This post is part of the 2016 Baseball Continuum Blogathon For Charity, benefiting the Roswell Park Alliance Foundation. The Roswell Park Alliance Foundation is the charitable arm of Roswell Park Cancer Institute and funds raised will be “put to immediate use to increase the pace from research trials into improved clinical care, to ensure state-of-the-art facilities, and to help improve the quality of life for patients and their families.” Please donate through the Blogathon’s GoFundMe page.

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And now, short reviews of three baseball-related books I’ve read somewhat recently:

Spalding’s World Tour: The Epic Adventure that Took Baseball Around the Globe – And Made It America’s Game, by Mark Lamster: Fun book on the Spalding world tour of 1888-89, set alongside the backdrop of the emergence of America as a world power, Spalding’s entrepreneurial and publicity-seeking abilities, and early labor tensions in baseball. Informative and entertaining about an interesting topic that isn’t wide known, and also provides several examples of Cap Anson being such an asshole you want to find a time machine in order to go back and throttle him. Seriously, Cap Anson was just the worst.

Yes, It’s Hot in Here: Adventures in the Weird, Wooly World of Sports Mascots, by AJ Mass: Written by a former Mr. Met turned ESPN fantasy sports writer, this book is a funny look at the world of mascots, and includes disputes with the Famous Chicken, the Mets’ front office being clueless, and looks at the many different people who don the mascot costumes. Not exactly hard-hitting and deep, but it doesn’t need to be.

Nuclear Powered Baseball: Articles inspired by The Simpsons episode “Homer at the Bat”, edited by Emily Hawks and Bill Nowlin: This e-book from SABR reprints biographies and articles about the classic “Homer at the Bat” episode, as well as a faux-“bioproject” entry for Homer Simpson himself, a listing of baseball players referenced on the show, and Joe Posnanski’s article on “MoneyBART”, the episode of The Simpsons about sabermetrics. Available free to SABR members (but available for sale to non-members), I don’t know if I’d pay money for it, but it’s definitely a fun tribute to one of the greatest baseball episodes in TV history.

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At 1 PM: A short break to let you know what is available as giveaways if you donate to the Blogathon.

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This post has been part of the 2016 Baseball Continuum Blogathon For Charity, benefiting the Roswell Park Alliance Foundation. The Roswell Park Alliance Foundation is the charitable arm of Roswell Park Cancer Institute and funds raised will be “put to immediate use to increase the pace from research trials into improved clinical care, to ensure state-of-the-art facilities, and to help improve the quality of life for patients and their families.” Please donate through the Blogathon’s GoFundMe page.