All-Pro Baseball Stars 1980

I was a baseball fanatic by 1980, and when the book fair came to my elementary school, I snapped up this little tome. You can read it in about an hour. Now, I'm sure the reader is asking, "What in the world could be relevant from 27 years ago about baseball?" But what I like about sports books from a given time frame - much like newspapers - is that you can see what the fuss was about at the time. Predictions are even given for the following year, and it is amusing to see how good and prescient the predictions are. You also learn about the players themselves - how they got there, what they excelled at, and what a great 1979 they had. I don't recall all the names, but here are a few from the book: Cecil Cooper, George Brett, Robin Yount, Jim Rice, Fred Lynn, Gorman Thomas, Mike Schmidt, Dave Kingman, Dave Concepcion, Brian Downing, Mike Flanagan, and Bruce Sutter. Obviously, some of those guys were much better players than others, but you get the point. And Pete Rose is honored as the 'player of the decade' for the 1970s. Also, it was amusing to see the A's listed as 'the A's.' Not the Oakland A's like the other teams. At the time this book went to press, rumor had it that the A's were moving to Denver after compiling an anemic 54-108 record in 1979. Incredibly enough, they stayed and won the Western division title just two years later. A good snapshot of baseball entering the 1980s.