Stealing Games
How John McGraw Transformed Baseball with the 1911 New York Giants
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- US$18.99
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The 1911 New York Giants stole an astonishing 347 bases, a record that still stands more than a century later. That alone makes them special in baseball history, but as Maury Klein relates in Stealing Games they also embodied a rapidly changing America on the cusp of a faster, more frenetic pace of life dominated by machines, technology, and urban culture.
Baseball, too, was evolving from the dead-ball to the live-ball era--the cork-centered ball was introduced in 1910 and structurally changed not only the outcome of individual games but the way the game itself was played, requiring upgraded equipment, new rules, and new ways of adjudicating. Changing performance also changed the relationship between management and players. The Giants had two stars--the brilliant manager John McGraw and aging pitcher Christy Mathewson--and memorable characters such as Rube Marquard and Fred Snodgrass; yet their speed and tenacity led to three pennants in a row starting in 1911. Stealing Games gives a great team its due and underscores once more the rich connection between sports and culture.
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Historian Klein (Rainbow's End: The Crash of 1929) offers a thorough account of the 1911 New York Giants. That team, led by future Hall of Fame manager John McGraw, stole 347 bases in one season a record likely to stand forever. As a player/manager (a common position at the turn of the century), McGraw was temperamental, a trait he carried from the Baltimore Orioles to the Big Apple when he took over the Giants in 1902 and eventually earned the nickname Little Napoleon. His 1902 squad finished the season an unfathomable 53.5 games behind the pennant-clinching Pittsburgh Pirates. The author then recounts the Giants' evolution into a dynasty that went on to win three straight pennants, beginning in 1911. Klein writes for the serious baseball fan, and his day-by-day (often hour-by-hour) account of the Giants' 1911 spring training will test even the most patient of readers. Nevertheless, he offers thought-provoking details of the drastic changes baseball underwent at the time, both on the field and in the boardrooms.
