Late Innings [Hardcover]

Roger Angell (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 429 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster; First Edition edition (April 1982)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671425676
• ISBN-13: 978-0671425678
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.5 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #150,810 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Still a great read, 2011, December 7, 2011

By 

Carolina Chess (South Carolina) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Late Innings (Hardcover)

This year (2011) I included Roger Angell's "Late Innings" in my offseason reading. It is fresh as ever. A collection of master works from baseball's greatest author.

Although not mentioned in the Forward nor anywhere else, "Late Innings" is apparently a collection of Mr. Angell's "New Yorker" columns from 1977 to 1981. They are not arranged in chronological order.

Included are some of Angell's best: "Distance", August 1980, on a visit with Bob Gibson; "Sharing the Beat", March 1979, on the early days of women sportswriters in locker rooms; and "The Web of the Game", June 1981, on a day with Smokey Joe Wood at Yale Field when Eli pitcher Ron Darling threw eleven no-hit innings but lost 1-0 to Frank Viola and St. John's in a 12-inning NCAA tournament game.

The columns cover a fascinating era in baseball history: The days of early free agency for the players, and baseball's often strange (and nutty, thanks to Commissioner Bowie Kuhn)reactions to the new phenomenon of emancipated ballplayers with genuine bargaining power.

"Late Innings" now is wonderful as a nostalgic look back at baseball thirty years ago, and an ever-thoughtful reflection on baseball, the men who play it, the owners, managers, coaches, writers, broadcasters, and fans whose voices, wisdom, and follies, come to us through Mr. Angell's brilliant reporting.

Highly recommended.

5.0 out of 5 stars Passionate, Poetic Look at Baseball, June 14, 2006

By 

K.A.Goldberg (Chicago) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Late Innings (Hardcover)

When Roger Angell writes a baseball book, readers are treated to a poetic literary experience. Angell embraces the game, and comprehend's the sport's personalities, nuances, and inequalities. LATE INNINGS is drawn from the 1977-1981 seasons - dated but still very much worth reading. Among the issues were the arrival of free agency, the Boston-New York rivalry, and personalities like Carl Yastrzemski, Nolan Ryan, Reggie Jackson, Joe Morgan, Bill Veeck, Bowie Kuhn, Mike Schmidt, etc. The top teams included power-based grass teams (New York, Boston, Baltimore, Los Angeles) and speed and line drive turf squads (Houston, Kansas City, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh). Many readers will enjoy remembrances of players, games, and the large number of now-gone stadiums (some of which weren't baseball-friendly). Younger readers will learn about the game's fairly recent past. And, of course, all readers should enjoy Angell's passionate and heartfelt writing.

4.0 out of 5 stars Baseball masterpiece, December 30, 2005

By 

Z. Blume (St. Louis, MO United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Late Innings (Hardcover)

Angell is without a daoubt the preeminent "literary" baseball writer of the late 20th century. His knowledge of the game and passion shine through, but those qualities are equally matched by his beautiful prose which make his pieces flow and leave readers very satisfied. This is a great book about the 1977-1981 baseball seasons, which leaves it a little dated, but does not detract from its value (one of the best parts of baseball is how little it changes from generation to generation). Angell is insightful, witty and animated throughout and I highly recommend it to anyone who is a fan of his writing, the New Yorker (for which he has been an editor for decades) or just love baseball.

An alternative to purchasing this book, however, would be Game Time which is an anthology of Angell's baseball writing through the years and contains most of his best stuff, but this book is also worth buying on its own because even stories that are less than his best are still very good.