Split Season: 1981: Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo, and the Strike that Saved Baseball, by Jeff Katz
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Split Season: 1981: Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo, and the Strike that Saved Baseball, by Jeff Katz
Read Online Ebook Split Season: 1981: Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo, and the Strike that Saved Baseball, by Jeff Katz
The never-before-told story of the momentous season torn in half by the bitter players strike.1981 was a watershed moment in American sports, when players turned an oligarchy of owners into a game where they had a real voice. Midway through the season, a game-changing strike ripped baseball apart, the first time a season had ever been stopped in the middle because of a strike. Marvin Miller and the MLB Players Association squared off against Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn and the owners in a fight to protect players rights to free agency and defend America's pastime.
Though a time bomb was ticking as the 1981 season began, the game rose to impressive---and now legendary---heights. Pete Rose chased Stan Musial's National League hit record and rookie Fernando Valenzuela was creating a sensation as the best pitcher in the majors when the stadiums went dark and the players went on strike.
For the first time in modern history, there were first- and second-half champions; the two teams with the overall best records in the National League were not awarded play-off berths. When the season resumed after an absence of 712 games, Rose's resumption of his pursuit, the resurgence of Reggie Jackson, the rise of the Montreal Expos, and a Nolan Ryan no-hitter became notable events. The Dodgers bested their longtime rivals in a Yankees-Dodgers World Series, the last classic matchup of those storied opponents.
Sourcing incredible and extensive interviews with almost all of the major participants in the strike, Split Season: 1981 returns us to the on- and off-field drama of an unforgettable baseball year.
Split Season: 1981: Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo, and the Strike that Saved Baseball, by Jeff Katz - Amazon Sales Rank: #345645 in Books
- Brand: Katz, Jeff
- Published on: 2015-05-19
- Released on: 2015-05-19
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.47" h x 1.19" w x 6.47" l, .0 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 336 pages
Split Season: 1981: Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo, and the Strike that Saved Baseball, by Jeff Katz Review
“[A] delightful, opinionated history… Katz brilliantly describes the bitter, fruitless, yearlong negotiations aimed at determining a team's compensation for the loss of a free agent player… A superior addition to the venerable genre of baseball season accounts.” ―Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“A crisply written, entertaining and informative book...This book brings that crazy season back into focus, and Katz shines a new light on 1981 that provides a unique perspective.” ―The Tampa Tribune
“In 1981, major league baseball suffered through its first-ever mid-season strike, and for a time, player union rep Marvin Miller and Commissioner Bowie Kuhn became more important to the game than any slugger or hurler. As they fought, a nation deprived of its pastime prayed for the return of greats like Reggie Jackson, Fernando Valenzuela, Pete Rose, and Nolan Ryan. Here a gifted writer, who just happens to be the mayor of the baseball mecca of Cooperstown, N.Y., tells the inside story of that split season when baseball ceased to be a kingdom ruled by royal owners and players won recognition for their central role in the grand old game. This is a ‘must read' tale for anyone who ever sat in the bleachers or flipped through the sports page.” ―Michael D'Antonio, author of Forever Blue, The True Story of Walter O'Malley and the Dodgers of Brooklyn and Los Angeles
“In 1981 I had just turned 21 and had saved up enough money to buy a Greyhound bus ticket across the country. My goal was to see as many new cities, catch as many cool gigs and most certainly see as much baseball as possible. I succeeded at the first two but that summer's strike kept me from seeing even a single game on my 3 week trip. Jeff Katz's fascinating and gripping book lets me know who was to blame and how it all went down with humor, attention to detail and an almost a horror film's inevitability. I knew what was going to happen, I knew how it was going to end but Katz kept me captive and turning pages until that frustrating year was over.” ―Steve Wynn, musician ,The Baseball Project and The Dream Syndicate
“With charm and affection, Jeff Katz has documented one of the wildest and most important baseball seasons in recent history. Split Season is a wonderful look back at a fascinating moment in the evolution of baseball.” ―Jonathan Eig, author of The Birth of the Pill, Opening Day, Luckiest Man and Get Capone
“For most baseball fans, the summer of 1981 is a void, an absence, a black hole. Jeff Katz has finally illuminated that dark space, showing us what we going on behind the scenes of the sports world's most prolonged labor action.” ―Paul Lukas, ESPN.com and Uniwatch
“This book is highly recommended for baseball fans with an interest in the business side of the game.” ―Library Journal
“By going behind the scenes to reveal the game-changing labor negotiations of 1981, and also bringing to life the thrills on the field--the unforgettable Fernando Valenzuela, and the last Yankees-Dodgers World Series among them--Jeff Katz has delivered a worthy book about a crucial season. Three cheers.” ―Kostya Kennedy
“In Split Season Jeff Katz makes the business of baseball as fascinating as the game afield, as the contentious 1981 season and the stunning changes it brought to Major League Baseball come to life all these years later… at its heart Split Season is about American history and its prime movers, capitalism and the battle for wealth. When the last pitch of 1981 is thrown, and the wrappers and beer cups swept up and the game changed forever, you will be far wiser than you were before. And not just about baseball.” ―Rick Telander, Senior Sports Columnist, Chicago Sun-Times
“Split Season is my favorite kind of book: informative, historical, retelling the story of one of the most pivotal baseball seasons over the last half-century on and off the field, but also funny. In an age of endless statistics, it reminds us the game is played by human beings whose feats and antics are far more interesting than on-base percentage stats. Writing such a book sounds easy. Jeff Katz has made it look easy. But trust me, it isn't.” ―Howard Bryant, author of The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron
“In Split Season Jeff Katz has brought life to the events of 1981 when 713 Major League baseball games were cancelled because of a player's strike. The great strength of this fast-moving narrative is Katz's ability to bring the same tension and insight to both fields of play--the one at the ballpark and the other at the bargaining table.” ―Paul Dickson
“Carefully crafted, painstakingly researched, Katz gives us Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo and as the book's sub title notes - the strike that saved baseball.” ―Harvey Frommer, Sportsology
“Katz, the mayor of Cooperstown, New York, revisits this turbulent time with a crisply written, entertaining and informative book.” ―The Tampa Tribune
“One of the more intriguing baseball books of 2015.” ―Detroit Atlantic
“Baseball is probably the only sport that could turn a near disaster into literature. Jeff Katz, the mayor of Cooperstown, has picked a terrific subject with Split Season: 1981: Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo, and the Strike that Saved Baseball.” ―Allen Barra, The Chicago Tribune
About the Author JEFF KATZ is the Mayor of Cooperstown, the "Birthplace of Baseball" and home to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. He is the author of The Kansas City A's & The Wrong Half of the Yankees. He was a featured speaker during a "New York baseball" program put on by The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, NY. He is a member of The Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).
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Most helpful customer reviews
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful. Must read for any baseball fan By Nancybabs Excellent read about a tumultuous time in baseball. Any fan of baseball would enjoy reading "Split Season 1981". Very interesting 'sub-stories' interspersed throughout the book were both entertaining and informative about the lives and personalities of the multitude of characters Katz covers. My one point of contention is that not all Cub fans ultimately loved Harry Caray. I, for one, thought he was a blithering idiot when they hired him and that he only got worse with time.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. Solid book with excellent research By clemente_in_right A nice job by the author Jeff Katz in diving deep into the 1981 season but covering those details clearly. The book goes back and forth between the negotiating table and the playing field as the owners and players battled over the collective bargaining agreement - specifically as the owners were looking to curtail their own appetite for spending on free agents. As other reviewers noted, because the book is primarily chronological, the narrative does jump around quite a bit from paragraph-to-paragraph. But, I'm not sure how else the author could deal with the subject matter.This is enjoyable and a fairly quick read. The book is fully indexed and Katz does a fine job in detailing his source materials. He also does a nice job (briefly) bringing in the events of the outside world in 1981 - Reagan being shot, Sadat being assassinated.My lone issue with the book - and it's a minor one - is that Katz dives into the obscure in a couple of cases. There are plenty of famous names that can be discussed and they are. But he also discusses those whose impact on the 1981 season was minimal to non-existent - almost as if he is name dropping some of his personal friends. I'm talking specifically about a story from Andy Strasberg, who was the Padres promotions person, and how he arranged to have a couple of minor league games played in major league stadiums. Later in the book Katz references a super group called the Baseball Project and actually quotes their lyrics to a song about Fernando Valenzuela. Both stories are unnecessary in the book and both of them took me out of the flow of the prose.
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful. Great book on all aspects of the 1981 baseball season By LSmith Review:1981 was a baseball season that was unusual for many reasons. It was the first season in which a player’s strike took place during the middle of the season. It was the first season in which the divisional series was played. This extra round of playoffs was necessitated by the decision to split the season after the 50 day strike ended. Oh, yes, there were also some memorable moments on the field as well when a portly Mexican pitcher took the baseball world by storm, the New York Yankees signed a player to the biggest contract at that time, and a relatively obscure pitcher for the Cleveland Indians pitched a perfect game, the 12th in the history of the game.In his book “Split Season”, current Cooperstown (NY) mayor Jeff Katz writes about that strange season in equal parts baseball and labor negotiations. Like the season, this split in topics was about equal in length and had many memorable passages in both parts. Unlike the season, there was no outcry about a lack of quality or interest nor did it seem like a gimmick when Katz wrote about the action on the field and in the negotiation rooms with in-depth description and great research.The sections on the labor negotiations, the issue over compensation to teams who lose players to free agency, and the poor communication on the topic between not only the two parties but also within the owners’ club, were my favorite parts of the book. Most readers of baseball book don’t like to read about this topic, but Katz’s style made it fascinating reading that I couldn’t put down. He did stay neutral on the topic, but if he had a bias, it appeared to be against the owners because of their poor communication and lack of solidarity.The baseball sections were great as well. Reading about the rise of Fernando Valenzuela as a rookie for the Dodgers, the ranting and meddling of George Steinbrenner and also stories about other good teams that year such as the Oakland A’s and Montreal Expos will make the reader either feel like he or she was there, or will bring back many good memories of the game that season. This despite the lower attendance after the strike ended and the ill-fated split season. It should be noted that the two teams who had the best records in the National League that season, the St. Louis Cardinals and Cincinnati Reds, did not qualify for the playoffs in this format, something that embarrassed the owners who devised the scheme.Like on the field, the best writing about the game itself was saved for the playoffs, especially the recaps of the league championship series and the World Series, won by the Dodgers in six games. Just the writing about the Yankees alone in this section makes it fun to read.My only issue with the book was that most of it focused on only a handful of teams and there was little mention of the non-contending teams. One item that I did wish merited more attention was that it was the last season of baseball at Metropolitan Stadium in Minnesota. The old park that was the Minnesota Twins’ first home didn’t get a single mention. The only reference about this was that the Twins were going to move to “the new Dome” in 1982. As someone who spent many summer days in my childhood at Metropolitan Stadium, I was hoping the book would mention this.Despite that slight, I enjoyed this book immensely and it is highly recommended for all baseball fans and historians. It is an excellent account of one of the strangest years in baseball history.I wish to thank Mr. Katz for providing an advance review copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.Did I skim?NoPace of the book:This was a very fast read considering the length of the book. Because Katz writes most of this, especially the sections on the labor negotiations and the strike, in plain language, it made those sections easy to read and comprehend.Do I recommend?Baseball fans and readers who enjoy baseball history will want to pick up this book on this pivotal but very unusual season for Major League Baseball
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Split Season: 1981: Fernandomania, the Bronx Zoo, and the Strike that Saved Baseball, by Jeff Katz
