Baseball Insider

On one of those cable financial stations the other day, one of the talking heads was explaining the concept of "Mancations."

Like the fans, she adored him. By the time his career as a player, coach, and manager ended, Yogi had collected

Last month I predicted the Yankees, Indians and Angels would top their divisions in the American League, while the Mets, Cubs and Diamondbacks would do the same in the National League.

Many former baseball players who left us with happy memories also passed away in the past year.

The 1947 baseball season was Jackie Robinson's first and Hank Greenberg's last. It also marked the debut of another Jewish slugger, Al Rosen.

The Yankees won their first World Series as they downed the New York Giants, four games to two. Ruth was the biggest star of the Series as he batted .368 with three home runs.

In the four years-plus I've been writing this column, I've received many questions from readers. This month would be a good time to showcase some of the more popular questions and tell you of a book about an Orthodox Jew in the baseball field.

Shawn Green didn't provide the power the Mets were hoping for last season as he hit only 10 home runs in 446 at bats.

Forget the results. The 2009 World Series featured the two best teams in baseball. In the old days, the Series always had the best team in the American League against the best team in the National League. But with the advent of two rounds of league playoffs, a good but not great team that has a hot week or two can find itself in the World Series.

When Gaylord Perry made it to the major leagues with the San Francisco Giants in 1962, manager Alvin Dark told him that while he had the makings of being a good pitcher, he would be a terrible hitter. In fact, Dark told Perry that man would walk on the moon before Perry would ever hit a home run.

The coliseum could house over 100,000 fans. On Opening Day the Dodgers drew 78,672 paying fans – almost double what their beloved former home, Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, could accommodate.

I was lucky enough to have met and interviewed many Hall of Famers including Joe DiMaggio, Hank Greenberg, Ted Williams and Stan Musial. I also had the chance to meet and gab with many of the stars from the old Negro Leagues who went on to play in the major leagues after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier – Hank Aaron, Ernie Banks, Larry Doby, Monte Irvin and Satchel Paige. But I never had the chance to meet Jackie Robinson.

Events morphed into what became known as the Six-Day War. While the war lasted less than a week, millions of words were devoted to it in newspapers and magazines over the days and weeks that followed.

Wow! What a finish to the 2011 baseball season. Even before the interesting seven-game World Series won by St. Louis, there was incredible drama in the final month.

As the years flew by, one thing remained constant in Sid’s life – the New York Yankees.

We knew which batters were hitting well and which ones were in a slump. We memorized what the batters did in the few days before we faced them.

All of the players respected him. There wasn't a finer player or finer man.

The year was1948 and a great baseball season was unfolding.

While Pittsburgh embraced Greenberg, Robinson had a more mixed reception in Brooklyn. The borough’s Jewish fans welcomed him, as did most of the rest of the Ebbets Field faithful.

It's been all over the news. You had to be in solitary confinement not to hear about umpire Jim Joyce's blown call at first base that should have ended the perfect game by Tigers pitcher Armando Galarraga against the Cleveland Indians in Detroit.

While I never attended a religious service in a non-orthodox house of worship, I spoke in every synagogue and Temple in the Detroit area. Some more than once. I also did some radio and television there, besides writing for some local publications, too. I was born in Detroit; it was my home my whole life.

I was one of 2,400 people at the recent Yeshiva Beth Yehudah dinner held in downtown Detroit.

Baseball fans know C. C. Sabathia signed a $161-million, seven-year contract with the Yankees. Not many fans know C. C. is short for Carsten Charles.

Rewind sixty years to 1953. Television was considered kosher by most and featured the likes of Desi Arnaz, Lucille Ball, Jack Benny, George Burns, Red Buttons, Perry Como, Arthur Godfrey, Clayton Moore as The Lone Ranger, Dinah Shore, Red Skelton, Danny Thomas, Jack Webb as Joe Friday on “Dragnet” and many others who provided great memories.

In 1870 the Chicago White Stockings headed south to New Orleans for preseason workouts.

A chance phone call to a sports call-in radio program would change the course of my life. But it wasn't by chance. It was orchestrated by Hashem.

Let me tell you about my new book. Like you, I’m interested in Jewish baseball players and Jewish history. So, after years of research, first-hand observations and interviews, I combined the aforementioned information from the post-civil war era to the present and came up with a book titled Jewish History in the Time of Baseball's Jews: Life on Both Sides of the Ocean.

Max Patkin had a long career in baseball as an entertainer. His trademark was wearing a baggy uniform with a large question mark on his back instead of a uniform number.

On the subject of the World Baseball Teams, we had a chance to see Jacob Steinmetz pitch for Team Israel against several major league all-star players representing the Dominican Republic.

I enjoyed watching the Yankees this year with their young players like Judge and Gary Sanchez.