There are two joys associated with the Christmas season. One is the joy of the season itself with decorating and baking and visiting friends and family. The other is getting back to the regular routine.

As you all know, part of my regular routine is writing and now that the 2023 Noel is no more I am putting the finishing touches on my latest project, The Men Who Saved Baseball and other baseball stories. This collection of fiction, essay, and memoir also includes “Their Glorious Summer,” the story of the 1981 Valley League championship race. This article has been available as a free download (and continues to be available as such) but is now available in paperback for as part of this collection.

The Men Who Saved Baseball and other baseball stories will be released on February 6^th—Babe Ruth’s birthday. After all, with his prodigious home runs and larger-than-life personality, the Babe saved baseball in the wake of the Black Sox scandal. To provide quick perspective, eight White Sox players, including Shoeless Joe Jackson were banned for life from baseball in 1921 for allegedly throwing the 1919 World Series. But the talk of baseball that year was Ruth who Ruth out-homered every other team in the major leagues.

Major League Baseball, in the eyes of many of us, needs to be saved once more only this time from itself. The gimmicks, the over-extended playoffs, and—ironically enough—the emphasis on gambling has detracted from the game. Simply put, the MLB Powers That Be don’t appreciate their own product. I fixed that, at least in my imagination. You see, in the titular story of The Men Who Saved Baseball, a Midwestern soybean researcher, James “Dutch” Sojabonen, develops a gasoline additive that makes him a fortune. An avid baseball fan, he starts his own professional league. The first year of the All-American League is modestly successful, but when Dutch signs “Sweet Daddy” Davidson, he finds the league’s version of Babe Ruth. The entire nation discovers the league and the fact that baseball has never lost its magic.

The Men Who Saved Baseball and other baseball stories will be available in paperback or e-book form on February 6^th. Please mark the date and order yourself a copy!