DiMag & Mick is a portrait of DiMaggio and Mantle as the old and young exemplars of what was a more confident, masterful age not only in baseball but in the country where they were held up as cultural heroes over two generations, symbolic of an America celebrating its recent triumph over Nazism and ever-curious about the new age of color television, rocket ships, and technology. Tony Castro shows DiMag and Mick as fathers and sons, rebels and heroes, and reveals the rite of passage of two men who would go down in baseball immortality – DiMaggio as he reluctantly prepares to leave the spotlight of adoration and hero-worship for glitzy world of Marilyn’s exploding Hollywood celebrity, and Mantle in his awkward attempt to leave his country roots of Dust Bowl Oklahoma for the big city exposure and expectations of greatness being placed on him. Yankee legend and glory holds a special magic all its own, and Castro examines the heart and soul of that mystique, especially the bond of the players themselves and how that came to breed and spread the perception that there was any animosity between DiMaggio and Mantle – two polarizing personalities who drove many teammates away from one and galvanized their friendship with the other.

"A portrait of baseball legends Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle"--

Major League Baseball's Opening Day, 1951. Nineteen-year-old Mickey Mantle puts on the New York Yankees' famous white pinstriped uniform. His stomach roils. Sweat beads his brow. Today is his first major league game in front of a near-capacity crowd at Yankee Stadium, and there is one man Mickey doesn't want to disappoint above all others: his father. Mickey Mantle: Rookie in Pinstripes is the uplifting true story of how a painfully shy teenager from rural Commerce, Oklahoma, became one of the biggest stars in Major League Baseball. While he looked to Joe DiMaggio for inspiration and dreamed of someday playing with that great New York Yankee, Mickey's true hero was his dad. Raised during the Depression, Mickey learned how to catch, hit, and field the ball from his father, Elvin. In high school, Mickey suffered a football injury that revealed a serious bone disorder. He wondered if he would ever play baseball again. But with the support and love of his father, he overcame his affliction and signed with the New York Yankees in 1949. A moving story of Mickey's early years in baseball, from his difficult rookie season to his triumphant return in 1951, Mickey Mantle portrays the everlasting bond between father and son and the making of one of baseball's greatest legends.

I really do believe I would be way up at the top of everything if I hadn’t been injured. When I was healthy, I really believe I was the best of anyone I ever saw play.—Mickey Mantle, reflecting on his career Mickey Mantle is one of baseball’s all-time greats. Playing for the New York Yankees for his entire professional career, Mantle was named to the All-Star team for 11 consecutive seasons, won three MVP awards, and was a seven-time World Series champion. He quickly became an icon who achieved hero status even while playing through injuries for most of his career. In Mantle: The Best There Ever Was, Tony Castro makes the impassioned argument that Mickey Mantle truly was the greatest ballplayer of all time. Acclaimed by the New York Times as the definitive biographer of baseball’s fabled number 7, Castro shares many of his personal conversations with Mantle, demystifying the legend and revealing intimate, never-before-published details from Mantle’s personal life. In addition, Castro offers illuminating new insights into Mantle’s extraordinary career, including the head-turning conclusion based on the evolution of analytics that the beloved Yankee switch-hitting slugger may ultimately win acclaim as having fulfilled the weighty expectation once placed on him: being even greater than Babe Ruth. Drawing from hundreds of interviews with ex-teammates, friends, and family, Castro masterfully blends Mantle’s public and private selves to present a fully rounded portrait of this complex, misunderstood national hero.

The story of Mickey Mantle's magnificent 1956 season Mickey Mantle was the ideal batter for the atomic age, capable of hitting a baseball harder and farther than any other player in history. He was also the perfect idol for postwar America, a wholesome hero from the heartland. In A Season in the Sun, acclaimed historians Randy Roberts and Johnny Smith recount the defining moment of Mantle's legendary career: 1956, when he overcame a host of injuries and critics to become the most celebrated athlete of his time. Taking us from the action on the diamond to Mantle's off-the-field exploits, Roberts and Smith depict Mantle not as an ideal role model or a bitter alcoholic, but a complex man whose faults were smoothed over by sportswriters eager to keep the truth about sports heroes at bay. An incisive portrait of an American icon, A Season in the Sun is an essential work for baseball fans and anyone interested in the 1950s.

Rich Marazzi has experienced Yankee history and its culture first-hand as a fan, a writer for Yankees Magazine, a radio talk show host, umpire in the Old Timer's Day game for 16 years, a writer for Mel Allen, the long-time voice of the Yankees, and currently as a baseball rules consultant who was hired by general manager Brian Cashman in 2004. He was also trained by Bob Sheppard as a back-up to the legendary Yankee Stadium public address announcer. In this book Marazzi takes the reader inside Yankee baseball by covering life in the press box, the dugout, the clubhouse, the umpire's room and more. He compiles untold Yankee stories culled from interviews of many of the Yankee greats over the last seven decades including Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Phil Rizzuto, Don Mattingly, Derek Jeter and more.

Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris are forever intertwined in baseball history thanks to the unforgettable 1961 season, when the two Yankee icons spurred each other to new heights in pursuit of Babe Ruth's home run record. History has largely overlooked the bond between the two men not as titans of their sport, but as people. Guided by Tony Castro, bestselling author and foremost chronicler of Mantle, readers will journey into history, from the Yankees' blockbuster trade for Maris, whose acquisition re-ignited Mantle's career after a horrendous 1959 season, to the heroics of 1961 and far beyond. This dual biography is a thoroughly researched, emotionally gripping portrait that brings Yankees lore alive.