A fascinating look at Roger Clemens, in the words of those who have had to face him at various times in his career, from All Stars (Cal Ripken, Jr., Torii Hunter) to rookies and even Clemens' eldest son.

At six feet, four inches and more than 220 pounds, Roger Clemens (1962- ) was a major figure in baseball for nearly a quarter century. The best pitcher of his generation, his 4,672 strikeouts rank third all-time. He dominates modern statistical analysis. High strung and temperamental, Clemens got into a barroom brawl during his first semester at University of Texas and once was jailed for punching out a Houston police officer. He endured sports writers heckling his inarticulate English and hostile fans decrying his aggressive pitching style. He retired in 2007 at 45 amid allegations of performance-enhancing drug use. Questioned by a Congressional committee about his alleged use of steroids, Clemens was accused of perjury but later acquitted. This book covers his life and his sensational but controversial career, with anecdotes from such baseball legends as Ted Williams, Casey Stengel and David Ortiz.

"The Last Nine Innings is the last word on the inside of baseball. It's full of wonderful revelations and perceptions that help us understand the game in ways that we might never have imagined. Charlie Euchner has done a marvelous job in getting players to talk, simply, about how they play, and we're the wiser for it." —Frank Deford "Charlie takes an unorthodox approach to an emotional week and succeeds at finding the heart of both the tension of the World Series and the technical foundations of the baseball profession. This is a different book, in a very good way." —Howard Bryant, the Washington Post, and author of Juicing the Game: Drugs, Power and the Fight for the Soul of Major League Baseball "The lengthy description of game 7 makes for dramatic reading, and the interviews with key players from that game add a human dimension." —Booklist "I enjoyed Charles's book. It's an interesting read, rich in thought-provoking detail and context, in the manner of Malcolm Gladwell. He deftly pulls off a difficult double play: educating the serious fan while entertaining the casual one." —Tom Verducci, Senior Writer for Sports Illustrated "The Last Nine Innings is entertaining, engaging and enlightening. You'll never watch a baseball game the same way." —Andrew Zimbalist, author of Baseball and Billions: A Probing Look Inside the Big Business of Our National Pastime and Robert A. Woods Professor of Economics at Smith College "Memo to ESPN analysts, FOX color announcers and daily baseball scribes: stop telling us about who had a haircut, who didn't have a haircut and who collects stamps. Rip out the red thread on the baseball, peel back the cowhide and talk about all the stuff that's wound up inside the game. That's what Charles Euchner does in The Last Nine Innings and it's fascinating." —Leigh Montville, author of Ted Williams, Biography of an American Hero and Why Not Us?: The 86-Year Journey of the Boston Red Sox Fans from Unparalleled Suffering to the Promised Land of the 2004 World Series The Great American Pastime has changed. For the first time in the history of the game, the three major forces that drive the evolution of modern pro baseball-The Triple Revolution-is revealed: The Triple Revolution: (1) Globalization of Recruiting and Business (2) Scientific Analysis & Reduction of Physical Baseball Movements (3) Evolution Effect of Modernized Stat-Crunching Charles Euchner uses a dramatic moment-by-moment narrative of the seventh game of the 2001 World Series between the Yankees and the Diamondbacks to display the Triple Revolution; and to reveal the hidden dimensions of the "game within the game": From pitching motions to batting styles, from fielding and base-running, to training and strategy. Euchner uses extensive interviews with all the players from this modern classic to produce a comprehensive view of the game that will fascinate casual fans, and stimulate baseball experts. The insider narrative includes Mariano Rivera, Jorge Posada, Derek Jeter, Tino Martinez, Luis Gonzalez and Curt Schilling, along with the game's coaches, managers, support staff, even medical researchers and top game stats experts. Among the questions answered: What is the ideal pitching motion? How can we judge defensive performance? What makes managers succeed and fail? What changes the odds over the course of the game? And much more. Whether a recreational fans, or serious student of the game, The Last Nine Innings enlightens; as baseball author Andrew Zimbalist writes, "You'll never watch a baseball game the same way."

Originally published in 1969, Robert Coover's first novel instantly established his mastery. A coal-mine explosion in a small mid-American town claims ninety-seven lives. The only survivor, a peculiar man subject to religious visions, is adopted as a prophet and quickly gains a following. Rapidly disseminated through the magic of media exposure, the cult spreads across America, and as its members gather on the Mount of Redemption to await the apocalypse, Robert Coover lays bare the madness of religious frenzy and the sometimes greater madness of normal citizens. The Origin of the Brunists is vintage Coover -- comic, fearless, incisive, and brilliantly executed.

In Civic Gifts, Elisabeth S. Clemens takes a singular approach to probing the puzzle that is the United States. How, she asks, did a powerful state develop within an anti-statist political culture? How did a sense of shared nationhood develop despite the linguistic, religious, and ethnic differences among settlers and, eventually, citizens? Clemens reveals that an important piece of the answer to these questions can be found in the unexpected political uses of benevolence and philanthropy, practices of gift-giving and reciprocity that coexisted uneasily with the self-sufficient independence expected of liberal citizens Civic Gifts focuses on the power of gifts not only to mobilize communities throughout US history, but also to create new forms of solidarity among strangers. Clemens makes clear how, from the early Republic through the Second World War, reciprocity was an important tool for eliciting both the commitments and the capacities needed to face natural disasters, economic crises, and unprecedented national challenges. Encompassing a range of endeavors from the mobilized voluntarism of the Civil War, through Community Chests and the Red Cross to the FDR-driven rise of the March of Dimes, Clemens shows how voluntary efforts were repeatedly articulated with government projects. The legacy of these efforts is a state co-constituted with, as much as constrained by, civil society.

Mark Twain, the American comic genius who portrayed, named, and in part exemplified America’s “Gilded Age,” comes alive in Justin Kaplan’s extraordinary biography. With brilliant immediacy, Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain brings to life a towering literary figure whose dual persona symbolized the emerging American conflict between down-to-earth morality and freewheeling ambition. As Mark Twain, he was the Mississippi riverboat pilot, the satirist with a fiery hatred of pretension, and the author of such classics as Tom Sawyer andHuckleberry Finn. As Mr. Clemens, he was the star who married an heiress, built a palatial estate, threw away fortunes on harebrained financial schemes, and lived the extravagant life that Mark Twain despised. Kaplan effectively portrays the triumphant-tragic man whose achievements and failures, laughter and anger, reflect a crucial generation in our past as well as his own dark, divided, and remarkably contemporary spirit. Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain brilliantly conveys this towering literary figure who was himself a symbol of the peculiarly American conflict between moral scrutiny and the drive to succeed. Mr. Clemens lived the Gilded Life that Mark Twain despised. The merging and fragmenting of these and other identities, as the biography unfolds, results in a magnificent projection of the whole man; the great comic spirit; and the exuberant, tragic human being, who, his friend William Dean Howells said, was “sole, incomparable, the Lincoln of our literature.”

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.