Thank you, <a href=”https://www.mcfarlandbooks.com”>McFarland</a> for providing this book for review consideration in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Mr. Book just finished World Series ’64: The Cardinals, The Yankees And The End Of A Dynasty, by John G. Robertson and Carl T. Madden.

The book started off with the Phillies’ collapse at the end of the 1964 season before turning to chapters on the Cardinals, Yankees, Mel Allen, a World Series preview and then moved on to a game by game look at the Series. Then, after a thorough game by game review of the World Series, the book concludes with a few chapters on the aftermath.

I did find a couple of errors in the discussion of Game 2. The book called a RBI by Curt Flood a fielder’s choice when instead it was just a 6-3 ground ball. It also said that the Yankees’ ended their 5-game World Series losing streak, which the book claimed was the longest in franchise history. The authors mentioned the 8-game World Series losing streak for the 1921-23 Yankees, but made the erroneous claim that it was interrupted by a tie. MLB precedent has established that ties do not count in winning & losing streaks. The fact that Baseball Reference’s streak finder thinks they do does not overrule that.

One amusing story, which I don’t remember seeing before, was prior to Game 6, with the Yankees trailing, 3-2 in the Series, the team was instructed to pack their bags and bring them to the stadium, since the team checked the players out of the hotel. Then, if they win, the Yankees would then recheck them back in for another night. Jim Bouton, who was the Game 6 starter, was upset by what he rightfully considered the team’s defeatist attitude.

Despite those two minor errors, the book passed all of my random fact checking. And those errors did not in any way detract from the enjoyment of the book. It was a much better book than David Halberstam’s October ’64. That one, while fact checking a randomly chosen Yankees-White Sox series, I found errors in his account of every single game and, in most, if not all, at least 2-3 errors per game.

I give this book an A. Goodreads requires grades on a 1-5 star system. In my personal conversion system, an A equates to 5 stars. (A or A+: 5 stars, B+: 4 stars, B: 3 stars, C: 2 stars, D or F: 1 star).

This review has been posted at Goodreads and my blog, Mr. Book’s Book Reviews

Mr. Book finished reading this on September 12, 2024.