The Pitcher And The Dictator

Author : Averell Smith
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 1496205499
Total Pages : 238 pages
Book Rating : 4.90/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Pitcher and the Dictator written by Averell Smith and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2018-04-01 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "How Satchel Paige spent one season playing for the dictator Rafael Trujillo's team in the Dominican Republic"--

Author : Averell Smith
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 149620669X
Total Pages : 232 pages
Book Rating : 4.95/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Pitcher and the Dictator written by Averell Smith and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2018 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Soon after Satchel Paige arrived at spring training in 1937 to pitch for the Pittsburgh Crawfords, he and five of his teammates, including Josh Gibson and Cool Papa Bell, were lured to the Dominican Republic with the promise of easy money to play a short baseball tournament in support of the country's dictator, Rafael Trujillo. As it turned out, the money wasn't so easy. After Paige and his friends arrived on the island, they found themselves under the thumb of Trujillo, known by Dominicans for murdering those who disappointed him. In the initial games, the Ciudad Trujillo all-star team floundered. Living outside the shadow of segregation, Satchel and his recruits spent their nights carousing and their days dropping close games to their rivals, who were also stocked with great players. Desperate to restore discipline, Trujillo tapped the leader of his death squads to become part of the team management. The American players believed they might be lined up and shot if they lost the tournament. When Paige's team ultimately rallied to win, it barely registered with Trujillo, who a few months later ordered the killings of fifteen thousand Haitians at the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Paige and his teammates returned to the states to face banishment from the Negro Leagues, but ironically they barnstormed across America wearing their Trujillo All-Stars uniforms. The Pitcher and the Dictator is an extraordinary story of race, politics, and some of the greatest baseball players ever assembled, playing high-stakes baseball in support of one of the Caribbean's cruelest dictators. For more information about The Pitcher and the Dictator, visit thepitcherandthedictator.com.

Author : Peter C. Bjarkman
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN 13 : 1538110318
Total Pages : 400 pages
Book Rating : 4.17/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Fidel Castro and Baseball written by Peter C. Bjarkman and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2018-12-07 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few political figures of the modern age have been so vilified as Fidel Castro, and both the vilification and worship generated by the Cuban leader have combined to distort the true image of Castro. The baseball myths attached to Fidel have loomed every bit as large as the skewed political notions that surround him. Castro was never a major league pitching prospect, nor did he destroy the Cuban national pastime in 1962. In Fidel Castro and Baseball: The Untold Story, Peter C. Bjarkman dispels numerous myths about the Cuban leader and his association with baseball. In this groundbreaking study, Bjarkman establishes how Fidel constructed, rather than dismantled, Cuba’s true baseball Golden Age—one that followed rather than preceded the 1959 revolution. Bjarkman also demonstrates that Fidel was not at all unique in “politicizing” baseball as often maintained, since the island sport traces its roots to the 19th-century revolution. Fidel’s avowed devotion to a non-materialist society would ultimately sow the seeds of collapse for the baseball empire he built over more than a half-century, just as the same obsession would finally dismantle the larger social revolution he had painstakingly authored. A fascinating look at a controversial figure and his impact on a major sport, this volume reveals many intriguing insights about Castro and how his love of the game was tied to Cuba’s identity. Fidel Castro and Baseball will appeal to fans of the sport as well as to those interested in Cuba’s enduring association with baseball.

Author : Mo Rocca
Publisher : Simon & Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1501197622
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.28/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Mobituaries written by Mo Rocca and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2019-11-05 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From beloved CBS Sunday Morning correspondent and humorist Mo Rocca, an entertaining and rigorously researched book that celebrates the dead people who have long fascinated him. Mo Rocca has always loved obituaries—reading about the remarkable lives of global leaders, Hollywood heavyweights, and innovators who changed the world. But not every notable life has gotten the send-off it deserves. His quest to right that wrong inspired Mobituaries, his #1 hit podcast. Now with Mobituaries, the book, he has gone much further, with all new essays on artists, entertainers, sports stars, political pioneers, founding fathers, and more. Even if you know the names, you’ve never understood why they matter...until now. Take Herbert Hoover: before he was president, he was the “Great Humanitarian,” the man who saved tens of millions from starvation. But after less than a year in the White House, the stock market crashed, and all the good he had done seemed to be forgotten. Then there’s Marlene Dietrich, well remembered as a screen goddess, less remembered as a great patriot. Alongside American servicemen on the front lines during World War II, she risked her life to help defeat the Nazis of her native Germany. And what about Billy Carter and history’s unruly presidential brothers? Were they ne’er-do-well liabilities…or secret weapons? Plus, Mobits for dead sports teams, dead countries, the dearly departed station wagon, and dragons. Yes, dragons. Rocca is an expert researcher and storyteller. He draws on these skills here. With his dogged reporting and trademark wit, Rocca brings these men and women back to life like no one else can. Mobituaries is an insightful and unconventional account of the people who made life worth living for the rest of us, one that asks us to think about who gets remembered, and why.

Author : Larry Tye
Publisher : Random House
ISBN 13 : 1588368475
Total Pages : 434 pages
Book Rating : 4.78/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Satchel written by Larry Tye and published by Random House. This book was released on 2009-06-09 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The superbly researched, spellbindingly told story of athlete, showman, philosopher, and boundary breaker Leroy “Satchel” Paige “Among the rare biographies of an athlete that transcend sports . . . gives us the man as well as the myth.”—The Boston Globe Few reliable records or news reports survive about players in the Negro Leagues. Through dogged detective work, award-winning author and journalist Larry Tye has tracked down the truth about this majestic and enigmatic pitcher, interviewing more than two hundred Negro Leaguers and Major Leaguers, talking to family and friends who had never told their stories before, and retracing Paige’s steps across the continent. Here is the stirring account of the child born to an Alabama washerwoman with twelve young mouths to feed, the boy who earned the nickname “Satchel” from his enterprising work as a railroad porter, the young man who took up baseball on the streets and in reform school, inventing his trademark hesitation pitch while throwing bricks at rival gang members. Tye shows Paige barnstorming across America and growing into the superstar hurler of the Negro Leagues, a marvel who set records so eye-popping they seemed like misprints, spent as much money as he made, and left tickets for “Mrs. Paige” that were picked up by a different woman at each game. In unprecedented detail, Tye reveals how Paige, hurt and angry when Jackie Robinson beat him to the Majors, emerged at the age of forty-two to help propel the Cleveland Indians to the World Series. He threw his last pitch from a big-league mound at an improbable fifty-nine. (“Age is a case of mind over matter,” he said. “If you don’t mind, it don’t matter.”) More than a fascinating account of a baseball odyssey, Satchel rewrites our history of the integration of the sport, with Satchel Paige in a starring role. This is a powerful portrait of an American hero who employed a shuffling stereotype to disarm critics and racists, floated comical legends about himself–including about his own age–to deflect inquiry and remain elusive, and in the process methodically built his own myth. “Don’t look back,” he famously said. “Something might be gaining on you.” Separating the truth from the legend, Satchel is a remarkable accomplishment, as large as this larger-than-life man.

Author : April Yoder
Publisher : University of Texas Press
ISBN 13 : 1477326782
Total Pages : 230 pages
Book Rating : 4.87/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Pitching Democracy written by April Yoder and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2023-03-14 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How Dominicans contribute to Major League Baseball and what they receive in return. From Juan Marichal and Pedro Martínez to Albert Pujols and Juan Soto, Dominicans have long been among Major League Baseball’s best. How did this small Caribbean nation become a hothouse of baseball talent? To many fans, the answer is both obvious and disconcerting: pro teams use their riches to develop talent abroad, creating opportunities for superhuman athletes and corrupt officials, while the rest of the population sees little benefit. Yet this interpretation of history is incomplete. April Yoder traces how baseball has empowered Dominicans in their struggles for democracy and social justice. While the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo saw the sport as a means of cementing its power at home and abroad, the Dominican people fashioned an emancipated civic sphere by seeing their potential for democratic success in their compatriots’ baseball success. Later, Dominicans articulated demands for democracy, economic opportunity, and civil rights through successful calls for public support of amateur and professional baseball. Today, Dominicans continue to demand that incentives for the baseball industry foster human as well as economic development. A revelatory and innovative history, Pitching Democracy restores agency to the Dominican people and honors their true love of the game.

Author : Steven R. Greenes
Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 1476672687
Total Pages : 281 pages
Book Rating : 4.87/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Negro Leaguers and the Hall of Fame written by Steven R. Greenes and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2020-09-01 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since 1971, 35 Negro League baseball players and executives have been admitted to the Hall of Fame. The Negro League Hall of Fame admissions process, which has now been conducted in four phases over a 50-year period, can be characterized as idiosyncratic at best. Drawing on baseball analytics and surveys of both Negro League historians and veterans, this book presents an historical overview of NLHOF voting, with an evaluation of whether the 35 NL players selected were the best choices. Using modern metrics such as Wins Above Replacement (WAR), 24 additional Negro Leaguers are identified who have Hall of Fame qualifications. Brief biographies are included for HOF-quality players and executives who have been passed over, along with reasons why they may have been excluded. A proposal is set forth for a consistent and orderly HOF voting process for the Negro Leagues.

Author : Leslie A. Heaphy
Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 1476663882
Total Pages : 236 pages
Book Rating : 4.83/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Black Ball 10 written by Leslie A. Heaphy and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2021-06-21 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Under the guidance of Leslie Heaphy and an editorial board of leading historians, this peer-reviewed, annual book series offers new, authoritative research on all subjects related to black baseball, including the Negro major and minor leagues, teams, and players; pre-Negro League organization and play; barnstorming; segregation and integration; class, gender, and ethnicity; the business of black baseball; and the arts.

Author : Robert Elias
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1317325184
Total Pages : 328 pages
Book Rating : 4.85/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Baseball and the American Dream written by Robert Elias and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-15 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating look at how America's favorite sport has both reflected and shaped social, economic, and

Author : Josh Chetwynd
Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 0786425946
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.45/5 ( download)

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Download or read book British Baseball and the West Ham Club written by Josh Chetwynd and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2006-12-15 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few people associate baseball with Great Britain, but for a brief period in the 1930s, America's pastime nearly gained a foothold with the British populace. Though never as popular as the beloved football clubs, or even greyhound races, baseball teams like the West Ham Hammers developed intense local followings, and played some excellent baseball--in 1936, the Hammers defeated the U.S. Olympic team. The outbreak of World War II ended the rising popularity of baseball among Britons, but speculation remains that, under different circumstances, British baseball could have flourished. This book traces the history of baseball as a popular British sport, concentrating on one particularly successful and notable team, the West Ham Hammers. It places the West Ham club within the historical context of 1930s Great Britain, and covers team management, major players (e.g., Roland Gladu, the "Canadian Babe Ruth"), and the fans, many of whom still cling fondly to faded memories of the club and West Ham Stadium. Eight appendices include team rosters, British baseball rules, and year-by-year records from 1890 to 2005.