Baseball best-sellers, Dec. 19

Note: Just like Chuck Lorre’s “vanity cards” at the end of The Big Bang Theory, you should read these list stories to their conclusion; the end is always changing, even though the theme is basically the same, finishing up with a self-promotional message.

On with the show…

As you may have notice in recent weeks, the output on the Bookshelf has been sparse. Received a one-week extension on my new book, which means it will be that much longer until things return to “normal.”

So without further ado, here are the top ten baseball books as per Amazon.com, as of this posting.

Caveat 1: Print editions only (at least for now); because I’m old school.

Caveat 2: Since the rankings are updated every hour, these lists might not longer be 100 percent accurate by the time you read them. But it’ll be close enough for government work.

Caveat 3: Sometimes they’ll try to pull one over on you and include a book within a category that doesn’t belong. I’m using my discretion to eliminate such titles from my list. For example, for some reason a recent listing included Tarnished Heels: How Unethical Actions and Deliberate Deceit at the University of North Carolina Ended the “The Carolina Way”, which, far as I can tell, is not at all about baseball, at least not in the main. For the sake of brevity, I will be omitting the subtitles, which have become ridiculously long in in some cases in recent years, also at my discretion.

1. Jeter Unfiltered, by Derek Jeter


2. The Greatest Baseball Stories Ever Told: Thirty Unforgettable Tales from the Diamond, by Jeff Silverman


3. Glory Days in Tribe Town: The Cleveland Indians and Jacobs Field 1994-1997, by Terry Pluto and Tom Hamilton


4. 2014 World Series Champions: San Francisco Giants, by Major League Baseball


5. Triple Crowned: The San Francisco Giants’ Incredible 2014 Championship Season


6. Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis


7. Derek Jeter: Excellence and Elegance, by The New York Times


8. The Closer, by Mariano Rivera with Wayne Coffey (Bookreporter.com review)


9. The Baseball Codes: Beanballs, Sign Stealing, and Bench-Clearing Brawls: The Unwritten Rules of America’s Pastime, by Jason Turbow


10. A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred, by George F. Will

Second week in a row that, for this writing at least, each of the top ten titles is an physical book. Usually I have to cull the e-books from the list to get to 10 physical hold-in-your-hands piece of work. Nice to see. Perhaps it’s the gift-giving thing; you can’t really wrap an e-book.

Not on this list? 501 Baseball Books Fans Must Read before They Die, although it is doing a bit better of late. Still, ya’ll are gonna do something about that, right?

If you have read it, thanks, hope you enjoyed it, and please consider writing a review for the Amazon page. Doesn’t have to be long (or even complimentary, if you didn’t like it), but anything would be appreciated. And thanks to those who have .

 

Baseball best-sellers, Dec. 19