Advance praise for Cheater’s Guide to Baseball
DMZ · January 16, 2007 at 6:43 pm · Filed Under Book reviews, General baseball, Off-topic ranting, Site information
“Derek Zumsteg should be ashamed to have such comprehensive knowledge of the history of cheating in baseball. Pete Rose gave me two to one odds this book would become a classic.” — Allen Barra, bestselling author of The Last Coach: A Life of Paul “Bear” Bryant
Pre-order now, folks. Your purchase supports me writing for USSM.
The Cheater’s Guide to Baseball
Only $11 – a bargain at twice the price.
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49 Responses to “Advance praise for Cheater’s Guide to Baseball”
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When will it actually be released? My father’s birthday is approaching rapidly.
When is the book signing?
I have mine on pre-order from Amazon. Just waiting for birthdays to buy more.
Mine’s February 14th. 🙂
Our print date is the end of February, I’m told. However: that may not mean it gets to a store or to Amazon before the start of March, and as with all schedules, it’s likely this is 50% good intentions, 25% guessing with crossed fingers, and 25% best-case scenario.
Among the more important bits of information I read on a post recently was that the author receives a better percentage when purchased by clinking on link here. Even more interesting is that USSM may benefit on any purchase from Amazon when purchased through USSM link.
That is easy enough to do. I also am interested regarding signing mutiple copies that will be gifts.
Signing them yourself? I fully endorse you doing so, as it’s entirely in the spirit of the book.
Just a thought. As many teams, house rules, etc have a swear word jar. How about a jar for words not spelled correctly. Sometimes it seems waste to post correct spelling right after an unfortunate mistake.
Actually I was hoping to have Mr. DMZ sign the books as post #1 asked book signing.
I bought a copy for myself. Hope it doesn’t take longer to have it sent to Canada.
Congrats Derek!
D-Rek: Do you plan any contests in the near future wherein the winners receive a fabulous prize consisting of this book?
I refuse to answer that question on the basis that it is addressed to D-Rek, and that’s really stupid.
You’re right, the fact that you won’t answer is pretty stupid, but don’t beat yourself up over it.
hmmmm. a self-inscribed book …
by the way, tonight’s KOMO Hot Stove trivia was Gaylord’s 300th game, and much amusement was had recalling Cruz’ crack about looking for the dry spot before he threw to first with the final out. I think you need to get copies to Glasgow, Dreyer & to the broadcast crew.
I encourage everybody to get the Amazon Credit Card, use the US$30 credit that comes with the card to buy two copies of the book. Use one for your coffee table and one for your bathroom.
Then cancel the card.
WAHAHAHAHA. YOU ARE SO CLEVER.
If I made some ridiculously stupid nickname out of your name, you wouldn’t feel obligated to answer to it.
Sean MC HAMMER!
That’s your response? Really?
Okay, you got me. I made a silly nickname just for shits and giggles. It was five characters. It appeared once, prefacing an actual quesiton. You took incredible offense to that, calling it ridiculously stupid. In fact, you were so bothered by it you even went and changed my user name out of revenge.
I’m not sure if I understand the response here. It was five characters that made one appearance in the history of space and time. It meant absolutely nothing. It was completely neutral in every way.
Again: really?
We have different definitions of “incredible” it seems.
Derek, it’s your site and you’re entitled to do any damn thing you please with it. But the condescending misanthropy you sometimes exhibit here troublesome for people who come here for the otherwise excellent content and analysis. I’m sorry if I offended you by using an ironic nickname.
I know I’m just one person, and for that reason you’re not likely to care very much about what I have to say here. But every one person adds up. When you advertise pre-sales for your book and seek donations after a server crash, those disenfranchised people suddenly matter.
Like I said, I’m just one guy. But I have a feeling I’m not the only one. But then again, your site, your rules.
Tell me how D-Rek is an “ironic” nickname.
You think I’m overreacting because I find D-Rek annoying, and you’re giving speeches about the horrors of my condescending misantrhopy because I tweaked your display name.
Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.
It’s ironic because it’s an incredibly stupid nickname and is in no way meant to be taken seriously. It’s so bad and so stupid that it’s meant to be funny. And I don’t give two shits that you tweaked my display name. My response has nothing to do with that. It had to do with your refusal to answer a legitimate question because of an innocuous nickname that just happened to be thrown in.
If you don’t mind me breaking the SUPER SERIOUS TENSION, I’d just like to say it’s slightly amusing ho we’re both guilty of blowing this out of proportion because we’re bored at 10:30 on a Tuesday night.
Whats up!…Al “USC RUNNING BACK/PEACE MAKER/SADDAMN HUSSEIN CAPTURER/AIDS CURER/SUPREME OUTFIELDER/PROFESSIONAL HITTER” Martin in the house
Nicknames rock…poor “F-Rod”…Frank Rodriguez with the Mariners…Every time he pitched I just wanted to add in the “U”
Long time lurker here. Just wanted to say I bought your pre-ordered your book, DMZ. Congratz.
If I may be briefly serious and clarify this whole thing briefly. From my side, here’s how this looks, including my thought process.
shaun writes:
Me: D-Rek. That’s too stupid. Is that a joke? Time to flip some crap over that.
shaun
Me: Oh ho ho, aren’t you clever, don’t throw your arm out patting yourself on the back over that one. This calls for some hilarious double-stage humor.
Step 1: edit display name
Step 2:
Step 3: wait
Turns out step 4 is “Corco cracks me up by jumping in unexpectedly”
Shizz Macking!!! writes
That’s your response? Really?
Me: okay, so he’s not seeing the humor in this setup, and he thinks I’m off somewhere, cleaning my guns or something, rather than returning the prank. I must egg him on. For science.
And change his name again.
S-Mac writes
Me: okay, so it’s cool to joke around with my name, but it’s not cool to joke around with tweaking his name, and I guess this somehow ties into.. voting rights? I don’t get it. Clearly the only path forward is further tweaking
…. which then pays off, sorta, except not really.
So, to be entirely and absolutely clear about this whole thing
1. I think D-Rek is a horrible and stupid nickname
2. I changed your name because I thought it would be funny to tag you with a horrible and stupid nickname as a response to D-Rek
3. I think at some point you started to take my tweaking as serious and a horrible symptom of some larger issue that required extended emotional dialogue
4. This spat has taken far too much of either of our time than is reasonable.
That’s all. Nobody flip out.
Bah. I made my comment and I sucked at it. Bummer. My apologies.
Now, in response to your list
1: Agreed.
2: Agreed. But I think I’m starting to warm up to my new user name. I think I would like Sean MC Hammer better, though.
3: Not the tweaking, but the initial response. I think that’s what triggered the release of my pent-up criticism of this very fine site.
4: Double agreed!
Now that we have all this taken care of, would anyone happen to know how I can get an RSS feed of just Dave’s posts? JUST KIDDING erek
Ah, hell. That last part should say JUST KIDDING
I can solve this…
Derek – Have a contest where the person who thinks of the best nickname for you gets a free copy of your book! Haha!
De-Militarized Zone.
I have to agree with S Mac here. This thread is just another example of Derek being Derek, who, just as he is in real life, is an arrogant smart ass who sometimes is just a little too full of himself.
And I wholeheartedly agree with S Mac’s contention in post #19. Sean, you’re not the only one. I love the site and much of its content and have contributed $$$ to the cause in the past, but the smarminess in this thread is just a little much. I doubt you’ll be seeing any more PayPal payments from me…
… let me know who you are and I’ll give you your money back. I’m sorry you feel that way.
Just preordered through this site, in part because I’m excited that whatever was magically blocking me from posting from work has gone away.
God, some people are RUDE.
People, it’s his NAME. If there’s anything that someone is entitled to be particular about, it’s their name.
This is a prime example of how sarcasm and humor can be misconstrued when done over the internet.
Derek: Has the publisher given you any indication as to which stores will carry your book? I apologize if this is a silly question, I am not familiar with the publishing process.
“Can’t we all just get along?”
or, alternatively,
“Love is a battlefield.”
Should be everywhere. Houghton-Mifflin’s a huge company. I’m not putting out 50 books and selling them on my doorstep.
How many books do I have to buy to get my name changed to ‘Sean MC HAMMER’?
Pre-ordered some time ago. Will trade beer for autographed inscription. PL
Whereas, the smarminess of the thread really enhances my enjoyment of the site.
Keep it up, D-Rek.
*hides*
D-Rek = dumbnickname
As for the post, this has to be my favorite part: “Pete Rose gave me two to one odds this book would become a classic.”. But the entire quote is great!
I would love to pre-order this book, but I have a birthday coming up, and I think someone may have purchased it for me already. I guess I’ll just have to buy a copy for a friend!
Thanks for all the great writing on the site DMZ, and I look forward to reading the book!
Also, has anybody read the Goose Gossage book yet? I read an excerpt the other day, and it looks pretty good.
I think D-Rex would be much better than D-Rek.
What about D-Rex-n-Effect?
I apologize for the obscure early-to-mid 90’s reference.
Something I’ve been wondering about, Derek — what made you decide to write on this subject?
42 – which Goose Gossage book? If you mean The Goose Is Loose, which he wrote back in 2000, I reviewed it on Marinerds a little over a year ago. It’s awesome. By all means you should go read it NOW. I felt like an idiot for having it sit on my shelf for six months before I got around to reading it.
This was a hilarious thread.
46. Well, Deanna, I didn’t get around to reading “Ichiro on Ichiro” until last week. I’d drunk enough and eaten enough on a cruise in the Caribbean, so I thought I’d read a book.
Now I can’t remember a thing I read… 🙂
My order says estimated shipping date for this item: April2, 2007