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New for 2014: The Baseball Thesaurus, 2e

Jack Buck

It’s a double play: We’re releasing the second edition of Jesse Goldberg-Strassler‘s best seller, The Baseball Thesaurus, and for the next week we’re offering free shipping to celebrate.

With readers responding to the first edition — which, by the way, sold out — it was time to come out with an expanded second edition, due April 15 from August Publications, with more definitions, expanded meanings, and more vintage photographs. Click here to order.

The Baseball ThesaurusBaseball is a sport with its own lingo — a colorful patois that’s developed over the years and millions of games. In The Baseball Thesaurus, a fascinating compendium of baseball terms, Jesse Goldberg-Strassler — broadcaster, storyteller, talker, voice — explains what baseball terms mean and how they came to be. Whether it’s Red Barber talking about the pea patch or Ernie Harwell discussing no-hitters, the language of America’s Pastime is brilliantly captured by Goldberg-Strassler. Sluggers deposit a Ballantine Blast in the nosebleeds. The top of the lineup sets the table for the heart of the order. Corner infielders guard the line. A lumberjack with a bad wheel staggers down the line while a glovesman flashes leather.

Who should read The Baseball Thesaurus? It’s for the media linguist whose job relies upon baseball jargon, the radio listener, the blog reader, the talk-show caller, the minor-league diehard, the Strat-O-Matic connoisseur, the seventh-inning stretcher, the stereotype breaker, the crank, the postgame fireworks enthusiast, the t-ball coach, the seamhead, the baseball Annie, the hot-stove moper, the bandwagoner, the purist, the casual rooter who enjoys a quick tidbit and has no need to attend both games of a doubleheader, and the fan who takes pride in scoring the game and teaching the tradition to others.

“A home run is never just a home run,” says Goldberg-Strassler. “It’s a roundtripper, a four-bagger, a dinger, a tater, or a jack.  Baseball’s language is unmatched in both its color and its poetry.”

“We were very happy to totally sell out of the first edition of The Baseball Thesaurus,” says publisher Kevin Reichard. “Jesse’s outstanding work truly resonated with baseball fans, and we’re pleased to be publishing a second edition in 2014.”

The experts agree.

“For fans old and new, Jesse Goldberg-Strassler’s thesaurus is a romp. On first glance, it’s a primer on baseball’s peculiar taxonomy and traditions, but open any page and you’ll find lots more, including amusing anecdotes and witty wordplay from the game’s great characters. Goldberg-Strassler has built a dugout in which Al Capone, James Earl Jones, and George Carlin lounge happily alongside Dizzy Dean, Cool Papa Bell, and Zoilo Versalles. A lollygagger’s delight!” – John Lott, baseball writer, National Post, Toronto

“What an incredible resource – I can’t get over the amount of work and the detail that went into this book. A great window on baseball’s lexicon from days of yore to the game today. This book won’t be far from my side next season.” – Dan Dickerson, Voice of the Detroit Tigers

Click here to order the second edition.

And don’t forget about yesterday’s big book news: We’re taking preorders for the second edition of Mark Cryan’s Cradle of the Game: Baseball and Ballparks in North Carolina.

Get used to these book announcements: We’ll have one more next week and two more before the end of the month.

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