The dating habits of Dallas Cowboy quarterbacks, videos of out-of-control mascots, more statistics than a college algebra class and a deep, visceral hate of ESPN – it’s just a typical day on sports blog Deadspin.com.
Now Will Leitch, editor of the site, has put it all in a book (heavy on the visceral hate of ESPN part): “God Save the Fan: How Preening Sportscasters, Athletes Who Speak in the Third Person, and the Occasional Convicted Quarterback Have Taken the Fun Out of Sports (and How We Can Get It Back).”
A look in Leitch’s library proves the title isn’t hyperbole. This is a guy who reads batting averages for fun. Here, the fan’s fan shares four of his favorites.
Baseball Prospectus 2008
by Baseball Prospectus Staff
This actually isn’t out until Feb. 18, but I have every yearly edition since they started making them back in 1997. This is supposedly a reference book, but I read it cover to cover like a novel the minute I pick it up. A day without baseball is a day wasted.
Sunday Money
by Jeff MacGregor
Most New Yorkers are scared of NASCAR, but transplanted Midwesterners like myself understand that it’s more about the culture than it is about the endless drone of cars zipping around in circles. This book gets so deep inside this that I finally understand what my uncle is talking about. Kind of.
Stepping Up
by Alex Belth
Brad Snyder’s (also good) “A Well-Paid Slave” got more attention, but this “other” biography of baseball pioneer Curt Flood shows just what the guy went through for players’ rights. He succeeded so thoroughly that we now have people like Scott Boras. Thanks Curt? I guess?
White Rat
by Whitey Herzog
A signed edition of the old Cardinals’ manager’s 1987 autobiography might be my most valued possession. (Plus, when he signed it, I was nine years old, and Whitey was pretty much Moses to me.) He was so great that not even Joe Torre could replace him.