My brother Charlie sent this one along, it was published by St. Martin's Press (where Kate worked).The subject matter and era are hard to beat for someone like me - I have more coherent memories of 1970s baseball than any other decade (including the current one). Plus we were collecting baseball cards in those days at a pretty fast clip, at least at the beginning of the decade. So this was highly enjoyed.
The author has a chapter for each year in the decade during which he summarizes the divisional races, playoff and World Series outcomes, major events during the year.
The far more interesting part of the book - though unfortunately just four of the chapters - is where he takes off on various themes: those round multi-purpose stadiums; AstroTurf; colorful uniforms; haircuts; stadium promotions (featuring, of course, dime beer night at Cleveland Muni and disco demolition at Comiskey Park).
A couple items of note:
I read that the wire "baskets" on the Wrigley Field fences were installed in 1970 following a bunch of drunk and/or stoned folks storming the field following an April game (supposedly a bunch of antiwar protesters in town). Also a discussion of how seedy the Wrigley area was in those days, much changed now.
Folks were distraught that Dave Kingman struck out 140 times in 1972 (he hit higher totals later in his career). You can tell baseball has changed, our own Diamondbacks feature a third baseman who has the three highest single-season strikeout totals of all time (topping out at 223). And they just gave him a contract extension last off-season.
Crazy times. It's difficult to imagine any current player involved in a wife-swap, pitching a game while on LSD, etc.
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