Aaron to Zuverink: Baseball Players of the Fifties

by Len Fiorito and Richard Marazzi

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0380684454
• ISBN13: 9780380684458
• Release Date: January 1984
• Publisher: Avon Books
• Length: 552 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Terrific baseball nostalgia

The research that went into this book, a "Where-Are-They-Now" on baseball players of the 1950's, must have been incredible. This is a great read -- either reading it straight through, or just picking it up and opening to random pages, or looking up a particular player that you're wondering about. In some instances the items about the players include material from interviews with the players themselves. The items often include amusing little references to events from the years when the players broke into the majors. One sometimes-annoying aspect is the authors' obsession with cute statistical coincidences -- like, "so-and-so player was born in 1922, and in so-and-so year he hit 22 home runs and made 22 errors, and in his final season he hit .222" -- but, I must admit, I kind of got into it after a while. A great little tidbit is that the book ends by noting that there was one player (Jim Baumer) who played a few major league games in 1949 and a few more in 1961 -- but missed the whole decade of the '50's (stuck in the minors, we must guess). As the authors say, he must wonder, just like the rest of us, where the '50's went. Beautiful!

Aaron to Zuverink

If you are a fan of those "whatever happened to's" or just really love baseball, this is the book for you. It's focus is on those players who made their major league debuts in the 50's. It profiles each player, regardless of their impact on the game. It gives a little history on their background, career and what they have done post-career. I also read their follow-up "Aaron to Zipfel" which follows the same format except that it follows those players who debuted in the 60's. I'm also hoping for one from the 70's (my era).