Customer Reviews

The Beer and Whisky League: The Illustrated History of the American Association--Baseball's Renegade Major League

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Many a baseball fan, frustrated by conniving team owners and spoiled multimillionaire players, must have wished that someone would start a new baseball league. In 1882, someone did--and the resulting American Association provided stiff competition for the then dominant National League for the following ten years.

The League, to be sure, quickly coopted the Association in some ways. The two circuits agreed to honor each others' player contracts--including the "reserve clause" which bound players to their teams even after their contracts expired--and the league champions met in a postseason playoff which foreshadowed the Twentieth Century World Series. The leagues competed for fans, however, with entirely salutary results--lower admission prices, Sunday baseball, and better umpiring and administration.

Most A.A. players have receded into the mists of time. The only player in "The Beer and Whisky League" whom most readers will recognize will be ! Charlie Comiskey, the player-manager of the St. Louis Browns who subsequently founded the Chicago White Sox. Nemec and Rucker, however, do an outstanding job of bringing the lost players to life and involving the reader in long forgotten pennant races and controversies. Any fan with an interest in baseball history can enjoy this book.

"The Beer and Whisky League" features a large number of photographs accompanied by captions illuminating interesting anecdotes about A.A. players and teams. The pictures, however, are not well integrated with the text.

The brief presence of African American players in the American Association--sixty years before Jackie Robinson--is bound to intrigue contemporary readers. Nemec and Rucker, perhaps hindered by a lack of documentary evidence, unfortunately devote only a couple of paragraphs to this aspect of Association history.

In 1890, the National League--but not the Association--attempted to impose a salary cap on its players! , who rebelled and formed yet a third major league. The th! ree leagues drove each other toward bankruptcy. The resulting financial squeeze led the League and the Association to raid each others' players and franchises, and the better heeled National League eventually prevailed. Four American Association teams defected to the National League in 1892. The Association itself folded and faded into obscurity, from which Nemec and Rucker have rescued it in this enjoyable book.

The baseball element in this book is only part of its charm. The author, with help from the publisher, has also assembled an aesthetic treat for the reader. As the cover suggests, the book is an artful prose and pictorial rendering of an early epoch in our National Pastime. A must I would think for every even mildly serious collector--and that is how I'd describe myself. I'm very glad to have found it and added it to my shelf.

The slew of rarely seen photos alone make this book a treasure. The captions accompanying the photos are so dense with insights and new information that they are really invaluable sidebars. The author's prose and story-telling ability is a full two or three cuts above that of most baseball historians, even the very top ones. Put all that together and it makes you just wish the American Association had lasted 20 years instead of ten so this book would have had to be "double the pleasure, double the fun."

I just discovered this book. In 1995 when it first appeared it was probably state of the art, but now some of the stats need to be updated because they don't match what's in the new edition of Total Baseball, etc. Otherwise this book is terrific.

Anyone out there know if this book is scheduled to be updated or reissued? Some of the stats are no longer current or consistent with what's in other reference books and I'd sure appreciate it if they were. Otherwise this book is blue ribbon all the way even if I wish it gave more on Va.'s only major league team ever.

This book gives an intersting look at the early days of professional baseball in the late 1800's. The information makes for a good read and the pictures are nice also.

if you love early base ball like I do.you will love this book.great stories about baseball pioneers who most people have never heard of but should read about for many reasons.david nemec hits an inside the park homerun!

The beer and wiskey league is the forgotten league, the league whose players are subject of total indifference from the Hall of Fame.

That's a shame. Many great players, colorful personnalities played in the American Association. Learn about Pete Browning, Guy Hecker, Toad Ramsey, Tip O'Neil, Bob Caruthers, Fleet Walker and others who left their prints into the baseball picture.

The book will introduce you to players who deserve to be remember.