Day 15: 30 baseball books in 30 days of April
The book: "Yankee Stadium: The Official Retrospective"
The author: Mark Vancil and Al Santasiere
How to find it: Rare Air Books, 245 pages, $50
Where we'd go looking for it: Online at at www.yankees.com would seem to be approrpriate. But we couldn't find it. Instead, it's going for $40 at Powells online bookstore.
The scoop: You'll come across maybe a half-dozen Yankee Stadium remembrance books this year, as the House That Steinbrenner Rebuilt is about to stage its final season, replaced by a bigger, more revenue-generating House That A-Rod Will Break the MLB Career Home Run Record In. They hope.
The team is careful to note that this is the only book of its kind officially licensed by the New York Yankees, complete with an introduction by George Steinbrenner, a foreword by Rudy Giuliani, and more than 150 photographs, many never before published, that show Paul McCartney, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, presidents Clinton and Bush among the patrons. ... how about a shot of Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe up in a club box in '61. There are shots behind-the-scenes of the press box, the owner's office, Joe Torre's old manager's office, the dugouts, the monuments.
It not only chronicles all the baseball ever played there, but also NFL games, college football, boxing, Papal visits, 9/11 ceremonies, Billy Graham revivals, rock concerts. All within that frieze white ring around the roof, which gave it its distinct accent.
With that $50 price tag, it better deliver. And it does. It's more than a coffee-table book. It's the size of a coffee table.
How it goes down in the scorebook: A Mantle-like shot heading over the right-field roof.
Even more on this subject: Yankee Stadium history books will be the rage, even moreso come October when fans realize the place will be torn down. These books will have the leg up on the late rush:
"Yankee Stadium: A Tribute: 85 Years of Memories: 1923-2008," by Les Krantz (Harper Entertainment, 176 pages, $29.95
The hook here is a DVD hosted by Reggie Jackson that also includes audio from Mel Allen and Bob Wolff. In some ways, a very cool, classy looking book. In other ways, it leaves a lot to be desired.
"Yankee Stadium Scrapbook: A Lifetime of Memories," by David Fischer (Running Press Book Publishers, 128 pages, $24.95)
This one feels more kid-friendly, starting with the cover that has a square cut out to make it look like a 3D postcard popping through. There are more tangible things for the reader to actually stop and look at, and touch as if it were real, like ticket stubs, a scorecard from Roger Maris' 61st home-run game and Don Larson's 1956 World Series perfect game, or a 1949 Fred Lieb World Series press pass (he worked for the Sporting News). The photos are also ones you surprisingly don't see in other Yankee Stadium books, such as one where Babe Ruth is handing out Baby Ruth candybars to the fans in right field in 1928.
"Memories of Yankee Stadium" by Scott Pitoniak, forward by Joe Torre (Triumph Books, $19.95, 224 pages). This relies more on remembrances from the likes of Bob Costas, Billy Crystal and Keith Olbermann. "There's a sign hanging in the runway leading from our clubhouse to the dugout," says Crystal. "It's a quote from Joe DiMaggio thanking the Lord for 'making him a Yankee. I look at that sign every home game I head out to the field.' I feel the same way." Nice quip from the Yankee Clipper, but it's probably not the same feeling Crystal gets when he goes to his courtside seat at a Clippers game.
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