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 "One
of my favorite episodes is 'Shadowball' which focuses on the
Negro Leagues and the admission of minorities into Major League
Baseball. Buck O'Neil, the charismatic player, coach, and historian
has some great insight to the old game.
By the way, if you are ever in
Kansas City, stop by the Negro League Hall of Fame. Chances are
Buck will greet you personally and spend time discussing baseball
with you for as long as you like. It was one of my most cherished
baseball moments."
"Burns
triumphs with a granular look at the various eras in baseball.
For the die-hard fan, this is a must for your collection. I tear
up every time I hear Gehrig's 'luckiest man alive' speech, sing
along with the 'Say Hey' song, etc. Burns puts you right in the
moment."
"You'll
love it. I just wish Burns would add one more volume to update
until the end of the century. But we would always be going back
for more as long as the game is played."
"For
the sheer amount of footage alone, this will probably be the
definitive documentary on the subject for many years to come.
But the real appeal is the historical perspective that ties together
the events of the day with the people living through them. Fans
of the game may nitpick, but there is nothing else I have seen
that tackles the subject of baseball better.
A fair warning: those with an
interest in history will likely love this, but casual fans may
find it a bit tedious. Those who dislike both history and baseball
will obviously shudder at thought of 18 hours of either. But
those who like both will actually find it too short."
 "As
a Brit only recently come to like Baseball, I have craved this
for years, so that I could learn the history of the game. Luckily
I got it this Christmas from my wonderful wife.
I really do think this is an
excellent collection, I've enjoyed it greatly, it's taught me
a lot, and it has some great stuff on it. The best bit? Buck
O'Neill. I'd not heard of him before and he is easily the most
appealing personality interviewed.
There are some things which should
have been done better. The most obvious is running old baseball
clips at the wrong speed. It should have been easy to find out,
or just plain guess, the frame speed of old movies and adjust
them: the classic Hollywood documentary did this in the 70s.
As it stands, I really don't know what Babe Ruth looked like
running round the bases. It's a pity because one of the joys
of the set are the old clips.
My other main complaint is that
in the second half of the set, living players are underused.
The historians like Dan Okrent and Robert Creamer do an excellent
job, but when we reached living memory, it would have been better
to have seen the real players involved in the incidents talking.
For example, it's absurd to hear the story of Pete Rose talking
to Carlton Fisk in the 1975 game six ('this is some kind of game')
from a third party when either Rose or Fisk could have told it.
The contributions of Buck O'Neill, Curt Flood, Ted Williams et
al are so much more meaningful than other people's view when
they are talking about their own history in the game. Even Happy
Chandler shows up singing Take Me Out to The Ball Game, so why
not talking about being the commissioner who allowed baseball
to integrate?
Little niggles like this take
away from the pleasure, but the pleasure is great. I'm now nostalgic
about 'take me out to the ball game' though I've only been to
one ball game in my life!
Finally, I have to say there
was a problem with one of the tapes, but Amazon replaced it immediately
without quibble."
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