Unique view of the history of baseball, through the eyes and pages of The Sporting News, a weekly publication created in 1886. This book charts the story of baseball's growth, discovery, perseverance, and accomplishment. Begins with modern baseball in 1901, the year the American League began play.

In Whats My Name, Fool? sports writer Dave Zirin shows how sports express the worst - and at times the most creative, exciting, and political - features of our society. Zirins sharp and insightful commentary on the personalities, politics, and history of American sports is unlike any sports writing being done today. Zirin explores how NBA brawls highlight tensions beyond the arena, how the bold stances taken by sports unions can chart a path for the entire labor movement, and the unexplored political stirrings of a new generation of athletes who are no longer content to just ''play one game at a time.'' Whats My Name, Fool? draws on original interviews with former heavyweight champ George Foreman, Olympic athlete John Carlos, NBA player and anti-death penalty activist Etan Thomas, antiwar womens college hoopster Toni Smith, Olympic Project for Human Rights leader Lee Evans and many others. It also unearths a history of athletes ranging from Jackie Robinson to Muhammad Ali to Billie Jean King, who charted a new course through their athletic ability and their outspoken views.

Profiles of 100 of the greatest baseball players of all time.

Sports events represent, for many, landmarks for memories, contexts that securely fix moments in past time. And in America, perhaps more than in any other country, they are part of what connects the individual to the multitude. When we add them to our remembrances, they subtly suggest that, like sporting contests, our personal tales are fit for public consumption. How easy and natural it is to add a little referential sidebar to the stories we tell: “I started work in January, I remember because the Bills had just lost the Super Bowl—the fourth one.” On a broader scale, sports have left their imprint on the stony history of the nation. Beginning slowly with a game of bowls (1611), something like miniature golf in New England (1652), horse racing on Long Island, and billiards in Charlestown (1722), the sporting life then gained momentum—and a firmer grip on the national conscience—with the early play of baseball, basketball, and football, games that would come to dominate the sports scene in 20th century America. Organized by day of the year, this volume provides the browser, the trivia buff and the sports historian a record of thousands of frames, matches, series, and championships. Whether it's the day a bases-loaded walk gave the National League its 16th All-Star victory in 17 seasons (July 17, 1979) or the day Harvard defeated Yale and Brown in the first-ever intercollegiate regatta (July 26, 1859), there's something new buried within the tome’s 365 layers for even the most knowledgeable fans.

Including the famous and not-so-famous, this collection features memorable mugs of baseball frozen for the ages: a youthful Ted Williams, a pensive Cal Ripken, an intense Babe Ruth, a menacing Randy Johnson, and a brutish Frank Thomas, among others. 200 color and b&w photos.

Greatness is in the eye of the beholder and any measure of that greatness stirs debate, outrage and a passion that burns deep in the soul of any professional football fan. The beholder in this volume is a team of editors from THE SPORTING NEWS, the publication that has chronicled the rise of the professional game from its club-sport infancy to the multimillion dollar National Football League that exists today. Not only have the top 100 professional football players of the century been selected, but they have been recording to the talent, passion, and excitement they brought to the field and the emotion they stirred among generations of fans.

Footballs greatest heroes come to life in this retrospective of the most legendary players in the game, including Lombardi, Landry, Starr, Staubach, Baugh, Bradshaw, and many others. 40,000 first printing.