Amazing Aaron to Zero Zippers: An Introduction to Baseball History

Gr 5 Up—One of the chief selling points for this title will be its 15-year-old author, who also blogs professionally about the game's history for Major League Baseball. Here, Nadel works his way through the alphabet in 26 short chapters, some on a particular player (Hank Aaron) or team (the Yankees), others serving as a roundup for a historically significant subject, such as strikeout pitchers, extra-inning games, or famous ballparks. He is up front with his opinions (Babe Ruth is the greatest player who ever lived, the Yankees have the "winningest and most amazing history of any team in…American sport."). But Nadel's interest is broad, and his passion for the game contagious. Significant space is devoted to lesser-known names in baseball history, including Japanese slugger Sadaharu Oh, the all-time world home run leader, who never played in the United States, and Effa Manley, an executive with the Negro League Newark Eagles and the first woman elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. Nadel offers helpful context for casual readers, noting, for example, that out of more than 300,000 major league match-ups, pitchers have recorded only 23 "perfect" games. However, the book's audience isn't always clear. The author offers a detailed explanation of what it means to steal a base, yet his writing is dense with statistics that would be meaningful only to a dedicated fan.