This book presents a ton of interesting baseball stories, mostly involving wild oddities, but but with interesting and humorous anecdotes sprinkled in, too. You'll read of amazing coincidences and odd happenings from the days of Babe Ruth, Rogers Hornsby, and Lou Gehrig to great stories about men such as Pete Rose, Hank Aaron and many many more. The book will make you laugh while it also amazes you and informs you-- and everything revolves about baseball lore. Chapters include: Odd Baseball Plays, Odd Humor, A World of Irony and Coincidence, Quotes (both interesting and humorous) of the Game, Odd Trick Plays, and more. Plus the book includes new, updated Bonus Material. Never before tales as well as classic stories (such as those about colorful characters such as Babe Herman) appear in the book. Read "The Case of the Disappearing Baseball" and about the time a pitcher retired a batter at first base by tossing his glove (with the ball wedged inside) to the first baseman. Then there's the story of a catcher who tricked a base runner by throwing a peeled potato wildly, causing the runner think the baseball had flown by him into the outfield.

When the runner took off for the plate to score, he was tagged out by the catcher who was still holding the ball. You'll read about a player "stealing" first base, of an amazing trick play Sandy Alomar almost got away with, of Jose Canceso doing a "header" to turn a fly ball into a home run, and you'll even see how players found humor in the aftermath of an earthquake. There's even the story of a mediocre pitcher who managed to throw a no-hitter in his first big league start then quickly sink into obscurity. Here's are two samples of some oddities (and humor) from the book: 1) Don Mattingly of the New York Yankees was an outstanding hitter and a fine first baseman. Even before he made it to the big leagues, scouts knew he would be a star. Still, there were several players drafted before him and, amazingly, three of them became professional football stars, forsaking the game of baseball. They were, by yet another strange coincidence, all quarterbacks: John Elway, Jay Schroeder, and Dan Marino. Furthermore, yet another college grid star, Rick Leach, was selected ahead of Mattingly.

While the quarterbacks had a great deal of National Football League success, Leach was a bust. The only baseball organization which came out this most unusual draft looking good was the Yankees. 2) Vic Power was journeyman who lasted for 12 years in the majors. He was never known for his speed, stealing only 45 lifetime bases with a season high of just nine. Despite that, in August of 1958 while with Cleveland, he stole home twice in the same game. Not only that, for the entire season he wound up with just one additional stolen base.3) During the glory days of the 1970s of the A's, the team owner was Charlie Finley, a controversial figure. Even though the A's won the World Series for an amazing three consecutive years (1972-1974), Finley was not exactly loved by many of his players.

One such player was pitcher Steve McCatty. When McCatty learned Finley had undergone heart surgery, he took this stab at his boss, "I heard it took eight hours for the operation--seven and a half to find the heart.".