn learned the sleeper hold from former wrestler and Jacksonville promoter Don Curtis, writing that “I got so much more respect from the fans seemingly overnight.”

Keirn would put the hold on opponents, and also execute the move on audience members at wrestling venues and people who would challenge him in bars. Even a doubting television host was not immune. The hold helped his credibility and allowed him to rise from the bottom of the wrestling card toward the top.

Keirn can be blunt. Evaluating the Fabulous Freebirds, he notes that Buddy Roberts and Terry Gordy were great workers but that Michael Hayes “was more interested in moonwalking rather than having a technically sound wrestling match.”
​
Roberts, Keirn said, never washed his tights.

​Some wrestlers in Memphis “seemed to be locking up with all the aggression of two feeble old ladies.”

Harley Race “could put the fear of God in you” because he protected the wrestling business “at all costs.”

Nick Bockwinkel “was all show to me.”

My bias here is about Florida wrestling, and I eagerly read every word about the promotion, but Keirn’s greatest success came when he teamed with Stan Lane to form “The Fabulous Ones” from 1982 to 1987. Keirn goes into great detail about his partnership with Lane and their battles against the Moondogs and the Road Warriors.
​
The Fabulous Ones wore suspenders, bowties, top hats and jackets to the ring. It was an update to the Fargo Brothers gimmick that flourished in the Tennessee territory years before, and it worked for the MTV generation.

They would strut to the ring with songs like “Everybody Wants You,” by Billy Squier, and they cut a silly video that mimicked ZZ Top’s popular video at the time, “Sharp Dressed Man.” With their Nashville connections, Keirn and Lane got to escort Kenny Rogers to the stage during a concert. They even met Mike Love of the Beach Boys at the airport in Memphis.

The pair became wildly popular and profited from the sale of merchandise, a concept that was still in its infancy in the 1980s. They even started a wrestling school, but that venture did not pan out. However, the most notable pupil was future wrestler Tracy Smothers.

What really shines through in the Keirn Chronicles is Keirn’s devilish side. The guy was a prankster who loved to pull a rib, or swerve, on fellow wrestlers. No one was immune.

He once turned off Jerry Brisco’s air supply when they were scuba diving in the Gulf of Mexico. Keirn enlisted an off-duty police officer in Daytona Beach to “bust” Mike Graham at a hotel room and stuffed a live armadillo into Prince Tonga’s wrestling bag.

The best prank Keirn pulled was on Curt Hennig at Memphis International Airport. Keirn got a police officer to serve an arrest warrant on Hennig as he exited a plane, and the startled and confused wrestler fell for the ruse hook, line and sinker.

“I loved to get guys arrested,” Keirn writes. “Because of the great relationships I formed with cops, I was able to regularly rib guys by having them arrested during my career.

“After all, who is going to argue with a cop?”

While wrestling may be scripted, the injuries were real. When he broke his ankle and could not wrestle, Keirn had to borrow money from his parents to stay afloat financially.

“One injury had taken me from being on the top of the world to the depths of unemployment,” Keirn writes. “All I do was sit around while waiting for everything to heal up.”

Like many wrestlers, Keirn has had some close calls. He nearly died after he was cut in the temple with a blade from another wrestler while “getting color.”

The Keirn Chronicles is another wrestling book worth putting on the shelf. A new generation of fans may see the WWE’s slick production and angles, but the wrestling business Keirn saw when he began was still raw, unpredictable and very Darwinist.

“It was simultaneously exciting, and more than a little bit scary, because anything could happen in this business,” Keirn writes.

His wrestling autobiography helps fans understand the life of a truly fabulous one.

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about the nearly 500 Goudey cards that Pittsburgh sports card shop owner Chad Weldon made a deal for: 

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/1930s-goudey-baseball-card-find-sports-card-junction/

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily previewing Panini's high-end Flawless basketball set:

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/flawless-basketball-returns-with-high-end-cards-low-print-run-and-embedded-gems/

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about SCP Auctions President/CEO David Kohler's Type I photograph of one the NBA's legendary photographs -- Jerry West sinking a 63-foot shot at the buzzer to send Game 3 of the NBA Finals into overtime:

​www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/photo-of-jerry-wests-iconic-buzzer-beater-in-1970-nba-finals-authenticated/

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily previewing the 2023 Topps Tribute baseball set:

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/topps-tribute-offers-a-big-hit-in-every-pack/

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about Upper Deck obtaining the exclusive license to producer USFL cards in 2023.

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/upper-deck-will-produce-usfl-cards/
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Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about Capt. Dan Adams, who discovered an incredible array of baseball memorabilia while driving through southwestern Maine in 1975:

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/retired-charter-boat-captain-reeled-in-treasure-trove-of-baseball-memorabilia/

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily about a pair of 1983 sets by Donruss -- the Action All-Stars cards and the Hall of Fame Heroes:

​www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/donruss-branched-out-in-1983-with-action-all-stars-hall-of-fame-heroes-sets/

​Here’s another book that will be sure to spark debates among sports fans.
It’s what we do. Who’s the best? Who’s the greatest? We could argue all day.

And that’s what ESPN host Mike Greenberg and his producer, Paul Hembekides, help sports fan do. They play a numbers game in a fast-paced look at sports legends and the numbers we associate them with.

Got Your Number: The Greatest Sports Legends and the Numbers They Own (Hyperion Avenue; $25.99; hardback; 317 pages) is more than just assigning a uniform number to a player and saying that athlete “owns it.”

For example, golfing great Jack Nicklaus never wore a uniform number while on the links. But Greenberg writes that the number 18 — signifying the Golden Bear’s major championships — tops the number worn by quarterback Peyton Manning. Joe Louis had 25 title defenses, Vin Scully was in the broadcast booth for 67 seasons with the Dodgers, and Rocky Marciano was unbeaten in 49 professional fights.

Greenberg runs the gamut from No. 1 to No. 100, and just about every legend is represented, from Red Grange to Tiger Woods.

It’s “heated debate with zero consequence,” Greenberg writes.
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And there will be some sharp disagreements. Right off the bat, I took issue. Greenberg, who lives in the New York City area, assigned No. 7 to John Elway. Not a bad choice, since Elway won two Super Bowls in five appearances and had a slew of eye-popping statistics to back it up. But No. 7 has to be Mickey Mantle — at least in my book. With 12 World Series appearances and seven championships, the Mick owned No. 7. A powerful switch-hitter who played hurt—and many times hung over — Mantle was the guy.
Take away Greenberg’s subway tokens for that one.

​But hey, that’s the point of this book. Many will argue that Elway is indeed who one thinks of when No. 7 is mentioned. “The Drive” against the Browns was awesome.

“It is hard to imagine there will ever be an athlete as beloved in any city as John Elway is in Denver,” Greenberg writes.

It’s a generational thing, perhaps. We can discuss it over a bottle of Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7. Can’t quibble with that number.

Many of the numbers that Greenberg assigns are slam-dunks — Bill Russell (No. 6), John Havlicek (No. 17) and Michael Jordan (No. 23), to keep it in the basketball family.

In baseball there is Ozzie Smith (No. 1), Derek Jeter (No. 2), Babe Ruth (No. 3), Joe DiMaggio (No. 5), Pete Rose (No. 14), Roberto Clemente (No. 21), Willie Mays (No. 24), Jackie Robinson (No. 42) and Henry Aaron (No. 44). And in hockey, Bobby Orr (No. 4), Gordie Howe (No. 9), Mario Lemieux (No. 66) and Wayne Gretzky (No. 99) are perfect selections.

I was curious to see who Greenberg would present No. 12 to, but it really was no surprise. You knew it had to be the G.O.A,T., Tom Brady. Same with No. 32. You had candidates like Sandy Koufax and even O.J. Simpson (if you could stomach that), but was there anyone who owned that number better than Jim Brown?

It was a nice touch to dedicate 72 to the perfect Dolphins of 1972, and 60 to the number of matches played between women’s tennis greats Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova. The number of Grand Slams won by Serena Williams (in addition to her singles titles) could have yielded to the Dolphins’ No. 39, Larry Csonka, but I understand that you have to get Serena in there somewhere.

Without revealing every number (why buy the book at that point?), other athletes receive Greenberg’s attention.

They include Pat Summitt, Richard Petty, Mildred “Babe” Didrikson, Walter Payton, Bob Gibson, Rod Laver, Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier, Billie Jean King, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson, LeBron James and Wilt Chamberlain.

What would have been fun: The inclusion of 1/8, for Eddie Gaedel. He certainly owned that number.

What Greenberg sets out to accomplish in Got Your Number is a fun time for sports fans, and he achieves that goal. He has a sharp wit and is not afraid to make fun of himself, as the title of one his previous books, Why My Wife Thinks I’m an Idiot, can attest.

The book has plenty of the kind of nuggets that sports fans love. And a reader does not have to follow it in numerical order.

Got Your Number is a fun read. And if you should happen to disagree with Greenberg’s choices, or have a different opinion than a friend, that’s OK too.
​
That’s what sports fans do.

If you are a fantasy baseball lover, love reading about up-and-coming player or just simply enjoy crunching numbers, then James Bailey has a book that will scratch your itch.

Major League Debuts: 2023 Edition ($17.99; paperback; 412 pages) is a deep dive into the 303 players who made their major league debuts during the 2022 season.

This wonderful reference guide covers Padres shortstop C.J. Abrams to Marlins pitcher Aneurys Zabala, which plenty of information in between.

Bailey is well-equipped to tackle such an ambitious project. He is a former associate editor at Baseball America and has written about baseball for Lindy’s Sports and Ultimate Sports Publishing.

Statistics used in the book are provided from Pete Palmer and Gary Gillette of Hidden Game Sports.

When he was not digging into statistics, the Rochester, New York, resident wrote five novels.

The Greatest Show on Dirt debuted in 2012. It drew upon Bailey’s stint with the Durham Bulls from 1990 to 1992 while he attended North Carolina State University. That was followed by Nine Bucks a Pound in 2014, which followed an underappreciated minor leaguer who decides to use performance-enhancing drugs and then has to deal with the consequences after his steroid use is discovered.

A third novel, the non-baseball Sorry I Wasn’t What You Needed, was released in 2015.
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Bailey’s latest forays into fiction have been the first two books of a trilogy. The First World Problems of Jason Van Otterloo was published in 2018, with a second book, Dispatches from a Tourist Trap, following in 2019.

Major League Debuts has a consistent formula. Bailey devotes approximately a page or page-and-a-half to each player. He begins with a synopsis of the player’s debut, followed by background that lists the player’s career before the majors and any fun facts. The third breakout summarizes the player’s 2022 season, while an “outlook” paragraph gives a projection of the player’s future.

Fun fact that Bailey does not include — and how could he have known? — I attended the 2022 debut of Rays catcher Rene Pinto, who went 2-for-3 with a home run and a single against the Seattle Mariners in a forgettable 8-4 loss on April 26 by Tampa Bay at Tropicana Field. Still, that turned out to be the best debut by a position player during 2022.

The best pitching effort also involved the Rays and Mariners, but I did not attend that game. Seattle’s George Kirby shut out Tampa Bay for six innings before a Mother’s Day crowd of 32.501 on May 8. He struck out seven but did not figure into the decision, but Seattle won 2-1 in 10 innings.

Before listing the biographies of the players, Bailey feeds the readers some overall statistics about the players. Bailey writes that the average age of the players making their debuts in 2022 was 25 years, 152 days. The youngest player was Francisco Alvarez of the Mets (20.315) and the oldest was Jason Krizan (32.305).

Not surprisingly, 223 of the 303 players introduced to the Big Show were born in the U.S. The next biggest group came from the Caribbean Countries, with the Dominican Republic (33) leading the way. Venezuela had 24, followed by Mexico (6) and Cuba (5).

Bailey notes that 39 of the players in his research had Tommy John surgery, including some non-pitchers.

Each player biography contains complete minor league and major league statistics, including games by position for every season. That would certainly be a useful tool for fantasy baseball players.

But why write such an exhaustive book?
​
“I kind of thought about the kind of book I might like to read, and started playing around with some ideas,” Bailey told MiLB.com’s Benjamin Hill on “The Show Before the Show” podcast on Wednesday. “And started playing around with some ideas and it kept on going.”

The statistics are great, and so are the season debuts, summaries and projections, but what makes Bailey’s work stand out is the attention to detail in the players’ backgrounds.

In addition to free sites, Bailey said he subscribed to at least 36 newspapers online.

“I literally subscribed to so many of them I still don’t have a complete list,” Bailey writes in his introduction.

There are players who have relatives in the majors, like Kody Clemens, the son of Roger Clemens. Joe Dunand of the Marlins is the nephew of Alex Rodriguez, and Maikel Garcia is the cousin of Alcides Escobar. Dalton Guthrie is the son of former pitcher Mark Guthrie, who pitched for 15 seasons in the majors. Fun fact about Dalton; he is only the third player to make it to the majors with the first name of “Dalton.” The others were Dalton Jones, who played nine seasons in the majors and batted .389 in the 1967 World Series with the Boston Red Sox; and Dalton Pompey, who played with the Blue Jays from 2014 to 2018.

Buddy Kennedy is the grandson of former major leaguer Don Money, a 16-year veteran who appeared in the 1982 World Series with the Milwaukee Brewers. And Bobby Witt Jr.’s father, Bobby Witt, won 142 games during his 16-season career in the majors.

There are several others, too.

One that Bailey missed: pitcher Alex Faedo is related to former major leaguer Lenny Faedo, who played for the Twins from 1980 to 1984.

Well, you can’t get them all. But 99% is rather good. Besides, the only reason I knew this is because the Faedos are from Tampa. Lenny was an assistant coach for my son’s Little League team in the late 1990s and gave him an autographed baseball.

Some of the players had great careers in the minors or as youth players. As Bailey notes, Nick Pratto drove in the winning run in the title game of the 2011 Little League World Series. Matthew Batten also reached the Little League World Series with the Shelton, Connecticut, All-Stars in 2008.

Bailey discloses that Jeter Downs, who debuted with the Red Sox, was indeed named for Boston nemesis Derek Jeter. Or that outfielder Narciso Crook, who was born in the Dominican Republic, learned English when he moved to Trenton, New Jersey, by listening to songs by Emimem. Lil Wayne and 50 Cent. It’s a fair guess that Crook did not learn how to throw by watching 50 Cent.

Bryan Hoeing’s mother, Donna Lamping Hoeing, broke the women’s scoring record at Ball State University (1,104 points in 93 games) and was inducted into the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame in 2017. Kramer Robertson’s mother, Kim Mulkey, was inducted into the National Basketball Hall of Fame in 2020 after coaching Baylor to three women’s basketball titles.

You get the idea. There is plenty of useful information in this book, and Bailey presents it clearly in a readable format. Readers will enjoy the statistics and the nuts-and-bolts information about each player, but others will gravitate toward the vignettes of each player.

The only criticism is that there are no photographs in the book, which would have been nice. Readers enjoy connecting to photos, even if they are only mugshots of the players.

Major League Debuts: 2023 Edition is a nice addition to a passionate baseball fan’s library. Bailey indicated that he plans to publish another volume for 2024, highlighting the players who reach the majors in 2023.

That is something to look forward to.

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors about a western New York man who took a plea deal after scamming collectors out of more than $33,000 in baseball card sales:
www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/new-york-man-enters-plea-deal-in-wire-fraud-case-that-scammed-collectors-out-of-33k-in-sports-cards/

2ere's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily previewing the 2022 Topps Stadium Club Chrome set:

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/2022-topps-stadium-club-chrome-focuses-on-autographs-parallels/

​Baseball and history go hand in hand. The history of baseball evokes fond childhood memories, when parents would take their children to watch games or would coach them in youth leagues.

But what about baseball in the future? What if it disappears from the American landscape? Could it ever make a comeback?

Those are some of the themes that first-time author William R. Douglas addresses in his novel, The Death and Resurrection of Baseball: Echoes from a Distant Past (Woodbridge Publications; $29.95; hardback; 252 pages).
​
Inspired by themes from movies like Field of Dreams and The Sandlot and weaving elements from David Aikman’s When the Almond Tree Blossoms and William Forstchen’s One Second After into his narrative, Douglas tells a futuristic story of hope, the return of family dynamics and what these days appears to be a lost art — getting along with others even if their beliefs are at opposite ends of the spectrum. There is also some baseball names bandied about — directly and indirectly —that will bring smiles to Chicago sports fans.
There are even a few casual references to the 1989 film, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and 1984’s The Natural.

But now, back to the future and Douglas’ novel.

It is 2166, more than a century after a second Civil War had devastated the U.S., killing millions of people. The nation has returned to “horse-and-buggy” mode after a computer virus wipes out data worldwide. Sports are played, but the emphasis is on soccer and lacrosse. Video games (then as now) have taken up the attention of youths.

Baseball is nowhere in sight, ever since a crippling three-year players strike. Then, a 5,000-pound bomb was dropped on a stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina, on April 11, 2061, killing 1,776 people. Note the irony. The next day, the Second Civil War began, 200 years to the day after the first Civil War began. Double irony.

These elements play to Douglas’ strengths. Graduating in 1980 with a degree in journalism, he eventually worked in the information technology field. Add to that his love for history and Chicago sports — particularly the White Sox — and Douglas pulls that knowledge into a compelling narrative that centers around his own hometown of McHenry, Illinois.

Joe Scott, a 12-year-old living in McHenry, is exploring in the VFW Woods — a no man’s land that was once the site of the Second Civil War’s bloodiest battle. Scott is walking with a friend when he finds a puzzling relic. It is a sign attached to a fence that reads “No Pepper.” Baseball fans in our time knows what that means, but in Douglas’ narrative the sport vanished from American culture more than a century ago.

Scott’s father tries to figure out what it means.

That is where Grandpa Moses steps in.

Brian Albert Woodbridge is 85 and a member of the revered Crucible Generation. Those were the people who had to deal with the immediate aftermath of the Second Civil War. Affectionately known as Grandpa Moses, he lives in Dyersville, Iowa (there’s that Field of Dreams tie-in) and remains a can-do guy. He is a former congressman who won his seat at age 65 and can drive a big-rig truck, a rarity in these times.

What Grandpa Moses also has is a trunk in his attic that contains a secret. “The property of a pirate, filled with gold and priceless gems,” he muses. When Joe Scott and his younger brother Austin come to visit, Grandpa Moses decides the time is right to find out what is in that mysterious trunk.
​
There is no gold, but the relics are priceless.

The boys and their grandfather find VHS and DVDs, along with equipment that can play them, along with baseball equipment. There is also a letter dated from 2064, written by Grandpa Moses’ great-great-grandfather.

The letter instructs them that there are two vaults buried in the backyard behind the farmhouse in Dyersville, and they discover more baseball relics, including a copy of “The Sandlot.”

“Baseball, huh. It looks like fun,” Joe Scott says.

It was. And the players take to the game quickly. Baseball suddenly becomes a national craze and a way for Americans to bond again. After a local newspaper reporter — go figure, newspapers were back in vogue in 2166? — and national media show interest, even the president weighs in. But Scott and his friends had to learn the game.

“It was one thing to watch movies and read books,” Douglas writes. “It was quite another to do what they were learning.”

The players compete vigorously, but show good sportsmanship and find themselves enjoying the nuances of the sport. Even the fans put away their differences and simply enjoyed the game.

It was a sentiment that Grandpa Moses thought about what mesmerized him about the old ballgame. He reached back into a behavior he had read about.

People were polarized, where it seemed as if “half of America had developed a hatred for the other half,” that led to the deaths of 90% of the U.S. population.
But a steadying influence was baseball.

“When the game was over and the seats emptied, everyone who had come in peace, left in peace,” he said.

While the baseball strike did not cause the Second Civil War, it removed decency that was exhibited through sports.

As a sidebar, when Grandpa Moses and Scott are invited to fly in a U.S. Army plane over the ruins of Chicago, they get to see some of that destruction firsthand. But the reason they were invited soon becomes apparent. The area is still crackling with radiation after an exchange of nuclear weapons caused the deaths of 80 million people in one day. But as the plane flies over the former South Side of Chicago, they see a partial structure that brings back memories of the old ballgame — Comiskey Park.

Douglas uses plenty of Chicago baseball references in his novel. Many are fun to find.

When a game is scheduled, with the president in the stands and a national television audience watching, other dignitaries arrive.

They include Illinois senators Beckert and Baines — could Douglas be referencing former Cubs infielder Glenn Beckert and White Sox Hall of Famer Harold Baines? There’s also a congresswoman named Barton, but it would have been funnier if she had been named Bartman (Cubs fans can wince now).

Bill Evans, Ned Chylak, Dave Eddings and August Donatelli are the umpires for the big game, and there’s some nostalgia there.

All of the real-life umpires have ties to Chicago. Billy Evans was a Hall of Fame umpire who worked the day Charlie Robertson pitched a perfect game for the White Sox in 1922. Nestor Chylak umpired the Toronto Blue Jays’ first-ever game, which was played against the White Sox in 1977. Doug Eddings was the plate umpire for Game 2 of the 2005 ALCS that involved the infamous dropped third strike while A.J. Pierzynski was batting. And he also was the plate umpire when White Sox pitcher Carlos Rodon tossed a no-hitter in April 2021.

And Augie Donatelli umpired a 1956 doubleheader between the Cubs and Braves that saw 15 home runs hit at Wrigley Field.

Reggie Spalding, who plays a part at the end of the novel, is a direct descendant of former baseball Hall of Famer and sporting goods pioneer Albert Spalding. The real-life Spalding, who developed the first baseball deemed “official” by the majors, opened his first store in Chicago.

The host of the “Good Morning, USA” that televises the game between the White Stockings and Bear Cubs is Laura Tubman, whose seventh great-grandmother was Underground Railroad heroine Harriet Tubman. The president, named Frederick Kennedy, is a Black Irishman whose genealogical branches include former presidents John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan.

Douglas is ever mindful of the impact the original Civil War had on America. In Kennedy’s dedication before the big baseball game, he references the Gettysburg Address, with an opening statement of “five score and seven years ago.”

I won’t give away the outcome of the game, but there are more Chicago references. When Scott’s rival Ted Lee Banks hits a home run in the eighth inning, the baseball broadcaster dusts off a “Hey, hey!” like Cubs announcer Jack Brickhouse did when Ernie Banks hit his 500th career home run on May 12, 1970.

There is also a player for the Bear Cubs named Roy Hobson, a nod to The Natural’s Roy Hobbs.

My favorite reference, though, is that the producer of “Good Morning, USA” is named Arnie Harris. If you followed Cubs baseball and announcer Harry Caray on WGN-TV, you know that the producer of the broadcasts was Arne Harris, who worked the games from 1964 until his death in 2001. The president of American News Network, which produced the fictional game in Douglas’ novel, was Harry Scully, a nice juxtaposition of Caray and Dodgers immortal broadcaster Vin Scully.

Maybe I am reading too much into all of these references, but I believe they were put there intentionally. They were fun to read.

If there is a criticism with Douglas’ book, it is that the climactic game has too much dialogue between the announcers. But that is a universal complaint even in 2023. It does not detract from the overall presentation; baseball fans will enjoy it.

For the most part, the dialogue and narrative is good. There is genuine wonderment that a game that seemed so ancient could make people enthusiastic and relearn the art of agreeing to disagree.

It is a nice moral theme.

Douglas’ book ends with a scene in heaven, with Jackie Robinson announcing the return of baseball after a century. Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and even Shoeless Joe Jackson marvel at the game’s return, but leave it to heaven’s Big Guy to have the final say.

“Let’s play ball!”

The Death and Resurrection of Baseball is a book brimming with hope. Douglas’ themes are not preachy, but they make one think. As they should.
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The novel speaks to family values, patriotism and the love of a game that may seem dead to some but still has remarkable resiliency.

Here's a story I wrote for Sports Collectors Daily previewing the 2022 Panini Obsidian football set:

www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/2022-obsidian-football-guide/