Browsing articles from "March, 2025"

The 42nd Annual CASEY Awards

Mar 27, 2025   //   by admin   //   Uncategorized  //  No Comments

Spitball Magazine’s 42nd annual CASEYs were a success, and a blast too. In front of a crowd of maybe 35 baseball diehards on a drizzly Sunday afternoon, the prestigious award for best baseball book of the year was given to Kevin Baker for his terrific book, The New York Game. At the award ceremony, hosted by Poor Michael’s Sports Bar in Cincinnati, Kevin was presented with his customized Louisville Slugger bat before I was handed a plaque honoring A Baseball Gaijin‘s selection as a fellow finalist. Although none of the other eight finalists were able to attend, their books were placed prominently at the front of the stage (Keith O’ Brien’s Charlie Hustle, a Pete Rose biography, finished runner-up to Baker’s book.). Copies of ABG and The New York Game were made available for purchase in the back of the room as Spitball editor and founder Mike Shannon posed some baseball history trivia questions. Then, each of the 10 finalist books were introduced one by one before Kevin was brought on stage for his presentation. Following Kevin’s talk, I joined him on stage for an introductory statement before answering questions from the assembled crowd.

BIO

Aaron Fischman is a sports writer, author, editor and multimedia journalist, who currently hosts the On the NBA Beat podcast, a weekly interview show he co-founded with fellow USC alums Loren Lee Chen and brother Joshua Fischman in advance of the 2015-16 NBA season. On the podcast, he and the crew interview some of the league’s best reporters on their particular beat. Fischman’s first book, A Baseball Gaijin: Chasing a Dream to Japan and Back, an uplifting nonfiction Japanese baseball story, has been nominated for the prestigious CASEY Award for best baseball book of 2024. Read more.