Al Oliver is a former Major League Baseball player. Over the course of his eighteen year career, he has been blessed to be able to play for the Pittsburgh Pirates (1968-77), Texas Rangers (1978-81), Montreal Expos (1982-83), San Francisco Giants (1984), Philadelphia Phillies (1984), Los Angeles Dodgers (1985) and Toronto Blue Jays (1985). From 1970 to 1976, he played for five Pirates division champions, including the team that defeated the Orioles in the 1971 World Series. Al Oliver was a career .303 hitter with 219 home runs and 1326 RBI's in 2368 games. He batted .300 or more eleven times and retired with 2,743 hits (45th on the all-time list). He is ranked among the all-time top 50 in games played (2368), total bases (4083), RBI (1326) and extra-base hits (825). Oliver was among the league's top ten in doubles nine times and among the league's top ten in hits nine times as well and finished in the top ten in batting average nine times. During his career, five times he was among the league's top ten in total bases and four times he was in the top ten in RBIs. Oliver is a seven time All Star player, a three time Sliver Slugger Award winner, and has won the 1982 National League Batting Title. Oliver's autobiography covers his faith and determination on both on and off the diamond. It also discuss Olivers life from overcoming hardships as a child to his eventual triumph of becoming a Major League Baseball player. His inspiring story will touch the hearts of many.

It started with one night out with the boys. She was the hot diner waitress putting herself through school. I was the rich, arrogant player everyone misjudges. On paper we didn't match. Yet all it took was one day. One single day to change her mind. She wasn't planning to spend her day off with me.She wasn't supposed to fall for my charm.But one day, one smile, turned into several nights of her calling out my name. I'm not the guy she should end up with. I'm jealous, possessive. Not here for a long time - just a good time. She's changed me. But, for some reason, I feel her slipping through my fingers and no matter what I do, I fear I'm going to strike out with the one and only girl I've ever fallen for.

Up until now, Billy Baggs's life has been loaded with nevers. Never been to a movie. Never played baseball with a real team. Never got over feeling guilty for the loss of his brother. But change is in the air. Billy discovers he has a natural talent for baseball, especially as a pitcher. Maybe, just maybe, there's more in store for him than life on the farm. But can Billy convince his father of that? Or is he destined to spend the rest of his life pitching nothing but hay?Teenager Billy Baggs is desperately needed on his family's struggling dairy farm, but he's also an extraordinarily gifted natural baseball player. How he struggles to reconcile his father's desire to keep him on the farm with his coach's interest in getting him on the field is at the heart of this ‘meaty story.… The complex characters grow and change in profoundly real ways.''K. ‘[With] flashes of humor, a wealth of lovingly recounted details evokes the difficult daily life on a small dairy farm.''Publishers Weekly. 1994 Best Books for Young Adults (ALA) 1994 Books for the Teen Age (NY Public Library) 1993 "Pick of the Lists" (ABA)

Looking for some new skills for the pitcher's mound, Logan Parrish visits Sal's Used Sporting Goods, where he meets a former minor league pitcher.

Jim Piersall baseball in the 1950s and 1960s for the Boston Red Sox, the Cleveland Indians, the Washington Senators, the New York Mets, and the California Angels. After brief forays into professional football and wrestling businesses, he has worked for many years in broadcasting and minor league player development for the Chicago Cubs. He lives in Arizona during the off-season and in Chicago during the season. Copyright © Libri GmbH. All rights reserved.

This is a new release of the original 1948 edition.

Is the face of American baseball throughout the world that of goodwill ambassador or ugly American? Has baseball crafted its own image or instead been at the mercy of broader forces shaping our society and the globe? The Empire Strikes Out gives us the sweeping story of how baseball and America are intertwined in the export of “the American way.” From the Civil War to George W. Bush and the Iraq War, we see baseball's role in developing the American empire, first at home and then beyond our shores. And from Albert Spalding and baseball's first World Tour to Bud Selig and the World Baseball Classic, we witness the globalization of America's national pastime and baseball's role in spreading the American dream. Besides describing baseball's frequent and often surprising connections to America's presence around the world, Elias assesses the effects of this relationship both on our foreign policies and on the sport itself and asks whether baseball can play a positive role or rather only reinforce America's dominance around the globe. Like Franklin Foer in How Soccer Explains the World, Elias is driven by compelling stories, unusual events, and unique individuals. His seamless integration of original research and compelling analysis makes this a baseball book that's about more than just sports.