Biographical Dictionary of American Sports: Baseball features 1,450 entries, arranged alphabetically. Beyond the statistical data found in most baseball reference books, BDAS: Baseball provides substantial information on the lives of players, managers, umpires, executives, sportscasters and sportswriters who have contributed greatly to the USA’s national pastime. Although true aficionados of the game may be disappointed not to find the obscure players they remember from their childhood (like Gates Brown of the Detroit Tigers), many great and near‐great players are included. More than Major League Baseball is covered. Also represented are the All‐American Girls Professional Baseball League and the Negro League.
There are many search alternatives, including Hall of Famers, Search Within Date Range, Free Text Search and the Player Comparison Search. The entries are impressive for an online source of brief biographical sketches. I recommend Player Comparison Search, where one can search four entries at once. This is great when looking for players from the same team. For example, I could search and find 1967 Boston Red Sox players Carl Yastremzski, Rico Petrocelli, Tony Conigliaro and George Scott. I also used it to find players with colorful nicknames, which are searchable. I quickly found entries for “Catfish” Hunter, “Mudcat” Grant, and “Charlie Hustle”, but not “Blue Moon” Odom. I only found a few inconsistencies. For example, I could not find an entry for “Pete Rose”, but I could for “Peter Rose”, because “Pete” wasn’t included as a nickname. Also, I could not find an entry for Denny McClain (baseball’s last 30‐game winner) when searching Pitchers. Dumbfounded, I searched the Table of Contents for him ‐ and there he was! Also, the section for Sportscasters was woefully inadequate. I could only find sportscasters who were ex‐players. Therefore, I could find Ron Santo and Steve Stone, but not Harry Cary. Also, there were no entries for Joe Garagiola, Tony Kubek or even “Mr Baseball” Bob Uecker.
This is probably the one great oversight. The criteria for inclusion in the BDAS: Baseball are rather limiting. Many current players are included; however, players from bygone days had to have the career numbers to make the cut. The editors might consider adding players with good stories instead of just great numbers. An entry for Mark “The Bird” Fydrich or Moe Berg, the catcher who reputedly was a spy during the Second World War, would be welcome. Overall, though, this is a great source filled with interesting information about the lives of the men and women associated with professional baseball in the USA.
