Eight Men Out: The Black Sox and the 1919 World Series by Eliot Asinof

Apr 21, 2013 Ryan Arnold rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is a book that was written and made for a person who truly understands the concepts of baseball and money as one. Professional baseball is a business and the quicker people understand that, the quicker they can use that to their advantage. The men of this time knew that the game was new and wanted to make the most money off of it. So when they payed the players to lose the games, it was for the maximum profit from bets placed on the games.
This book gives great detailed descriptions of the...more

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Mar 02, 2013 Lukas Stauderman rated it 5 of 5 stars

I felt that Eliot Asinof's Eight Men Out: The Black Sox and the 1919 World Series, is probably one of the best baseball books that I have read. It is a nonfictional book about the 1919 World Series, where the Chicago White Sox, ultimately the best team in baseball during this time period, decided to "throw" the Series. It was one of the worst scandal's in the history of sports as the 8 players of the White Sox were ultimately thrown out of baseball for life. As I have read many books over the l...more I felt that Eliot Asinof's Eight Men Out: The Black Sox and the 1919 World Series, is probably one of the best baseball books that I have read. It is a nonfictional book about the 1919 World Series, where the Chicago White Sox, ultimately the best team in baseball during this time period, decided to "throw" the Series. It was one of the worst scandal's in the history of sports as the 8 players of the White Sox were ultimately thrown out of baseball for life. As I have read many books over the last 6 months, this has been one of the best that I have read during that time period.

The main theme of the book is that you should never let money influence your decision to do something you would not normally take the risk or the chance of doing. Money can be a powerful weapon and can be used to control people, change emotions, and with enough of it, you can do whatever you want. As there was later a movie made about the book(I have seen it), you get a great deal of information from the book that is left out of the movie. One small thing is the fact that before the series even started, the betting odds on the series in Chicago was at even money. So if it seemed as though the word had gone viral, and every person seemed to have some insight as to what was going on, why continue to go through with the plan? Simple: White Sox owner Charles Comiskey had no problem spoiling the sportswriters, whom he considered friends, he was selfish and stingy when it came to player's contracts and giving them large sums of money.

A rumor is that Eddie Cicotte, the Sox best pitcher, was told that if he won 30 games in 1919, then he would be given a $10,000 bonus. He had won 29 that year, but he had been benched for two weeks in August and missed five starts, under the orders of Comiskey. Apparently Comiskey wanted to save Cicotte's arm for the World Series and therefore, he had him rest. Cicotte, a 35 year old pitcher, had been around in the league for 14 years, "Shoeless" Joe Jackson for ten, but the rest of the players were fairly young and just beginning their careers. Guys such as Swede Risberg, "Lefty" Williams, and Happy Felsch, could have possibly went on to have great, Hall of Fame caliber careers. So why do it?

They were angry that they played on the best team in the league and still made the league minimum, making less than second rate players on second division teams. The Cincinnati Reds players made close to twice as much as each of the White Sox players at the same positions. They fixed the series with some high end gamblers, as they wanted $80,000 before the series began, in cash; $10,000 for each player. After the series was finished, there was a trial held for 8 convicted players on the White Sox for throwing the series.

As I have previously mentioned, this is a terrific baseball book, as it talks about an iconic moment in this sport's history. This blow almost caused an end to professional baseball, ticket sales went down, causing the prices of foot in the stadium to go up and the contracts of the players to diminish. Throughout the history of baseball, there have been other moments such as these, and at this time, betting and gambling on baseball games was a common thing. Often times you would here stories of a game being thrown hear and a game being thrown there, however never such as important as the World Series. This book is great for baseball fans out there who enjoy the history of the game and respect the game, however, this book is not appealing to everyone. (less)

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Oct 29, 2012 Ryan Bramlett rated it 4 of 5 stars

The Major League Baseball World Series has been a celebrated event for decades. Hundreds of thousands crowd around their TV to watch America’s pastime or if they are if they are lucky enough get to watch the game first hand. But the fans of the Chicago White Sox during the 1919 fix were not so lucky. The struggles and steps taken by the players and gamblers during the fix was packed into this intriguing book by Eliot Asinof. The story is about a New York gambler, Arnold Rothenstein that wanted t...more

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Oct 03, 2012 Cole Hamilton rated it 4 of 5 stars

I think that the purpose of the author to write this book was to inform sports readers or anyone about the 1919 Chicago Black Sox and how eight of the players tried to fix the World Series for 100,000 dollars. Its a biography about the team so you know he wrote it to inform everyone who has heard about it on what actually happened.
The theme of the story is that the pressures of baseball in 1919 was very high that it turned very talented men to betray the game of baseball. So don't fall under t...more

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Feb 03, 2012 Nancy Kennedy rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is the kind of nonfiction read I love, a book about an iconic incident you think you know something about. "Say it ain't so, Joe!" That's pretty much what I knew of the "Black Sox" baseball scandal.

Everything I thought I knew about the throwing of the 1919 World Series turns out to be wrong. Just about every fact Mr. Asinof unearthed surprised me: Why did they do it? Were they just bad apples? When did people start to suspect the fix was on? Who initiated the fix? Who really made money? Who...more

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Apr 12, 2013 Gerald rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: baseball fans

Recommended to Gerald by: Bought it because of the subject,

A inside, thorough look at the most serious scandel in baseball, with the 1919 Chicago White Sox accepting bribes from professional gamblers to throw the World Series. It also shows the odious nature of the reserve clause. The reserve clause bound a player to one team for life. They could not play anywhere else, unless the owner allowed it. The reserve clause treated players like indentured servants, with greedy owners paying them nowhere near what they were worth. In an atmosphere of disrespect...more

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Dec 02, 2011 Michael Campbell rated it 3 of 5 stars

Eight Men Out is the story of how the 1919 Chicago White Sox intentionally threw the World Series. The author, Eliot Asinof, wrote the book as "a reconstruction the Black Sox scandal drawn from a rich variety of sources and from research into all the scattered written material concerning it". In other words, the author conducted vast research of articles published during that time, court documents, and interviews with some of the White Sox players who were still living.

The author stated that the...more

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Apr 30, 2012 D M rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed

i'm an old-time baseball history fan. i'd like to believe that my grandfather and great grandfather cheered for the quite defunct philadelphia athletics back in the heyday of american baseball when the athletics were definitiely the apple of philly's eye, 5 world series wins in 20 years. this is not a book about those athletics but about a great team that coexisted in those grand years, the White Sox.

most of us know some of this story of the original cheaters in major league baseball.
poor pay...more

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Sep 02, 2012 Max Newman rated it 2 of 5 stars

Eight Men Out was not the best sports book I've read, but it's a fair book to read. The book details the 1919 Chicago White Sox baseball team, as eight of the players on the team are involved in a scandal. The eight players have struck a deal with gamblers, so the gamblers can win money, as the gamblers have surprisingly bet for the Cincinatti Reds to win. In the end, the Reds do win the World Series, but because the eight Sox players involved in the "Black Sox scandal" intentionally played bad,...more

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Jan 11, 2011 Kelly rated it 3 of 5 stars

loved the beginning with its brief history of baseball, including the following:

"There was hardly a game in which some wild, disruptive incident did not occur to alter the outcome...On one occasion, a gambler actually ran out on the field and tackled a ballplayer. On another, a marksmen prevented a fielder from chasing a long hit by peppering the ground around his feet with bullets"(11).

i'm not sure i completely agree with the authors overall take on the event. sure, it's an honest portrayal (...more

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Sep 29, 2009 Tommy rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: baseball, non-fiction

This was a terrific book especially for anyone who enjoys baseball history.

Considering what sparse records exist about the events and the trials I think Asinof does a masterful job of constructing the story of all the involved parties including multiple gamblers, players, owners, commissioners, judges, etc. The list of people whose point of view is presented honestly in a nuanced and sensitive way is truly astounding. Even more astounding is that the entire account doesn't seem more muddled. Asi...more

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May 05, 2013 Jan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Contrary reader here. I am not necessarily a baseball fan, but I am a good story fan. When 42 was imminently coming out I watched Ken Burns's Baseball. The story of the 1919 Chicago "Black Sox" scandal stood out. I watched John Sayles's movie and then set about reading the book. The thing I do like about baseball stories are the character names. Where else can you read about Shoeless Joe Jackson, Lefty Williams, Kid Gleason and a Judge whose honest-to-God name was Kennesaw Mountain Landis. The s...more

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Jul 23, 2011 Matt Black rated it 5 of 5 stars

A fantastically well written book It goes into great detail of the story of the fix of the 1919 World Series, many of which are not known until reading this novel. It was a scandal that rocked baseball to its core and changed the game forever. "The scandal was a betrayal of more than a set of ballgames, even more than of the sport itself. It was a crushing blow at American pride" (197). Sadly, cheating never left the game. Even today, players will look to get any edge they can. But after reading...more

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May 25, 2010 Leah rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: summer-reading-2010, non-fiction

Who would have thought that a book about a baseball corruption scandal published in 1963 would be such a page-turner? Certainly not me, but I was pleasantly surprised that I had such a hard time putting it down. Of course, I do like baseball.

I'm not sure why I decided to include this in my summer reading project. I like baseball, I like nonfiction, and I'd always heard about the World Series scandal of 1919. I guess that was enough to land it on my reading list. Anyway, I enjoyed this book treme...more Who would have thought that a book about a baseball corruption scandal published in 1963 would be such a page-turner? Certainly not me, but I was pleasantly surprised that I had such a hard time putting it down. Of course, I do like baseball.

I'm not sure why I decided to include this in my summer reading project. I like baseball, I like nonfiction, and I'd always heard about the World Series scandal of 1919. I guess that was enough to land it on my reading list. Anyway, I enjoyed this book tremendously. My only complaint was how the book ended, which I'd say was abruptly. I guess I expected some philosophical winding-up or some thoughts on the human desire for money at all costs, or something.

The book is divided into five parts, each of which deals with a different part of throwing the World Series: the setup, the Series, the trial, the aftermath. The thing that makes this book so easy to read is that the author does a fair amount of imagining conversations and fabricating encounters. That technique is probably frowned upon in nonfiction or history writing today, but perhaps in the 1960s, absolute accuracy took second place to readability. I actually appreciated this technique, as it made the sometimes dry retelling of baseball plays more palatable and easy to read.

I came away from this story feeling sorry for the eight baseball players who threw the World Series. Sure, they did commit a crime, but it seemed like they were punished disproportionately for their sins. The mishaps and misbehavior of the other characters in the story (the lawyers, the club owners, the gamblers, and the judges) seemed very suspicious and went relatively unpunished as far as I could tell.

Although I really enjoyed the readability of this book, I wonder what a more scholarly interpretation of the scandal would reveal, since Asinof didn't really go into details about his sources. I found myself wondering more than once about where the information about the actual plot came from, whether it was just from the testimonies of the players, or from corroborating sources.

I'd recommend this book to anybody who is vaguely interested in early twentieth-century American history, since the book really has strong descriptions of life in 1919, and the ways in which the World Series was so important to so much of the American population. It's so readable that I think people who aren't necessarily baseball fans would be able to enjoy it.(less)

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Oct 12, 2012 Will Hochberger rated it 5 of 5 stars

Eight Men Out....... It definitely surprised me in a good way. I knew about throwing games and I had also heard about the 1919 world series. THis brings my whole view and conception of baseball to a different level on America's pastime.

THis is a great book with intersting detail that the average sports fan couldn't get for flipping the channel to ESPN. It is kind of like a review of that time period and how different it was. From the fans attendance to the transportation of the players to the am...more

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Jan 07, 2011 Kipi rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Baseball and American history lovers

Shelves: american-history, baseball, non-fiction, read-in-2011

Excellent telling of the Black Sox story. It will never fail to break my heart when I think about the wasted talent that resulted from their banishment. Charles Comisky came out of the whole thing looking like the victim when it was his tight-fistedness that drove the players to do what they did. Not making excuses...just stating facts. Chick Gandil is not a likable character, but the others...especially Buck Weaver, Joe Jackson, Eddie Cicotte and Lefty Williams...I will always have sympathy for...more

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Oct 16, 2012 Shawn rated it 4 of 5 stars

An incredibly well researched, very well detailed book. This is a great book for those who love baseball and those who do not. The story is great, sad, and incredible. Really another era in baseball and in time, yet has a moral conviction about it, that could be used in today's game with the steroids scandal.

You feel sorry for the players and yet you wonder if justice was truly served with their lifelong ban. A ban that follows them into death as well, since no one can get into the hall of fame....more

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Mar 07, 2013 Chad Weller rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book was really historic how the 1919 black sox's cheated their way into the world series.

This book is about how they used steroids to give 8 men on the black sox the competitive edge against there oponets. But the board disided to do there random drug test on the black sox players. When they did it only 8 people of the black soxs were suppened for the rest of the season, therefore they wouldn't play in the world sereis.

I would highly recomen this book for people who love the game of baseb...more

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Aug 28, 2012 Tim rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sports

I had this book on my shelf for a very long time. I think I read it once long ago, but I didn't think that I remembered much about it. Turns out that, as I read it, I did remember more than I thought. (Maybe it was from seeing the movie long ago too, I don't know). Anyhow, this made the experience less enjoyable because it really wasn't new.

You can't help but feel bad for the ballplayers in this story. Even the slightly scummy ones like Gandil. It just shows the sort of corruption that can happe...more

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Mar 20, 2010 Erin rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: those interested in baseball history

Recommended to Erin by: saw the movie 1st

Shelves: books-read-in-2010

Wow... That's my 1st reaction to this book. I have the movie and have owned the book for several years but have never endeavored to actually read it until last month. It is an incredibly gripping and well-researched book. Mr. Asinof presents the story from the many different sides, which forced the reader to confront the blurred lines between perpetrator and victim in the whole deal. It was especially interesting to me that an event that is so big in the history of baseball was as shabbily piece...more

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May 08, 2013 Eddy Allen rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: arts-and-historical

The headlines proclaimed the 1919 fix of the World Series and attempted cover-up as "the most gigantic sporting swindle in the history of America!" First published in 1963, Eight Men Out has become a timeless classic. Eliot Asinof has reconstructed the entire scene-by-scene story of the fantastic scandal in which eight Chicago White Sox players arranged with the nation's leading gamblers to throw the Series in Cincinnati. Mr. Asinof vividly describes the tense meetings, the hitches in the conniv...more

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Mar 19, 2013 Kevin rated it 3 of 5 stars

Eight Men Out (the movie) was one of my favorite baseball movies, so I thought I'd listen to the audio book. There is A LOT more to the story in the book than there was in the movie. It is interesting how gambling really controlled baseball back in the beginning of the sports. For example, people would toss rocks at the outfielders trying to catch a fly ball if they had a bet on the game. And the weird thing is, there was no rule against it!

After reading the book, you can understand more why Bar...more

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Jan 17, 2010 Diane rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: sports, history, non-fiction

An interesting book – I never saw the movie and only sort of knew the full story of the Black Sox. I had a couple of interesting and competing reactions. The first was how different the world is today – the second was how much the world today is the same. First, I was struck by how today when there are accusations of drugging in sports, the principles are millionaire players who immediately point the finger at other people. In 1918, the principles were basically poor kids who did wrong and who t...more

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Jun 21, 2008 Ryan rated it 4 of 5 stars

The author of Eight Men Out died last week and I heard of him and the book on a public radio show, Its only a game. I seem to have good luck with books I hear about in this manner.

The book is wonderful - there is a wonderful flavor of 1919, of sitting in the ballpark, of gamblers and the obsession that I've come to recognize in the blues guitarist and the baseball fan. The book has the right mix of history, personality and reporting on a black mark in baseball history. I am not a baseball fan b...more

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Jan 09, 2008 Tung rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

The nonfiction account of the 1919 World Series and the Chicago “Black Sox” scandal. Asinof relates the short history of baseball through 1919 and the prevalent gambling and cheating that grew as the game’s popularity grew. He describes the power of the club owners, and their mistreatment and abuse of the players that drove the players’ plan to throw the World Series. Asinof documents the histories of all 8 of the players involved, as well as the histories of the relevant gamblers. The book is b...more

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Oct 09, 2009 Alexandre Giesbrecht rated it 5 of 5 stars

Although it is impossible to know how much of this book romanticizes the real story, it is convincing, and a detailed account of the story that can be best described to Brazilians as the story behind the ghosts on the movie "Field of Dreams". Much of the book is narrated as a thriller, and even though everybody will know how the story ends before it even begins, it captures the reader's attention from start to finish. I had trouble putting it aside every time I got to it.

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Feb 01, 2012 Mark rated it 4 of 5 stars

I only knew about the Black Sox scandal in broad outline, so I was glad to learn more in this detailed account.

The writing is light and readable, but the narrative tells of a group of rather foolish men who allowed their disgruntlement at poor treatment from White Sox owner Charles Comiskey to lead them into the remorseless clutches of professional gamblers. Though they were acquitted of criminal charges, they were barred from major leagues baseball for life while those who corrupted them mostly...more

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Feb 15, 2009 Sarah rated it 4 of 5 stars

I love books about the '20s. I'm fascinated by the way people talked and how innocent everything seemed at surface level. And then you find out that lots of people were into drugs and alcohol, and flappers were essentially prostitutes. Intriguing.
Anyway, the story of the 1919 White Sox is so sad. I think Eliot told it well - he managed to make me feel bad for these ballplayers who sold their souls to the devil and lost so much because of it. Parts of it were a bit long-winded, particularly the p...more

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May 03, 2013 Eric rated it 5 of 5 stars

Easily my favorite sports-related book of all-time, Eight Men Out tells the story of the infamous 1919 World Series, which was purposely lost by the White Sox in return for money from gamblers. After reading the book, if you don't sympathize with the players, who were nickle-and-dimed by Charlie Comiskey, you have no heart. Shoeless Joe for the Hall of Fame!

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Sep 19, 2012 Rachel rated it 4 of 5 stars

Wow. I knew little about the Black Sox aside from watching "Field of Dreams" and the repeated phrase of "Say it ain't so, Joe." This book gives a broad scope of the key people involved with the 1919 World Series. Not a heart warming book by any means; after all it is all about corruption--though it is fascinating.

Wondering why Asinof doesn't list his sources?

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