I absolutely ADORE this book. Anyone who likes baseball, whether a casual or hardcore fan, should immediately get this book. It's perfect for a bathroom book, even! It goes through baseball by the decade since the 1870s, and makes it INTERESTING! Bill James emphasizes that we love baseball b/c we are emotionally invested in it. So he writes the history of the game in a way that we can be emotionally invested in historical players and teams. It covers teams, players, rules, scandals, births, deaths, and even uniforms. I'm only through the 1930s right now, but it is already one of the best baseball books I've ever read.

A note - this is written by a baseball stat geek, but you don't have to know that much about stats to understand it. He explains well. But if you're someone like Joe Morgan who doesn't believe in baseball analysis using statistics, it might piss you off. I, however, love stat geeks.