Spitball: The Literary Baseball Magazine

Spitball is a literary baseball magazine founded in 1981 and dedicated to poetry, short fiction, prose, art, and book reviews; all devoted to baseball. In 1983 Spitball established the CASEY Award to honor the authors and publishers of the best baseball books published each year. The CASEY was the first award of its kind, and it is widely recognized as the most prestigious award that a baseball book can be given.

 A key component of Spitball's mission is the timely publication of authoritative, lively, and appreciative reviews of quality baseball books. These reviews can be found in our Baseball Books Reviewed section. We also publish short and to-the-point reviews of current baseball books in the "Baseball Book News" column at the back of each issue of Spitball Magazine.

Spitball's Latest  News

On Sunday, March 16, in Cincinnati, Ohio, Kevin Baker accepted the 42nd annual CASEY Award for The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City (Knopf) and gave a rousing and funny acceptance speech on the subject of his book; and as a bonus explained how the City of Cincinnati and its pioneering Red Stockings fit into the story. Also, on hand to accept a Finalist's Nomination Award, all the way from California, was Aaron Fischman, the author of A Baseball Gaijin: Chasing a Dream to Japan and Back (Sports Publishing), the fascinating story of Tony Barnette who pitched in the Major Leagues after serving a long and productive apprenticeship in the Nippon Baseball League.  Spitball Magazine congratulates Kevin Baker and Aaron Fischman, their publishers, and the authors and publishers of all the Nominated Finalists for the 2024 CASEY Award. Thanks to Meg Shannon and Michael Jonson of Poor Michael's Sports & Karaoke Bar for hosting the 42nd annual CASEYs.

February 2, 2025

Kevin Baker Wins 2024 CASEY Award!

Set to Speak at CASEYs Sunday, March 16

Spitball: The Literary Baseball Magazine (estb.1981) is pleased to announce that Kevin Baker, author of The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City (Knopf), has won the 42nd annual CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year. The New York Game received votes of 1 + 1 + 2 = 4 points for a near unanimous score. It is the fifth time in the history of the Award that the winner has received such a score. No book has ever received a unanimous vote.

Charlie Hustle (Pantheon Books) by Keith O'Brien finished second with a score of 6 on the basis of 1 + 2 + 3 votes. The other second-place vote was received by Baseball, The Movie (Triumph Books) by Noah Gittell. The Last of His Kind (Hachette Books) by Andy McCullough finished in third place with a score of 10 on the basis of votes of 3 + 3 + 4.

Judge Judith Testa called The New York Game "totally brilliant." The book she said, "Combined tremendous research with brilliant writing. I could open that book to any page and immediately become adsorbed in the story." Judge Mike Harmon also highly praised the book, commenting that "It grabbed me early with its vivid descriptions of the earliest precursors and configurations of baseball; its detailed portraits of New York baseball luminaries, such as Christy Mathewson, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, John McGraw, and Casey Stengel, to name just a few; and its expositions of the origins of the National, American, and Negro Leagues, of the Giants and the Polo Grounds, the Dodgers and Ebbets Field, and the Yankees and their House that Ruth Built. All of this with the unrelenting growth and the political background of the City also seamlessly woven into the story: the corruption of Tammany Hall and the machinations of scoundrels, such as  Arnold Rothstein and Mayor Jimmy Walker, followed by the reforms of FDR, Dewey, and LaGuardia. It all adds up to a rich and absolutely absorbing saga in which NYC becomes representative of our entire nation and which goes a long way in explaining how baseball became the nation's national pastime."

Spitball Editor Mike Shannon added that the most amazing thing about The New York Game is the way that it makes so many well-known stories seem original, as if the reader is learning of them for the first time. "This is a tribute," said Shannon, "to Mr. Baker's impressive abilities: his unearthing telling new details that add so much to each story and his faultless writing style which enables the reader to effortlessly glide through his narration. The book had some serious competition, especially from Mr. O'Brien's astonishing biography of Pete Rose, but no one can argue with the Judges' decision. As always, we are grateful for their service to Spitball Magazine, to all the Nominated Finalists, and to the entire baseball literaure community. We congratulate Kevin Baker and his publisher, Alfred A. Knopf, for winning the 42nd CASEY Award and all the Nominated authors and publishers."

The 42nd annual CASEY Awards will take place on Sunday, March 16, at 2:00 at Poor Michael's Sports Bar, located at 11938 Hamilton Avenue, Springfield Township 45231. Admission is open to the public, and the $20 donation includes a one-year subscription to Spitball Magazine. For more information, contact Mike Shannon at (513) 384-8553.

November 2, 2024

Finalists for 2024 CASEY Award Announced

Spitball Magazine is pleased to announce that the following ten books have been named as Finalists for the 2024 CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year:

A Baseball Gaijin: Chasing a Dream to Japan and Back * Aaron Fischman * Sports Publishing;

Baseball: The Movie * Noah Gittell * Triumph Books;

Charlie Hustle: the Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball * Keith O'Brien * Pantheon;

Dewey: Behind the Gold Glove * Dwight Evans w/Erik Sherman *Triumph Books;

The Last of His Kind: Clayton Kershaw & the Burden of Greatness * Andy McCullough * Hachette Books;

Mike Donlin: A Rough and Rowdy Life from New York Baseball Idol to Stage and Screen * Steve Steinberg and Lyle Spatz * University of Nebraska Press;

The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City * Kevin Baker * Knopf;

The Original Louisville Slugger: The Life and Times of Forgotten Baseball Legend Pete Browning * Tim Newby * University Press of Kentucky;

Pinch Hitting (a novel) * Morris Hoffman * Black Rose Writing; and

Season of Shattered Dreams: Postwar Baseball, The Spokane Indians, and a Tragic Bus Crash that Changed Everything * Eric Vickrey * Rowman & Littlefield.

"This is another list of great books, which proves once again the inexhaustibility of baseball as a worthy topic for our best writers, as well as a continuing justification (if one were needed) for the very existence of the CASEY Award," said Editor Mike Shannon. "The book that distances itself in the judging from the others in the list will represent a very high achievement indeed, and we are confident that our Judges panel will select the one book here that does deserve to be recognized as the very best of 2024. Congratulations to all the Nominated authors and publishers, and thank you to all the publishers and authors who submitted their 2024 books to Spitball as part of the CASEY Award process."

The 42nd annual CASEY Awards will take place in Cincinnati, Ohio, on the second or third Sunday in March 2025. More details about the exact date and location of the event will appear on this website in the months to come.

October 28, 2024

Issue #95 Now On Its Way to All Subscribers!!!

The Fall 2024 issue of Spitball Magazine (#95) was mailed today in Cincinnati and is now on its way to all subscribers, advertisers, contributors, and publishers of baseball books reviewed in the issue. This may be the best overall issue of the Magazine ever published, and we are excited for our subscribers to see it. Donnie Pollard's cover of Todd Helton is especially stunning, as Mr. Rockies has never looked so good! If you do not receive your copy of this great issue within the next two weeks, please contact Editor Mike Shannon at spitball5@hotmail.com asap. And if you consider yourself a real baseball fan but are not a subscriber ... what in the name of Mookie Wilson are you waiting for???

September 14, 2024

BALLPEN It Is! New Name for a Group of Baseball Writers

The Judges have spoken and decided that the best name for a group of baseball writers is ballpen, a name submitted by Steve Hickoff of Kittery, Maine.  Ballpen not only received the highest total score of 27 points; it also garnered the most first-place votes by far: eight. Congratulations to Steve who will be sent as his prize a blowup stretched-over-a-wooden frame of the Fall issue of Spitball, which will be an image of recently inducted Hall of Famer Todd Helton, done by the inimitable Mr. Donnie Pollard. 

Battery, submitted by Bob Mayberry, finished in second place with 19 points; and bullpen, submitted by Al Turnbull, finished in third place with 15 points. Congratulations to them too, as well as the other nine participants who submitted at least one name which made it onto the Final Ballot.

We thank the five original Judges of the contest for their service (Paul Dickson, Jeff Hughes, Charles Mandel, Donnie Pollard, and Mark Schraf), and the following LIFETIME SUBSCRIBERS who agreed in a pinch to cast votes for the Final Ballot: Kurt Adkins, Ryan Brecker, Bill Bumgarner, Paul Carl, Mike Carstensen, David Garza, Ted Hallman, Ed Johnson, William Johnson, Michael Keefe, Ken Kraft, Stephen Marmon, Larry Phillips, Ted Pinney, Colin Robertson,  Mark Rushing, Ann Skoats, Jackson Snyder, and Mike Wickham.

Stay tuned for the second part of the contest!

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June 26, 2024

JUDGES PANEL for 2024 CASEY Award Seated

Harmon, Morgenstein, and Testa ... oh my! Yes, Spitball is pleased to announce that Mike Harmon, Gary Morgenstein, and Judith Testa will serve as Judges for the 2024 CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year, even though none of them hail from Kansas. Now in its 42nd year, the CASEY Award is the first, the oldest, and the most prestigious honor a baseball book can receive, and serving as a Judge is an honor in itself. As Editor Mike Shannon says, "It is essential that CASEY Judges have two equally important qualifications: a love of literature and books and a passion for the game of baseball. It would be difficult to think of a panel who better represents these criteria than the three Judges we have seated today. As always their task, in pinpointing the one book among the Finalists that makes the greatest contribution to baseball literature, will be a difficult one, but we have every confidence that they will reach a decision that will stand the test of time. We are also, of course, grateful for their service."

Introducing the Judges for the 2024 CASEY Award:

MIKE HARMON (Cincinnati, OH) is a retired trial lawyer, a graduate of the University of Cincinnati Law School, a member of numerous civic and philanthropic boards, and a Lifetime Subscriber to Spitball Magazine. The son of famed Cincinnati sportswriter Pat Harmon, Mike grew up in a baseball-centric household and as a kid enjoyed access to the Crosley Field  press box, as well as the private box behind home plate of GM Gabe Paul. The sports editor of his high school and college newspapers, he taught high school English, and after retiring from private law practice served as Litigation Chief of the Ohio Attorney General's office in Cincinnati for a decade and as Litigation Chief for the City of Cincinnati for another decade. He and wife Fran have been married for 54 years.

GARY MORGENSTEIN (Brooklyn, NY) is the author of one of the most impressive achievements in baseball literature, the dystopian baseball "Dark Depths" trilogy (A Mound Over Hell, A Fastball for Freedom, and A Dugout to Peace). After taking a B.A.  degree in political science from SUNY at Stony Brook (1974), he worked as a journalist and free lance writer and later spent most of his career in television public relations. An award-winning dramatist, Gary has also written two other baseball novels: Take Me Out to the Ball Game (1980) and The Man Who Wanted to Play Center Field for the New York Yankees (1983).  To promote the latter book, he participated in an open tryout at Yankee Stadium.

JUDITH TESTA (St. Charles, IL) earned a PhD in art history from the University of Chicago and is a professor emerita at Northern Illinois University, where she taught art history and won numerous awards for her teaching excellence. Growing up in Long Island, a short train ride from Brooklyn, New York, she became a die-hard fan of the Brooklyn Dodgers and (despite her allegiance to Dem Bums) an admirer of Sal Maglie, the NY Giants pitcher who was known as a Dodgers-killer. This interest in Maglie inspired her to write an outstanding biography of him entitled Sal Maglie: Baseball's Demon Barber (2007). The author of two books about her beloved Italy (Rome Is Love Spelled Backwards and An Art Lover's Guide to Florence), Judith also writes for the Chicago-area Italian-American monthly magazine, Fra Noi.

Sunday, March 24, 2024

Three-time CASEY Award Winner Joe Posnanski Draws Big Crowd at 41st CASEY Awards

A large and enthusiastic crowd of literary baseball fans crammed into Poor Michael's Sports & Karaoke Bar in Cincinnati, Ohio, on March 24 to welcome back Spitball Magazine favorite Joe Posnanski who graciously accepted his third CASEY Award for Why We Love Baseball, a book which tells the story of 50 of baseball's greatest moments in Posnanski's irresistible and incomparable style. After accepting the "Kentucky Blue"-barrelled & gold-inscribed Louisville Slugger baseball bat which represents the CASEY Award, Posnanski explained the genesis of his book, the idea that baseball gets a hold of its fans at an early age and never lets go. "I think that the greatest era of baseball for any fan is whatever era baseball was in when he was ten years old," Joe said. He also made a dramatic comparison between baseball and football to explain the appeal of storytelling to baseball fans. Baseball's biggest annual event is the Hall of Fame Inductions in Cooperstown, New York; football's biggest event is the draft of college players. Football fans, he pointed out, are thus always looking forward, to the future; while baseball fans are inclined to look backwards, at the past: a difference which causes baseball fans to revere the National Pastime's history. 

CASEY Award Finalists Jim Chapman (Baseball Photography of the Deadball Era) and Steve Gietschier (Baseball: The Turbulent Midcentury Years) were also on hand to accept Nomination Awards. Chapman explained that he self-published his lavish tome in order to maintain the high photo reproduction standards his beautiful book evinces. He also wanted to be able to freely credit the great "lensmen" of the era who had the skill and foresight to take the astonishing photographs which grace his book. Gietschier, a marvelous storyteller in his own right, spoke of his feelings about the wide-spread praise his sweeping history, in effect a sequel to Harold Seymour's two-volume history, has received. "You write a book, putting your heart and soul into it, and it gets published, and then people buy it and they enjoy it and they let you know that ... it doesn't get any better for an author than that," he said. After accepting their awards, the three authors patiently answered questions from the audience for half an hour or so, demonstrating the thoughtfulness, expertise, and love of the game of baseball which infuses their exceptional work. Spitball congratulates them and their publishers, the Judges for the 2023 CASEY Award (John Derks, Joe Gazzo, and Tom Gilbert), and the other Finalists for the 2023 CASEY. We also thank our hosts for the event (Michael Jonson and Meg Shannon), all those who donated door prizes, and attendees of the 41st CASEYs, the great fans who showed once again why Cincinnati remains the literary baseball capital of the world.

Joe Posnanski Wins 2023 CASEY Award!!!

Joe Posnanski  and Dutton, an imprint of Penguin Random House, have won the 2023 CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year for Why We Love Baseball: A History in 50 Moments. Why We Love Baseball received rankings of 1 - 2 - 5 from the three Judges for a total low score of 8 points. It finished three points ahead of runner-up Baseball Photography of the Deadball Era by Jim Chapman, which received rankings of 1 - 2 - 8 for a score of 11. Judge Tom Gilbert praised Posnanski's book, saying, "It was said a few decades ago that baseball preserves two fundamental elements of traditional American culture -- chewing tobacco and story telling. Joe Posnanski's new book is nicotine-free, but it is chock full of compelling baseball stories. Some of them you have heard, but not told this well; others will be entirely new to most of us. The man can write, but the best thing about the book is the author's profound love for our oldest American team sport. Every page reminds us why we fell in love -- and stayed in love -- with baseball."

Steven Gietschier, author of Baseball: The Turbulent Midcentury Years, finished in third place with a score of 13 on rankings of 1 - 5 - 7. The other second-place vote was received by Ryan McGee, author of Welcome to the Circus of Baseball; and three other different books received the three third-place votes. 

This marks the third CASEY Award win for Mr. Posnanski, who now joins Kostya Kennedy as the only two authors in that extremely exclusive literary club. Posnanski won the 2007 CASEY Award for The Soul of Baseball and the 2021 CASEY for The Baseball 100. Spitball Magazine Editor-in-Chief Mike Shannon had this to say about the competition's result: "We knew it would be a dogfight this year, as the list of Finalists is very impressive indeed, and it was a fairly close contest, at least at the top of the rankings. But Joe just seems to have the magic touch. It's not just that he's a superb writer; that's only part of it. He's a great storyteller, and he has a knack for getting to the heart of the matter and for touching people with his words. We heartily congratulate him and his publisher (Dutton) on his amazing third CASEY Award win and look forward to his next baseball book whenever he might write and publish it. We also wish to congratulate all the authors and publishers whose outstanding baseball books were Nominated as Finalists. It was truly a great year for baseball books. Finally, we extend our sincere gratitude to the Judges of the 2023 CASEY Award for a job very well done. John Derks, Joe Gazzo, and Tom Gilbert ... they had a most difficult task, and they rose to the occasion like champions."

The 41st annual CASEY Awards will take place on Sunday afternoon at 2:00 on March 24, 2024 at Poor Michael's Sports and Karaoke Bar in Springfield Township, OH, at 11938 Hamilton Avenue 45231. As usual, the event will feature door prizes, a shout-it-out trivia contest based on 2023's baseball books, a comic appearance by BALLZAK the Magnificent, a display of all baseball books published in 2023, an acceptance speech by Mr. Posnanski, and possibly appearances by some of the Nominated Finalists. Admission to the event ($20) includes a one-year subscription ($15) to Spitball, the sponsor of the CASEY Award, and delicious hot dogs, back by popular demand. 

June 25, 2021

Cincinnati, OH 

CASEY Award Policy Announcement

    Spitball: The Literary Baseball Magazine has announced a policy to officially govern the administration of the CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year: henceforward, at least one of the three Judges newly seated on the three-Judge CASEY Award panel each year must be a current subscriber of the Magazine. CASEY Award Judges are not paid, but they do receive complimentary Judges' copies of the baseball books Nominated as Finalists, plus the honor and satisfaction of being an integral part of the process which determines the greatest honor the author and publisher of a baseball book can receive. The 2021 competition marks the 39th year of the existence of the CASEY Award, which was inaugurated in 1983.

    According to Spitball Editor Mike Shannon, the announcement represents a formal declaration of what has been actual CASEY Award practice for some time. "When it comes to Judges for the CASEY, we are always looking for the same thing," he said. "We need people who are knowledgeable and enthusiastic about both baseball and literature, and that pretty much defines the readership of Spitball Magazine. What this official policy does is recognize that fact, plus it gives us a chance to more deeply involve, even if it is one person at a time, our readership in the CASEY Award process. Our subscribers, in other words, begin to have a more proprietary relationship to the Award, which is a good thing. We have always invited our subscribers to nominate books for the CASEY Award each year, and we will continue to do that, but the opportunity to make nominations is open to everyone; including people who are not and have never been subscribers to Spitball Magazine. Being a Judge for the CASEY though is a much more important part of the overall process, and so we think it is only fair and natural that we ensure that our subscribers are always represented on the panel."

    Shannon went on to say that this policy does not necessarily limit the composition of any year's panel to one Spitball subscriber; it merely ensures the presence of at least one subscriber. "We are not only proud of the CASEY Award itself," said Shannon, "but also of everyone who has been a part of it all these years: the winning authors and publishers, of course, but in addition to them ... all the authors and publishers nominated as Finalists, all the wonderful publishers who have supplied their Nominated books to the Judges, the Judges who have done such a great job in fulfilling their duty, all the loyal supporters and attendees of the many CASEY Award ceremonies we have sponsored, and all the generous people who have hosted the CASEYs. It's been a concerted effort by a lot of great people, and we are grateful to them all."

    A related announcement about the Judges for the 2021 CASEY Award will be made in this space soon.

Jeremy Beer Accepts 37th CASEY Award for "Oscar Charleston: The Life and Legend of Baseball's Greatest Forgotten Player"

    On Sunday, August 30, 2020, Jeremy Beer accepted the 37th annual CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year from Spitball Editor Mike Shannon at Wiedemann's Brewery and Restaurant in Cincinnati, Ohio. Mr. Beer spoke for 25 minutes before a knowledgeable and appreciative crowd of Cincinnati-area baseball fans about the subject of his important biography, which has rescued one of the game's greatest players from the dust bin of baseball history. Beer explained that Charleston must be considered among a handful of the very best players, black or white, because of his unmatched resume. He said that Charleston's greatness consisted of four factors: his unmatched playing ability as an all-around great hitter, defender, and base runner/base stealer; his supremacy as a championship manager in Negro League baseball; his pioneering status as the first black scout employed by a team in the white major leagues; and the difficulties he routinely and bravely overcame to achieve his many accomplishments. At the conclusion of his remarks Mr. Beer took questions from the crowd for another 20 minutes and took a few practice swings with his beautiful blue & gold Louisville Slugger CASEY Award baseball bat. He now joins the pantheon of previous CASEY Award winners.

    Prior to the presentation of the CASEY Award to Mr. Beer, the "Spitball Magazine crowd" once again displayed its amazing knowledge of baseball history during a shout-it-out trivia quiz, based on questions taken from 2019 baseball books; and Greg Gajus, Deron Grothaus, John "Hondo" Skurkay, and Rob Langenderfer took home "Baseball Trivia King" certificates, "suitable for framing." All 2019 baseball books received by Spitball for review were on display; and, as usual, BALLZAK, the Magnificent (aka Steve Blessinger) wowed the crowd with his humorous prognosticating abilities. Greg Gajus also accepted a Finalist Nomination Award for Baseball Revolutionaries: How the 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings Rocked the Country and Made Baseball Famous. Spitball thanks the 2019 CASEY Award Judges, Dave Grob, Michael Leahy, and C.W. Spooner, for a job well done; Jon and Betsy Newberry of Wiedemann's Brewery for graciously hosting the 37th annual CASEYs; Jim Crowley, Doug King, and Eric Soergel for a great job as pinch-hit introducers of the Nominated Finalists during the official program; and especially all the patrons of the CASEY Awards who braved "the elements" to attend the event.

Rob Neyer Wows 'em at 36th Annual CASEY Awards Banquet 

The 36th annual CASEY Awards Banquet was another sold-out affair and was highlighted by CASEY Award-winner Rob Neyer's fascinating and wide-ranging discussion of his winning book, Power Ball, and recent analytical trends which have dominated the game at the major league level and caused some fans to consider that game less interesting than its predecessor. The usual festivities were part of the afternoon, including door-prize give-aways, a shout-it-out trivia quiz based on 2018's baseball books, a display of all baseball books published in 2018, an appearance by BALLZAK, the Magnificent, a rundown of all books Nominated as Finalists for the 2018 CASEY, and Mr. Neyer's acceptance speech. After his formal remarks, Neyer took questions from the audience for almost 45 minutes. Author John Erardi was also on hand and accepted a Nomination Award for his biography, Tony Perez : From Cuba to Cooperstown. It was another very special event, and Spitball thanks all the Nominated authors and publishers, everyone who helped stage the event, especially Scott Schmidt of Crosley's Sports Bar & Eatery, and all those loyal fans of baseball literature who attended. It's because of that latter group that the CASEY Awards Banquet has become the premier Hot Stove League event on the baseball calendar!

NEW MAILING ADDRESS

It's official: Spitball now has a new mailing address, and all books for review, submissions, and correspondence should be mailed to:

536 Lassing Way

Walton, KY 41094

Please make a note of our new address.

BACK ISSUE SET

Complete sets of Spitball Magazine are not available, as numerous past issues are completely SOLD OUT. We do, however, offer back issue lots, containing 15-17 different back issues. The differing number of issues available is the result of supplies on hand and finds/repurchases of past issues. The current price of the Back Issues Lot is $35, postpaid.

Sorry, we no longer accept payment for anything via Paypal.