Bottom of the Ninth

Nature abhors a vacuum. So does sports and business. Many thousands of words have been poured over the move of the Dodgers and Giants out of New York and out to the gold fields of California. I can't recall anyone really taking the time to detail what happened next in New York after the city was left with just one team and a huge vacuum in its baseball loving soul.

Michael Shapiro takes the time to tell what happened next with his book Bottom of the Ninth: Branch Rickey, Casey Stengel, and the Daring Scheme to Save Baseball from Itself. This book was a great read. I fancy myself as a guy who knows both his baseball and his history but this book told me a story I had no clue about.

Have you ever heard of the Continental League? I admit that I had never heard of it until reading this book and yet this brainchild of Branch Rickey came tantalizingly close to becoming a third Major League in baseball. The effects of the threat of the Continental League can still be seen today any time you watch a game involving the Mets, Astros, Angels, Twins or Rangers (formerly the Senators). Throw in teams in Denver, Atlanta, Buffalo and Toronto and you have what would have been the Continental League. (Poor Buffalo got screwed the most out of all the would be Continental League cities.)

The effects of the Continental League can also still be felt today any time you watch an NFL game featuring a former AFL team. Many of the same cities and many of the same ownership groups were involved in both the Continental League and the AFL. Probably most significantly, the AFL took the Continental League's TV revenue sharing plan hook line and sinker and rode that plan to the success the NFL enjoys today.

Had you ever heard of Del Webb? I had not and I was astonished on how much power the publicly silent co-owner of the New York Yankees wielded behind the scenes.

The book was written focusing on two men - Branch Rickey and Casey Stengel much like Moneyball was written with a focus on Billy Beane and Bill James. If you enjoyed Moneyball you surely will enjoy Bottom of the Ninth. I can't recommend it enough.