Baseball's Greatest Season: 1924

Baseball's Greatest Season: 1924
by Reed Browning

Baseball's Greatest Season: 1924
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Book Summary Information

Author: Reed Browning
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2005-04-30
ISBN: 1558494871
Number of pages: 203
Publisher: University of Massachusetts Press

Book Reviews of Baseball's Greatest Season: 1924

Book Review: The Life & Times of Baseball, 1924
Summary: 5 Stars

Reed Browning's "Baseball's Greatest Season, 1924" makes the assertion that, given the close pennant races in both leagues, the 1924 season is the greatest in history. I thought that 1908 was pretty good, maybe the best, but Browning does have some convincing arguments for 1924: it was a watershed year for baseball, after World War I, the lively ball, the rookies and near rookies who began then or were breaking in around that time, and the last major scandal involving the throwing of games. Plus, it had a very exciting World Series involving a first time league champion versus one that had just won its league for the fourth time in a row.

Browning constructed his book in an interesting way, alternating the happenings of the sixteen teams during the year with the off-the-field aspects of baseball during that time. It is an effective way of getting a well-rounded picture of the total baseball scene for 1924. For example, a chapter may cover the period from Memorial Day to the 4th of July, and the surges and failings of the pennant contenders and second division teams are outlined. The next chapter may be about the business of baseball in the mid-1920s: how the money was earned by each club, how it was spent, and how much might be spent on which items. There are some that may find this kind of information less interesting than pennant races, or a distraction to the flow of the book, but there are also those who find this information interesting and may enjoy this slight break in the 1924 season to get an overall view of baseball in that era.

Overall, it is most interesting book, one that has the drama of exciting pennant races, the joy of a national hero making his first World Series appearance, a seven-game contest between contrasting styles of play, extra inning dramatics several times during the Series, unexpected quirks of fate in the last game, and, as in all good plots, a surprising ending. It's definitely a good book to read.

Summary of Baseball's Greatest Season: 1924

No season in the history of baseball matched 1924 for escalating excitement and emotional investment by fans. It began with observers expecting yet another World Series between the Yankees and the Giants. It ended months later when the perennially hapless Washington Nationals (Senators), making their first Series appearance, grabbed the world championship by scoring the season-ending run on an improbable play in the bottom of the twelfth inning of the seventh game.

In alternating chapters of narrative and analysis, Reed Browning explains how the 1924 season marked the last time a team playing old-fashioned "inside" baseball won the championship. Along the way, the season featured two taut September pennant races and a variety of compelling human interest stories: George Sisler failing to recover his once incomparable batting eye after a sinus infection; Rogers Hornsby batting .424, a figure no player has matched since; Babe Ruth overcoming injuries in the opening and closing phases of the season to win his only batting crown; Dazzy Vance registering one of the greatest seasons that any post-dead-ball pitcher has ever chalked up; and the revered Walter Johnson, presumed over the hill, returning to glory in the regular season and then, after two disappointing Series starts, winning the seventh game in relief.

The season even had elements of a morality play, when in its closing days a Giant tried to bribe an opponent into throwing a game. Disclosure of the proposal prompted an American baseball public, already pulling for the underdog Washington team, to cast the Series as a struggle between good and evil. In addition to capturing the mounting drama of this extraordinary season, Browning places the story in a broader historical context. He discusses how baseball operated as a business in the 1920s, who the major league ball players were, what the fans and ballparks were like, how the game of baseball was played, and why the Washington club was able to win.

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