This biography of Tris Speaker is the first to tell the full story of Speaker's turbulent life and to document in sharp detail the grit and glory of his pivotal role in baseball's dead-ball era.

During the Cleveland Indians' checkered 110-year history, only two of its teams have brought home baseball's ultimate prize. While the 1948 team continues to be revered by Clevelanders, little has been written about the 1920 team that won the city's first pennant and World Series. Few, if any, World Series championship teams faced as much adversity as did the 1920 Indians. Among the obstacles they faced were the death of their star pitcher's wife in May; the shadow of the Chicago "Black Sox" scandal; and the tragic deadly beaning of shortstop Ray Chapman, the only fatal injury ever sustained by a major league player on the field of play. This chronicle of that extraordinary season highlights an overlooked chapter in the history of one of baseball's most beloved underdogs.

Baseball was rocked in the winter of 1926 when one-time star pitcher and all-time trouble maker Dutch Leonard produced letters implicating Baseball Gods Ty Cobb and Tris Speaker in a game-fixing scheme that unfolded days before the 1919 World Series. It's the biggest gambling scandal in baseball history this side of the Black Sox and Pete Rose.

During the Cleveland Indians' checkered 110-year history, only two of its teams have brought home baseball's ultimate prize. While the 1948 team continues to be revered by Clevelanders, little has been written about the 1920 team that won the city's first pennant and World Series. Few, if any, World Series championship teams faced as much adversity as did the 1920 Indians. Among the obstacles they faced were the death of their star pitcher's wife in May; the shadow of the Chicago "Black Sox" scandal; and the tragic deadly beaning of shortstop Ray Chapman, the only fatal injury ever sustained by a major league player on the field of play. This chronicle of that extraordinary season highlights an overlooked chapter in the history of one of baseball's most beloved underdogs.

"An biography of perhaps the most significant and controversial player in baseball history, Ty Cobb, drawing in part on newly discovered letters and documents"--

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * Winner of the CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year “An instant sports classic.” —New York Post * “Stellar.” —The Wall Street Journal * “A true masterwork…880 pages of sheer baseball bliss.” —BookPage (starred review) * “This is a remarkable achievement.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review) A magnum opus from acclaimed baseball writer Joe Posnanski, The Baseball 100 is an audacious, singular, and masterly book that took a lifetime to write. The entire story of baseball rings through a countdown of the 100 greatest players in history, with a foreword by George Will. Longer than Moby-Dick and nearly as ambitious,? The Baseball 100 is a one-of-a-kind work by award-winning sportswriter and lifelong student of the game Joe Posnanski. In the book’s introduction, Pulitzer Prize–winning commentator George F. Will marvels, “Posnanski must already have lived more than two hundred years. How else could he have acquired such a stock of illuminating facts and entertaining stories about the rich history of this endlessly fascinating sport?” Baseball’s legends come alive in these pages, which are not merely rankings but vibrant profiles of the game’s all-time greats. Posnanski dives into the biographies of iconic Hall of Famers, unfairly forgotten All-Stars, talents of today, and more. He doesn’t rely just on records and statistics—he lovingly retraces players’ origins, illuminates their characters, and places their accomplishments in the context of baseball’s past and present. Just how good a pitcher is Clayton Kershaw in the 21st-century game compared to Greg Maddux dueling with the juiced hitters of the nineties? How do the career and influence of Hank Aaron compare to Babe Ruth’s? Which player in the top ten most deserves to be resurrected from history? No compendium of baseball’s legendary geniuses could be complete without the players of the segregated Negro Leagues, men whose extraordinary careers were largely overlooked by sportswriters at the time and unjustly lost to history. Posnanski writes about the efforts of former Negro Leaguers to restore sidelined Black athletes to their due honor and draws upon the deep troves of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum and extensive interviews with the likes of Buck O’Neil to illuminate the accomplishments of players such as pitchers Satchel Paige and Smokey Joe Williams; outfielders Oscar Charleston, Monte Irvin, and Cool Papa Bell; first baseman Buck Leonard; shortstop Pop Lloyd; catcher Josh Gibson; and many, many more. The Baseball 100 treats readers to the whole rich pageant of baseball history in a single volume. Engrossing, surprising, and heartfelt, it is a magisterial tribute to the game of baseball and the stars who have played it.

The biography of Oscar Charleston, a Negro Leagues legend and one of baseball’s greatest and most unjustifiably overlooked players.

This comprehensive guide takes the reader on a historical journey, providing an in-depth look at the icons of sport, captured through their greatest collectibles. Composed by the leading experts in the field, never before has one book covered such a variety of hobby subjects. For those interested in building a fine collection of sports memorabilia, from baseball cards to autographs to game-used bats, each subject is covered in great detail. Within each chapter, the best of the best has been selected by the experts. Whether you are a hardcore collector or just an avid sports fan, this book not only helps bring the legends of sport to life but it provides crucial tips on how to assemble a world class collection. From Babe Ruth to Tiger Woods, from Wilt Chamberlain to Joe Namath, every major sport is covered. This book contains hundreds of sports memorabilia images, including many of the finest examples in the world.

Full-color, detachable facsimile reproductions, both front and back, of 92 authentic baseball cards. Among the players are Hornsby, Young, McGraw, Stengel, Rickey, Gehrig, Williams, Mantle, Spahn, Robinson, Musial, Koufax, Clemente, and many more. There is no duplication of cards with Sugar's Classic Baseball Cards.

"Hooper's instinct for knowing where the ball was going to be hit was uncanny. I'm sure, too, that he made more diving catches than any other outfielder in history. With most outfielders the diving catch is half luck; with Hooper, it was a masterpiece of business."--Babe Ruth, on his selection of Harry Hooper for his all-time all-star team Through the figure of Harry Hooper (1887-1974), star of four World Series championship teams and a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, Paul Zingg describes baseball's transformation from an often rowdy spectacle to a respectable career choice and entertainment institution. Zingg chronicles Hooper's rise from a sharecropper background in California to college and then to the pinnacle of his sport. Boston's leadoff hitter and right fielder from 1909 to 1920, Hooper later played for the Chicago White Sox, managed in the Pacific Coast League, and coached Princeton's team. When he retired from playing in 1925, he held every major fielding record for an American League right fielder. Hooper's diaries, memoirs, and six decades of letters offer a rich and colorful commentary on the evolution of the game, as well as insight into the tensions between a player's public and private lives.