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toddlleopold's review
2.0
Sometimes you take a flyer on a book and it pans out. Other times it turns out to be waste.
This is one of those other times.
I thought “Baseball at the Abyss” would be as much about Ty Cobb, Tris Speaker, and gambling in the mid-1920s as it would be about Babe Ruth. But the former fade away once the book gets rolling, and the latter half is essentially about Ruth and the 1927 season, a tale much told.
Oh, I learned a few things: the importance of Babe’s manager Christy Walsh (who deserves his own book), the impact on the box office by Ruth and the Yanks at a time that was the primary source of money, a few tidbits here and there. But the material is thin, and worse, Taylor repeats things as if he forgot he’d said them a chapter ago. (Nobody has editors anymore.)
His style also grated, particularly his own ay of leading off chapters with big windups and small payoffs.
This would have been a nice SABR article. As a book, it’s limp.
This is one of those other times.
I thought “Baseball at the Abyss” would be as much about Ty Cobb, Tris Speaker, and gambling in the mid-1920s as it would be about Babe Ruth. But the former fade away once the book gets rolling, and the latter half is essentially about Ruth and the 1927 season, a tale much told.
Oh, I learned a few things: the importance of Babe’s manager Christy Walsh (who deserves his own book), the impact on the box office by Ruth and the Yanks at a time that was the primary source of money, a few tidbits here and there. But the material is thin, and worse, Taylor repeats things as if he forgot he’d said them a chapter ago. (Nobody has editors anymore.)
His style also grated, particularly his own ay of leading off chapters with big windups and small payoffs.
This would have been a nice SABR article. As a book, it’s limp.