More Than Merkle

David W. Anderson is a telecommunications consultant in northern Indiana. He is also an umpire for Indiana high school and Babe Ruth league baseball. Keith Olbermann is anchor for Fox Sports.

"David Anderson's book is a winner in its own right. Not only does it enlighten us about a season that might really have been 'the best and most exciting' of all time, it gives us the feeling that we're standing hatless among the overflow crowds of nearly a century ago, rooting for Matty, Rube, the Big Train, the Flying Dutchman, the Georgia Peach, and all the other flannel-clad immortals of days gone by... Anderson has fashioned as close to a masterpiece of baseball research and analysis as any first-class author has produced in a long time."-David Shiner, HaroldSeymour.com -- David Shiner HaroldSemour.com "A fascinating archival account of what baseball and America were like nearly a century ago."-New York Times Book Review New York Times Book Review "Those not acquainted with the dramatics of the 1908 campaign might find Anderson's hyperbolic title a bit extreme until they read of the many astonishing events that took place that year. To wit: three NL teams finishing within a half game of each other (forcing the first-ever playoff game) and an AL race decided by .004 percentage points. Toss in the exploits of legendary figures Christy Mathewson, Honus Wagner and other future Hall-of-Famers and the book's description more resembles an exercise in prosaic restraint."-USA Today Baseball Weekly USA Today Baseball Weekly "Baseball enthusiasts will enjoy this."-Library Journal Library Journal "As his title suggests, there was more to this memorable season than an infamous blunder."-Sports Illustrated Sports Illustrated "The arrival of a new baseball season serves to rekindle an old question: Which was the most exciting season ever played? In a book called More Than Merkle, David W. Anderson comes up with an answer that will startle many fans: the season of 1908. Just to make things perfectly clear, he subtitles his opus 'A History of the Best and Most Exciting Baseball Season in Human History.' Of course, the centerpiece is Fred 'Bonehead' Merkle, whose 'boner' of not running from first to second base while the winning run was scoring cost the New York Giants a pennant. Both leagues had close races that year, and the author covers them in exuberant detail. He also focuses on such star players as Christy Mathewson, Three-Finger Brown and Johnny Evers, not to mention more obscure figures, such as a pitcher with the fascinating name of Orval Overall, who won two games for the Chicago Cubs in the World Series (their last World Championship). Baseball antiquarians will relish the book."-Parade Parade