Ball Four by Jim Bouton, Leonard Shecter (1990, Paperback, Anniversary)

When first published in 1970, Ball Four stunned the sports world. The commissioner, executives, and players were shocked. Sportswriters called author Jim Bouton a traitor and "social leper." Baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn tried to force him to declare the book untrue. Fans, however, loved the book. And serious critics called it an important social document. Today, Jim Bouton is still not invited to Oldtimer's Days at Yankee Stadium. But his landmark book is still being read by people who don'tordinarily follow baseball.

Unavailable for several years, Ball Four, in this twentieth-anniversary edition, is sure to be discovered by a whole new generation of readers as more than a trailblazing sports book, but also a great book on the American dream fulfilled.

Industry Reviews
"As it turned out, of course, one might as well have tried to resist free verse. Publishers would continue to put out reverent books about sports heroes--the shelves are filled with hagiographies of everyone from Michael Jordan to Joe Montana--but Bouton had changed the form."
New Yorker - David Remnick (06/10/1996)

"What continues to impress...is Bouton's humor, his eye and ear for detail, his willingness to confess his own vulnerability. These are qualities only rarely on display in books by ballplayers."
New York Times Book Review - Andrew Santella (10/01/2000)

A book deep in the American vein, so deep in fact it is by no means a sports book" —David Halberstam
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"<I>Ball Four</I> is a people book, not just a baseball book." —Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, <I>The New York Times</I>