Essential baseball
The New Yorker Book of Baseball Cartoons
A great collection of the many baseball cartoons that have appeared in the magazine over the years.
Triumph and Tragedy in Mudville
Gould was a well renowned paleontologist/biologist, but was a lifelong baseball fan too.
A Great and Glorious Game
Written by the last commissioner that wasn't a puppet of the owners. Giamatti was academic to the n-th degree, but he sure loved baseball.
Let’s Not Eat the Bones
A collection of pieces from his annual baseball abstracts, but without all of the numbers. Recommended—if you can find it.
Moneyball
An insider account about Billy Beane, the general manager of the Oakland A’s, on how to win with sabermetrics and a very small budget. Probably the best baseball book written in the past ten years.
Baseball Prospectus
The best baseball annual around. The best part of this book is the commentary on each player and team. While the statistics are great, it is the commentary that sets it apart.
Baseball Forecaster
This book is the book to prepare for the upcoming fantasy baseball season. Shandler started this series explicitly for fantasy baseball, however, in his quest to predict performance he has added to study of baseball.
The Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract
A great book, one of the best baseball books ever, though I confess that Bill James is starting to annoy me more and more.
The Glory of Their Times
Wonderful book about old school baseball, as told by the old school players.
Baseball Dynasties
Rob Neyer is my favorite baseball writer (he writes for ESPN.com). He teamed up with Epstein to write about the best baseball teams of all time. Excellent book.
Whatever Happened to the Hall of Fame?
Bill James has his critics lately, but you can’t argue with his contribution to baseball with his annual books in the 80’s and books like this. This one is about the Hall of Fame. The original title was better though—The Politics of Glory.
The Bill James Guide to Baseball Managers
This time James looks at baseball managers and wrote a great book in the process.
Ball Four
This book was earth-shattering when it was written because it was the first behind the scenes account of baseball. It is great book written from the perspective of a relief pitcher in the twilight of his career. Absolutely hysterical too.
The Hidden Game of Baseball
Palmer (and James) did an enormous job in taking baseball out of the dark ages. While someone that looks good in a uniform but can’t hit still gets more opportunities than those that can hit but look awful, Palmer in this book started a revolution to recognize great hitters with beer guts.
Total Baseball
While all the statistics are available on the net, there’s nothing like sitting down with a 1000+ page book of tissue thin paper with a sea numbers in 6pt type. Essential for any baseball bookshelf.
Fair Ball
Finally, a book written about the business of baseball. Very little of substance is written on the subject, and Costas (my favorite announcer) entered the fray with a well written, concise, book about what is wrong with the business of the sport, and how to fix it. And of course, it was completely ignored by the powers that be.