The Twenty-Four-Inch Home Run

Last updated
The Twenty-Four-Inch Home Run: And Other Outlandish, Incredible But True Events in Baseball History
24 Inch Home Run Bryson.png
Author Michael G. Bryson
LanguageEnglish
SubjectBaseball
GenreNon-fiction
PublisherContemporary Books
Publication date
1990
Pages293
ISBN 978-0-8092-4341-9

The Twenty-Four-Inch Home Run: And Other Outlandish, Incredible But True Events in Baseball History is a book about baseball lore written by sportswriter Michael G. Bryson. The title refers to the book's central story, about a game where Andy Oyler hit a baseball that became stuck in the mud 24 inches in front of home plate, allowing him to score an inside-the-park home run before the opposing team located it. [1] All told, the book contains 250 such stories, including an anecdote about a team registering a triple play without touching the ball. [1] Bryson also debunks several well-known baseball legends, including Babe Ruth's called shot and the story that Abner Doubleday invented baseball. [1]

The News Journal described the book as being filled with "wisecrack anecdotes" and "amazing facts, ludicrous turns of events, and hilarious quotes." [1] Baseball historian Stew Thornley described the book as "compilation of strange but supposedly true baseball tales", but questioned the veracity of the Oyler story, saying that Bryson "provides more details and great embellishment but did not give the date of the game." [2]

The book has been cited as a source by Society for American Baseball Research, [3] several reference books, [4] [5] [6] and a book about baseball's influence on American foreign policy. [7] One review wryly quipped "The title explains this book about as well as any brief review could." [8]

It was used as a source for Matt Tavares's children's book Mudball. [9] The book was featured by the LA84 Foundation in its 1991 convention. [10]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roger Connor</span> American baseball player (1857–1931)

Roger Connor was an American 19th-century Major League Baseball (MLB) player. He played for several teams, but his longest tenure was in New York, where he was responsible for the New York Gothams becoming known as the Giants. He was the player whom Babe Ruth succeeded as the all-time career home run champion. Connor hit 138 home runs during his 18-year career, and his career home run record stood for 23 years after his retirement in 1897.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hilton Smith</span> American baseball player

Hilton Lee Smith was an American right-handed pitcher in Negro league baseball. He pitched alongside Satchel Paige for the Kansas City Monarchs and Bismarck Churchills between 1932 and 1948. He was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2001.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Al Rosen</span> American baseball player (1924-2015)

Albert Leonard Rosen, nicknamed "Flip" and "the Hebrew Hammer", was an American baseball third baseman and right-handed slugger for the Cleveland Indians of Major League Baseball for ten seasons in the 1940s and 1950s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nicollet Park</span>

Nicollet Park was a baseball ground located in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The venue was home to the minor league Minneapolis Millers of the Western League and later American Association from 1896 to 1955.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lexington Park</span>

Lexington Park was the name of a former minor league baseball park in St. Paul, Minnesota. It was the home of the St. Paul Saints from 1897 through 1956, when it was replaced by the first version of Midway Stadium.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Midway Stadium</span>

Midway Stadium was the name of two different minor league baseball parks in Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States, both now demolished. The name derived from the location of the stadium in Saint Paul's Midway area, so named because it is roughly halfway between the downtowns of Minneapolis and Saint Paul.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ray Oyler</span> American baseball player (1937–1981)

Raymond Francis Oyler was an American baseball player, a major league shortstop for the Detroit Tigers (1965–1968), Seattle Pilots (1969), and California Angels (1970). He is best remembered as the slick-fielding, no-hit shortstop for the 1968 World Series champion Tigers and as the subject of the "Ray Oyler Fan Club" organized by Seattle radio personality Robert E. Lee Hardwick in Seattle. Oyler is noteworthy for having had the lowest career batting average of any position player in modern baseball history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Athletic Park (Minneapolis)</span> Baseball park in Minnesota, US

Athletic Park was the home of the Minneapolis Millers baseball team from 1889 to mid-season 1896. The park was located behind the West Hotel at 6th St and 1st Ave North in Minneapolis near where Target Center and Target Field are today.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gerald Tomlinson</span> American journalist

Gerald Arthur Tomlinson was a crime writer and editor. He wrote about sports, crime and New Jersey topis. Over twenty-five of his stories appeared in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine and Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine. He became a member of Mystery Writers of America in 1993. He was a member of the Society for American Baseball Research and he served on the Publications Committee from 1990 through 1991.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Toni Stone</span> Female Negro League baseball player (1921–1996)

Toni Stone, born as Marcenia Lyle Stone, was an American female professional baseball player who played in predominantly male leagues. In 1953, she became the first woman to play as a regular on an American major-level professional baseball team when she joined the Indianapolis Clowns in the previously all-male Negro leagues. A baseball player from her early childhood, she also played for the San Francisco Sea Lions, the New Orleans Creoles, the Indianapolis Clowns, and the Kansas City Monarchs before retiring from baseball in 1954. Stone was taunted at times by teammates, once being told, "Go home and fix your husband some biscuits", but she was undeterred. It has been widely reported that during an exhibition game in 1953, she hit a single off a fastball pitch delivered by legendary player Satchel Paige, although the claim has failed verification.

Halsey Lewis Hall was a sports reporter and announcer in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul area from 1919 until the 1970s.

Michael G. Bryson was a news and sports reporter and editor from Des Moines, Iowa and the elder brother of travel writer Bill Bryson. He co-authored a book The Babe Didn't Point: And Other Stories About Iowans and Sports with his son Michael G. Bryson Jr in 1989. He wrote The Twenty-Four-Inch Home Run in 1990.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Lehner</span> American baseball player

Paul Eugene Lehner was an American outfielder in Major League Baseball, playing mainly as a center fielder for five American League teams from 1946 through 1952. A native of Dolomite, Alabama, Lehner batted and threw left-handed. Listed at 5 feet 9 inches (1.75 m) tall and 165 pounds (75 kg), he was nicknamed "Peanuts" or "Gulliver." He worked in the region's coal mines as a young man.

The 1970 Oakland Athletics season involved the A's finishing second in the American League West with a record of 89 wins and 73 losses. In 1970, owner Charlie Finley officially changed the team name from the Athletics to the "A's". An "apostrophe-s" was added to the cap and uniform emblem to reflect that fact.

The 1963 Kansas City Athletics season was the ninth for the franchise in Kansas City and the 63rd overall. It involved the A's finishing eighth in the American League with a record of 73 wins and 89 losses, 31+12 games behind the AL Champion New York Yankees. The 1963 season was also the first season in which the Athletics debuted their current color scheme of green and gold.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Earl McNeely</span> American baseball player (1898-1971)

George Earl McNeely was an American professional baseball outfielder and coach. He played in Major League Baseball for the Washington Senators and St. Louis Browns. McNeely threw and batted right-handed, and was listed as 5 feet 9 inches (1.75 m) tall and 155 pounds (70 kg). He was a lifelong resident of Sacramento, California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andy Oyler</span> American baseball player (1880-1970)

Andrew Paul "Pepper" Oyler was an American professional baseball player who played one season in Major League Baseball for the Baltimore Orioles in 1902. In 27 games as a third baseman, shortstop, and outfielder for the Orioles, he had 77 at-bats with 17 hits and one home run.

Donald Wesley Wheeler was an American professional baseball player, a catcher who appeared in 67 games in Major League Baseball catcher for the Chicago White Sox in 1949. The native of Minneapolis threw and batted right-handed, stood 5 feet 10 inches (1.78 m) tall and weighed 175 pounds (79 kg) during his baseball career.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Judy Gumbo</span>

Judy Gumbo Albert, known as Judy Gumbo, is a Canadian-American activist. She was an original member of the Yippies, the Youth International Party, a 1960s counter culture and satirical anti-war group, along with fellow radicals Anita and Abbie Hoffman, Nancy Kurshan and Jerry Rubin, and husband Stew Albert

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 De Yampert, Rick (September 2, 1990). ""Home Run" eases torment of football". The News Journal .
  2. Thornley, Stew (2006). Short Home Runs: Mythical and Real. Minnesota Historical Society. p. 51. ISBN   9780873515511.{{cite book}}: |newspaper= ignored (help)
  3. Thornley, Stew. "Nicollet Park (Minneapolis)". The Baseball Biography Project. Society for American Baseball Research.
  4. Porterfield, Jason (2009). "Bibliography". Baseball in the American League Central Division. The Rosen Publishing Group. p. 45. ISBN   9781435850422.
  5. Porterfield, Jason (2009). "Bibliography". Baseball in the American League East Division. The Rosen Publishing Group. p. 45. ISBN   9781435850439.
  6. Levine, Peter (1992). Baseball History 4: An Annual of Original Baseball Research. Mecklermedia. ISBN   9780887365782.
  7. Elias, Robert (2009). "Notes for pages 8-11". The Empire Strikes Out: How Baseball Sold U.S. Foreign Policy and Promoted. The New Press. p. 296. ISBN   9781595581952.
  8. Kliatt Young Adult Paperback Book Guide. Vol. 24–25. 1990. p. 52.
  9. Tavares, Matt (2005). "Bibliography". Mudball. Candlewick Press. ISBN   9780763623876.
  10. Smith, Ronald A.; Stephen Wenn. "Convention Book Display-1991" (PDF). LA84 Foundation.