A Clever Base-Ballist: The Life and Times of John Montgomery Ward

Labor disputes in baseball go back a full century before the 1994 Major League strike that devastated a season. The sport's first labor crisis, in 1890, was precipitated by Hall-of-Famer John Montgomery Ward, a pitcher, hitter, and infielder who was one of professional baseball's first big stars. Ward set up baseball's first union and led a players' revolt against National League owners by setting up the Players' League, which survived for just a year but foretold a century of conflict between players and owners. Di Salvatore's biography provides a portrait of Ward, the evolution of baseball, and American life a hundred years ago. Includes several pages of b&w photographs, reproduced newspaper clippings, and other memorabilia.
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This is a grand book--vehement, scholarly, funny, exuberant, and artfully evocative of the man and his time. Bryan Di Salvatore is one of the finest writers of nonfiction in America.--Ian Frazier

One of baseball's earliest stars, John Montgomery Ward (1860-1925) was a formidable talent. Today, he stands alone as the only player with more than 100 wins as a pitcher and 2,000 hits as a batter. Ward played at a time when baseball was evolving from a pastime into a business, and his most important legacy may have been his role in establishing modern organized baseball (as his plaque in the Baseball Hall of Fame reads). He organized the sport's first union, the Brotherhood of Professional Ball Players, and in 1890 led a revolt against National League owners by creating a third major league--The Players' League--presaging a century of bitter conflict between players and owners. In this engaging biography, Bryan Di Salvatore captures the brash energy of this larger-than-life sports figure and offers a keenly observed narrative about baseball's often troubled coming of age.