A unique look at baseball's clubhouse culture through the eyes of batboys

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Heat, Travel Team and Million-Dollar Throw. Brian is living every baseball kid's dream: he is a batboy for his hometown Major League team. Brian believes that it's the perfect thing to bring him and his big-leaguer dad closer together. And if that weren't enough, this is the season that Hank Bishop, Brian's baseball hero, returns to the Tigers for the comeback of a lifetime. The summer couldn't get much better! Until Hank Bishop starts to show his true colors, and Brian learns that sometimes life throws you a curveball.

The definitive work on the language of baseball—one of the “Five Best Baseball Books” (Wall Street Journal). Hailed as “a staggering piece of scholarship” (Wall Street Journal) and “an indispensable guide to the language of baseball” (San Diego Union-Tribune), The Dickson Baseball Dictionary has become an invaluable resource for those who love the game. Drawing on dozens of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century periodicals, as well as contemporary sources, Dickson’s brilliant, illuminating definitions trace the earliest appearances of terms both well known and obscure. This edition includes more than 10,000 terms with 18,000 individual entries, and more than 250 photos. This “impressively comprehensive” (The Nation) book will delight everyone from the youngest fan to the hard-core aficionado.

Still not sure what makes a sinker different from a curve? Can't remember when the M&M boys played with the Yankees? Want to know where the "seventh-inning stretch" comes from? Then you've done the right thing by picking up this book - the most complete collection of baseball terms and slang to be found between two covers. Impeccably researched, The New Dickson Baseball Dictionary covers all the bases.

Ever since he moved out of the house, Wednesday has become Simons favorite day of the week. It is the day he picks up his fourteen-year-old daughter, Leni, from school, drives her to her piano lessons, and enjoys a post-lesson weekly dinner ritual with her. But one Wednesday after he drops Leni at home, Simon suddenly has a foreboding feeling that something is wrong and is subsequently led down a path he never could have imagined. In thirteen poignant and compelling stories filled with a varied cast of characters including Billie Holiday and a thinly disguised Paul Newman, Neil Isaacs shares a glimpse into the high and low points in the lives of lovers and loners, siblings and spouses, and families and neighbors. From Marthas Vineyard to Aruba and the Caymans and from Boston to New York and San Antonio, his characters face life-changing moments and learn valuable lessons while dealing with lifes unpredictable challenges. One Thing and Another and Other Stories shares short tales that reveal the quirks and flaws of human nature and prove that we are all more alike than different.

More than any other sport, baseball has developed its own niche in America's culture and psyche. Some researchers spend years on detailed statistical analyses of minute parts of the game, while others wax poetic about its players and plays. Many trace the beginnings of the civil rights movement in part to the Major Leagues' decision to integrate, and the words and phrases of the game (for example, pinch-hitter and out in left field) have become common in our everyday language. From AARON, HENRY onward, this book covers all of what might be called the cultural aspects of baseball (as opposed to the number-rich statistical information so widely available elsewhere). Biographical sketches of all Hall of Fame players, owners, executives and umpires, as well as many of the sportswriters and broadcasters who have won the Spink and Frick awards, join entries for teams, owners, commissioners and league presidents. Advertising, agents, drafts, illegal substances, minor leagues, oldest players, perfect games, retired uniform numbers, superstitions, tripleheaders, and youngest players are among the thousands of entries herein. Most entries open with a topical quote and conclude with a brief bibliography of sources for further research. The whole work is exhaustively indexed and includes 119 photographs.

Clubhouse Confidential is the explosive, inside story of Yankees players and managers by a bat boy who saw it all You are invited to come behind the closed doors of the Yankees' clubhouse for the ride of your life in this intimate memoir about the team's glorious years and the superstars who made it all possible. For the first time ever, Luis "Squeegee" Castillo, bat boy and clubbie for the Yankees from 1998 to 2005, talks about working with Derek Jeter, Andy Pettitte, Jorge Posada, Mariano Rivera, Joe Girardi, Bernie Williams, Roger Clemens, Joe Torre, and many other modern-day Yankee greats. Luis saw and heard what really happened in the privacy of the clubhouse, at parties, and in hotel rooms, bar fights, and secret meetings from Miami to St. Louis, from Detroit to Arizona, and from Toronto to New York. He even vacationed with some players and got to know them like family, discovering their pitching and hitting secrets, joining them in all-nighters, and learning their often hilarious methods of meeting girls and having fun on the road. Like a fly on the wall, Luis takes you backstage to show you how A-Rod's bragging when he hits home runs annoys teammates. Discover how manager Joe Torre checks racing results during games. Hear what happens inside the sanctity of the clubhouse after Roger Clemens beans Mets catcher Mike Piazza and then-a few months later during the 2000 World Series-throws a bat at him. Find out how Mariano Rivera eats junk food during games, why Posada routinely fights with El Duque, what Jeter is really saying to players on other teams as he rounds the bases, and so much more. Everyone knows what happened on the field. Now pull up a chair and enjoy the secret stories that only Luis can tell about what really happened behind the scenes-and why.