Community Reviews

Rating(4 / 5.0, 100 votes)
5 stars
32(32%)
4 stars
34(34%)
3 stars
34(34%)
2 stars
0(0%)
1 stars
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100 reviews
July 14,2025
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A must read for any serious baseball fan. This book has its captivating moments that can truly hold your attention and make you feel as if you are right in the middle of the action. However, it also has its drawbacks. There are too many parts that seem to drag on, causing the pace to slow down and perhaps making the reader lose a bit of interest. Additionally, there are an excessive number of characters who are of only peripheral importance to the main story. These characters can sometimes be a distraction and make it a bit more difficult to focus on the central narrative. Nevertheless, despite these flaws, I would still highly recommend it to fans of the sport. The passion and love for baseball that is evident throughout the book is enough to make it worth reading for those who have a genuine interest in the game.

July 14,2025
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An old friend.

This and SEASONS PAST always had a profound impact on me, constantly making me wish that I could have been present to attend ballgames in the early 20th-century.

The era was filled with so many names and an abundance of captivating stories.

Among them, Shoeless Joe and Eddie Cicotte stood out in particular.

Just imagining the excitement and energy of those early ballgames, with the crowd cheering and the players giving their all on the field, is truly enticing.

Their skills and contributions to the game have become part of baseball lore, passed down through the generations.

It makes me wonder what it would have been like to witness their传奇 performances firsthand.

Perhaps I would have been inspired by their determination and passion for the sport.

Even though I can't go back in time, reading about them and learning their stories allows me to catch a glimpse of that bygone era and appreciate the rich history of baseball.

July 14,2025
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The story of the 1919 World Series fix is a fascinating and tragic chapter in baseball history. The players involved, known as the Black Sox, had their lives and careers forever changed. Shoeless Joe Jackson, despite his outstanding performance in the Series, was banned from baseball for accepting a bribe. Eddie Cicotte, a great pitcher, made a poor decision for financial reasons. Chick Gandil was considered the ringleader, and his actions led to the downfall of the team. Claude Williams had a great regular season but pitched poorly in the Series. Swede Risberg's actions were despicable, and he even threatened Joe Jackson during the trial. Oscar Felsch was a simple man who got caught up in the conspiracy. Fred McMullen was a minor player in the scandal. George Weaver, who was not part of the conspiracy but knew about it and said nothing, was also banned from baseball. The book under review provides a detailed account of the scandal and the players involved. It is a must-read for any baseball fan or anyone interested in American history. The author does a great job of bringing the story to life and making the reader feel as if they were there. The photos from the "Field of Dreams" movie add to the overall experience. Overall, this is a great book that I would highly recommend.

The trial of the players was a media circus, and the verdict was a surprise to many. Although the players were found not guilty, they were still banned from baseball by Judge Landis. His statement that no player who throws a game will ever play professional baseball again set a precedent for the future of the sport. The baseball owners, eager to clean up the game, appointed Landis as the first Commissioner. His actions helped to restore some of the public's faith in baseball.

The legacy of the Black Sox scandal lives on today. It is a reminder of the importance of integrity in sports and the consequences of making poor decisions. The players involved will always be remembered for their part in this tragic event. However, it is also important to remember that they were human beings who made mistakes. Some of them, like Shoeless Joe Jackson, tried to make amends in their later years. The story of the Black Sox is a complex and fascinating one, and it will continue to be studied and discussed for years to come.
July 14,2025
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This is a remarkable book that was精心crafted for an individual who truly grasps the intertwined concepts of baseball and money. Professional baseball, indeed, is a business, and the sooner people recognize this fact, the quicker they can leverage it to their benefit. The individuals of that era were well aware that the game was nascent and aimed to extract the maximum amount of money from it. Consequently, when they paid the players to lose the games, it was with the intention of reaping the maximum profit from the bets placed on those games.


This book offers extremely detailed descriptions of the events that transpired during the 1919 World Series and the scandal associated with it. It is a very well-written book that I was able to read with great ease. Given my interest in baseball and the financial aspects involved, I had a good understanding of the basics presented in the book, which facilitated my rapid progress through it. Additionally, I made use of the pictures of the characters in the middle of the book to assist me in correlating the words in the text with the characters who were uttering them.


If you have a limited knowledge of baseball and do not understand the financial underpinnings behind it, this might prove to be a challenging book to read. Moreover, it contains numerous references to the United States during the late 1910s, and if you are unfamiliar with that period as well, once again, this book will pose difficulties.


The most captivating aspect of this book was the dialogue between the characters. Obviously, it was not the exact dialogue between the characters, as there is no way to know precisely what people were saying to each other at that time. However, the dialogue seems so incredibly accurate and makes so much sense that it feels as if it were precisely what they were communicating to one another.


Every character in the book was either a player on the Chicago White Sox or a gambler/associate who played a significant role in the throwing of the World Series. The combination of the engaging dialogue and the author's astute insights comes together to form a truly outstanding book.
July 14,2025
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Considering my reading habits, I should have delved into this years ago. It赫然 appears on almost every list of great baseball books and was even adapted into a fine film in 1988. I believe I was overly swayed by more recent scholarship that challenges Asinof's evidence and conclusions. Now that I have read it, I can see that John Sayles was more inclined towards the side of Joe Jackson and Buck Weaver than the book itself.


Asinof more or less contends that Jackson might have batted.375, yet he only exerted his maximum effort in the games they were permitted to win. Buck Weaver was far more entangled in the plot, even though he ultimately refrained from participating in the fix. Sayles makes it a mystery as to how deeply involved they were by zeroing in on Gandil and Cicotte's treachery and leaving other players as enigmas.


The reason this book is a classic and will endure is that Asinof's style makes you feel as if you are directly witnessing the plot unfold rather than merely being informed about it. He leads you to follow the conspirators into hotels and fabricates conversations based on depositions. We can surely assume that some of the sworn testimony was false, but he argues that the players and even the gamblers were mostly willing to come clean, especially once they were granted immunity.


If you peruse Asinof's bibliography, you can observe that this was his sole classic work. His evident talent here simply didn't gel with other subject matters. I wish I had read this prior to reading "Burying the Black Sox: How Baseball's Cover-Up of the 1919 World Series Fix Almost Succeeded" by Gene Carney. I am now tempted to re-read it.

July 14,2025
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A story of betrayal?

After reading this, it becomes quite evident that the management might have been even shadier than the players who were involved in fixing a series. It seems as if Comisky and Johnson managed to amass wealth at the expense of the players. What they did was undeniably wrong. However, it is also apparent that they were just a small part of a much larger and more complex story.

The question that lingers is whether anything in the realm of sport is truly safe from the clutches of organized gambling. The way this story is told is quite engaging and well-done. It makes one wonder about the extent of corruption that might be lurking beneath the surface in the world of sports.

Could there be more cases like this that have yet to come to light? It is a thought-provoking and concerning issue that demands our attention and further investigation.
July 14,2025
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Really a 3.75.


There is an interesting truth behind one of the most famous events in baseball history.


Baseball has remained relatively unchanged over the past 100+ years. The owners continue to make money hand over fist, and gambling is now more involved than ever, with ads for betting apps running during the games. Additionally, many people still question the validity of the MLB playoffs' outcomes, but those who do are now labeled as "conspiracy theorists." Although players now have more power (thanks to their union) and earn significantly more money than they used to, they still have to fight for their rights to receive a "fair" share from the owners.


Despite all of this, both in the past and present, the fans still love the game. They prove this every time they spend a significant amount of money to go and watch the games. They also spend a large portion of their hard-earned money supporting the gambling industry. Baseball is ultimately an "entertainment" business, and it seems that the people are still being "entertained."

July 14,2025
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An incredibly well-researched and extremely well-detailed book indeed.

This is not just a great book for those who have a profound love for baseball, but also for those who may not have a particular inclination towards the sport.

The story it tells is both great and sad, and truly incredible. It takes us back to another era in baseball and in time, yet it has a moral conviction that could have significant implications for today's game, especially in the context of the steroids scandal.

As you read, you can't help but feel sorry for the players. At the same time, you find yourself wondering if justice was truly served with their lifelong ban. This ban not only follows them throughout their lives but also into death, as they are forever barred from entering the hall of fame.

So, there exists this lifelong and deathlong ban. However, it's important to note that not everyone gets punished in the same way, which really points out the true inequality of what happened.

This book offers a thought-provoking look into a complex and controversial chapter of baseball history.
July 14,2025
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Eight Men Out was not the best sports book I've read, but it's a fair book to read.

The book provides detailed information about the 1919 Chicago White Sox baseball team. In this team, eight players were involved in a scandal.

These eight players made a deal with gamblers. The gamblers bet surprisingly for the Cincinnati Reds to win, so that they could win money.

In the end, the Reds did win the World Series. However, it was because the eight Sox players involved in the "Black Sox scandal" deliberately played badly, which made the Cincinnati Reds the champs in 1919.

The book not only details the black sox scandal but also describes the aftermath.

Overall, it's a fair book to read. For sports buffs like me, it's a fine book. However, Eight Men Out wasn't the best sports book I've read. I would not necessarily recommend it to others as I've read better baseball books than this one.
July 14,2025
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The material presented was truly interesting, yet the book itself was rather lackluster. In essence, Comiskey truly deserved what he got. He was such a miserly capitalist bastard that he was paying his top team only one quarter of what the lesser teams received. It was like paying the Yankees on a minor league scale in comparison to the rest of professional baseball.

I felt a great deal of sympathy for Shoeless Joe. He was a simple country bumpkin who just so happened to be the best hitter in the country. However, he was constantly being taken advantage of because he was illiterate, easily confused, and misled.

I am truly amazed at the vast amount of graft and its pervasiveness. I wonder just how much that money is buying in today's world. How could there possibly not be money changing hands behind the scenes? And Pete Rose is merely a scapegoat, just as Martha Stewart was.

It makes one question the integrity of the entire system and how much corruption truly lies beneath the surface.
July 14,2025
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This is truly the definitive book on this iconic scandal. As I delved into its pages, I couldn't help but feel a sense of sympathy for Joe Jackson.

It beautifully combines elements of organized crime, the fabric of early 20th century American urban life, and the inherent romanticism of baseball. While reading, I constantly had flashes of Ken Burns' documentary footage playing in my mind.

However, it's a bit too profound for me to assign to undergrads, even in a sports history class. It would be better served as a "for further reading" title. Given that it's enmeshed in so much legend, I knew it was going to be a murky situation. But Asinof does an excellent job of untangling and clarifying what actually happened amidst the smoky backroom dealings that gave rise to the scandal.

It begins as a baseball book and concludes as a courtroom drama. Throughout the story, there are larger than life figures, from Shoeless Joe to Arnold Rothstein, and finally, fittingly, it ends with Kennesaw Mountain Landis.
July 14,2025
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I truly relished this book as it pertains to one of my most cherished interests, baseball. Baseball history has always held a great allure for me. I had read about this particular scandal previously, yet for some reason, I had never gotten around to reading this book.

\\tWhat made this book so captivating was the diverse perspectives presented by each individual implicated in the scandal, ranging from the gamblers to the players themselves. It was a detailed account of the motives that drove them to take the actions they did. Moreover, there was an element of mystery, as the exact nature of what transpired during each event, such as the discussions between gamblers and players, remains unknown. Overall, it was extremely engaging to read about the chronological sequence of how the events unfolded. For instance, they went from having a normal season, one of the greatest in history, to deliberately losing the World Series.

\\tAlso, through reading this, I discovered that there were other instances of fixing in baseball subsequent to this scandal. However, due to the significant negative publicity that baseball had received, they were reluctant to investigate these other cases as fans had once again begun to embrace the game. If I were to rate this book on a scale of 1 to 5, I would毫不犹豫地 give it a 5. I thoroughly enjoyed every aspect of it, and as I mentioned earlier, it delves into baseball history, which is a subject that I am truly passionate about learning.
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