{"title":"Dennis Snelling","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"lefty-o-doul-book-dennis-snelling-9780803290969","title":"Lefty O'Doul","description":"From San Francisco to the Ginza in Tokyo, Lefty O’Doul relates the untold story of one of baseball’s greatest hitters, most colorful characters, and the unofficial father of professional baseball in Japan. Lefty O’Doul (1897–1969) began his career on the sandlots of San Francisco and was drafted by the Yankees as a pitcher. Although an arm injury and his refusal to give up the mound clouded his first four years, he converted into an outfielder. After four Minor League seasons he returned to the Major Leagues to become one of the game’s most prolific power hitters, retiring with the fourth-highest lifetime batting average in Major League history. A self-taught “scientific” hitter, O’Doul then became the game’s preeminent hitting instructor, counting Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams among his top disciples.   In 1931 O’Doul traveled to Japan with an All-Star team and later convinced Babe Ruth to headline a 1934 tour. By helping to establish the professional game in Japan, he paved the way for Hideo Nomo, Ichiro Suzuki, and Hideki Matsui to play in the American Major Leagues. O’Doul’s finest moment came in 1949 when General Douglas MacArthur asked him to bring a baseball team to Japan, a tour that MacArthur later praised as one of the greatest diplomatic efforts in U.S. history. O’Doul became one the most successful managers in the Pacific Coast League and was instrumental in spreading baseball’s growth and popularity in Japan. He is still beloved in Japan, where in 2002 he was inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame. This edition features a new epilogue by the author.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50263987847441,"sku":"CIN0803290969G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52740139188497,"sku":"NIN9780803290969","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0803290969.jpg?v=1761387262"},{"product_id":"lefty-o-doul-book-dennis-snelling-9781496234759","title":"Lefty O'Doul","description":"From San Francisco to the Ginza in Tokyo, Lefty O’Doul relates the untold story of one of baseball’s greatest hitters, most colorful characters, and the unofficial father of professional baseball in Japan. Lefty O’Doul (1897–1969) began his career on the sandlots of San Francisco and was drafted by the Yankees as a pitcher. Although an arm injury and his refusal to give up the mound clouded his first four years, he converted into an outfielder. 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Calling itself the Pacific Coast League, this outlaw association frequently outdrew its major league counterparts and continued to challenge the authority of Organized Baseball until the majors expanded into California in 1958. The Pacific Coast League introduced the world to Joe, Vince and Dom DiMaggio, Paul and Lloyd Waner, Ted Williams, Tony Lazzeri, Lefty O'Doul, Mickey Cochrane, Bobby Doerr, and many other baseball stars, all of whom originally signed with PCL teams. This work chronicles the history ofthe Pacific Coast League and covers its foremost personalities, governance, and contentious relationship with the majors, proving that the history of the game involves far more than the happenings in the American and National Leagues.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":50465073201425,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50465074086161,"sku":"CIN0786465247G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0786465247.jpg?v=1751075388"},{"product_id":"pacific-coast-league-book-dennis-snelling-9780786400454","title":"The Pacific Coast League","description":"The Pacific Coast League enjoyed a reputation as one of the premier minor leagues in organized baseball. Joe DiMaggio, Ted Williams, Lefty Gomez, the Waner brothers and Ernie Lombardi were among the future Hall of Famers who played in its cozy parks. Legendary minor leaguers such as Smead Jolley, Buzz Arlett, Lefty O'Doul and Frank Shellenback made their marks in the PCL.     This reference work is a season-by-season guide to the glory days of the PCL. It includes a listing of starters and primary reserves for all teams from 1903 through 1957, as well as playoff results, managerial records, and statistical leaders for each season. Complete PCL records for over 500 of the circuit's most notable players are also provided.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51423742820625,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51423743836433,"sku":"CIN0786400455G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52149603664145,"sku":"NLS9780786400454","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":52549523046673,"sku":"CIN0786400455VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0786400455.jpg?v=1750786117"},{"product_id":"whiz-kids-book-dennis-snelling-9781496242686","title":"The Whiz Kids","description":"Before the 1950 World Series, the Philadelphia Phillies were infamous for a record-breaking lack of achievement that dated from their conception in 1883 through the 1940s. When twenty-eight-year-old Robert Carpenter Jr. took over in 1944, the Phillies had won only a single National League title in more than sixty years. For the next five years, Carpenter and the newly hired general manager, Herb Pennock, would overhaul the team’s operations, building a farm system from scratch and spending a fortune on young talent to build a team that would gain immense popularity and finally bring a National League pennant in 1950.   Nicknamed the “Whiz Kids” because they had so many players under thirty, the team caught lightning in a bottle for one season. Although they lost the World Series to the New York Yankees, the team became legendary in Philadelphia and beyond. The Whiz Kids is about a team that shocked everyone by winning, and then shocked everyone by never winning again. It includes a cast of characters and unusual storylines: a first baseman targeted for murder by a woman he had never met; a young catcher from Nebraska, Richie Ashburn, who became a Hall of Fame center fielder and later voice of the team for nearly three decades; a left fielder who lived and played in the shadow of his legendary father, then inspired Ernest Hemingway with the most legendary swing of a bat in franchise history; and a thirty-three-year-old bespectacled relief pitcher who won the Most Valuable Player Award with an undertaker as his personal pitching coach. The team succeeded under the watchful eye of its young owner, whose father handed him the team, and a college professor manager, only to see it slowly crumble as the slowest in the National League to integrate.  The Whiz Kids recounts the history of a team that, though hand-built to be champions, fell short-yet remains legendary anyway.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ -","offer_id":51632715497745,"sku":"","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":51632715923729,"sku":"NGR9781496242686","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51632715956497,"sku":"NIN9781496242686","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":52071570964753,"sku":"CIN1496242688VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1496242688.jpg?v=1750892522"},{"product_id":"greatest-minor-league-book-dennis-snelling-9781476678276","title":"The Greatest Minor League","description":"In 1903, a small league in California defied Organized Baseball by adding teams in Portland and Seattle to become the strongest minor league of the twentieth century. 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Caricatured as a scrawny, sour man who couldn't hit and who owed his fame to that poem, in truth he was the heartbeat of one of the greatest teams of the 20th century and the fiercest competitor this side of Ty Cobb.     Evers was at the center of one of baseball's greatest controversies, a chance event that sealed his stardom and stole a pennant from John McGraw and the New York Giants in 1908. Six years later, following reversals and tragedies that resulted in a nervous breakdown, he made a comeback with the Boston Braves and led that team to the most improbable of championships.     Spanning the time from his birth in Troy, New York, to his death less than a year after his election to the Hall of Fame, this is the biography of a man who literally wrote the book about playing second base.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"- \/ - \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52452283810065,"sku":null,"price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52452284465425,"sku":"NLS9780786475919","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9780786475919.jpg?v=1759364227"},{"product_id":"glimpse-of-fame-book-dennis-snelling-9780786477494","title":"A Glimpse of Fame","description":"Ron Necciai once struck out 27 hitters in a nine-inning minor league game. Floyd Giebell beat Bob Feller to clinch the 1940 American League pennant for the Detroit Tigers. John Paciorek had three hits in three at bats in his big league debut--and never played another game in the majors.     These three players and twelve other talented men (Bill Koski, Ed Sanicki, Joe Stanka, Bill Rohr, Al Autry, Joe Brovia, John Leovich, Bert Shepard, Doug Clarey, Marshall Mauldin, Bernie Williams, and Frank Leja) reached the top of their profession only to sink back into obscurity. Through interviews with all the players and extensive research, their stories are told. Major and minor league year-by-year statistics for each player are included.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":52452307173649,"sku":"NLS9780786477494","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9780786477494.jpg?v=1759364304"}],"url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/collections\/author-books-by-dennis-snelling.oembed","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}