Where Nobody Knows Your Name

This is John Feinstein's latest book, and it's a must-read if you're a baseball fan(atic). Feinstein basically spends one season in the Triple-A International League, chronicling the highs and lows of life as a player, manager, and umpire in the highest of the minor leagues of baseball.

This is one of those books that I kept marking passages in to read to my husband. Feinstein is a great storyteller who is given a lot of access, and he uses that combination to share some funny, amazing, and heart-wrenching real stories about people both whom you've heard of and of whom you will never hear. He focuses mostly on 3 or 4 teams and a dozen or so people who are either on their way up or on their way down (that's pretty much the way it is in AAA, nobody wants to stay there). But he also shares great stories of baseball lore, like what Tommy Lasorda had to say about Bobby Valentine when he managed him in the Dodgers farm system (the book is worth the read for that story alone).

I learned a lot of things from the book that I didn't know about all the movement in baseball if you're not a "hot prospect" or signed to a multiyear  contract, and read some really great baseball stories. I highly recommend this book for any fan of the game.

Where Nobody Knows Your Name