They Played the Game

"[An] excellent oral history for fans with a taste for the game's past."—Wes Lukowsky, Booklist

"Wow, 47 pros whose memories cover playing days from 1912 to 1981. Wonderful mix of legends, good players, and those who had 'a cup of coffee.'"—John Vorperian, SABR Lajoie Chapter newsletter

"No matter how long his career lasted or how he compiled his statistics, a baseball player is always eager to share his experiences. Author Norman Macht has collected anecdotes from 47 former players who played from the Deadball Era of the early 20th century up to the 1970’s in this fast-paced book."—Lance Smith, Guy Who Reviews Sports Books

"Noted baseball historian Norman L. Macht brings together a wide‑ranging collection of baseball voices from the Deadball Era in the 1910s through the 1970s, including nine Hall of Famers, in the new book They Played The Game. They take the reader onto the field, into the dugouts and clubhouses, and inside the minds of both players and managers. These engaging, wide-ranging oral histories bring surprising revelations, both highlights and lowlights, about their careers, as they revisit their personal mental scrapbooks of the days when they played the game."—Jason Schott, Brooklyn Digest

"A fine collection of player memories. . . . Macht allows 47 players to take a wistful, candid and, in some cases, critical look at their baseball past. . . . Macht’s mixture of player interviews works well."—Bob D'Angelo, Sports Bookie

"Interview books like this are like peanuts. Once you start reading, you can't stop. . . . Macht's collection is one that baseball fans won't want to miss."—John Rossi, Inside Game

From the interviews:
 
“They talk about those Yankee teams with all those hitters and pitchers. But we were the biggest bunch of red asses; we got on each other. . . . Only Joe DiMaggio didn’t have to say anything. He just had to look at you.”—Gene Woodling
 
“Drysdale and Koufax, who are throwing 90-plus on the black part of the plate and using the fastball to move batters back off the plate when we get ahead in the count—I defy somebody to get a hit. It’s just not possible.”—Johnny Roseboro
 
“Do I think we should have won some pennants during Leo’s [Durocher] years in Chicago? Absolutely. We had the best talent in baseball and we didn’t win. I don’t know why. If we had won in ’69, we probably would have won the next two or three years. But there was a stigma attached to not winning that year.”—Don Kessinger
 
“Casey Stengel would never give you a direct answer to a question. If an interviewer asked him one question, he’d get four answers. And if you had four questions to ask, you’d never get past the first one.”—George “Highpockets” Kelly
 
“Most of the guys who succeed in sports and businesses and life’s accomplishments get a little dig in the ass going and God damn it pushing all the time. They want to be the best, they want to do things, they want to be remembered,  they want to be on top of the heap. No question about it. And Lefty Grove was one of them son of a bitches.”—Ted Williams
 
“Honesty has gotten more managers fired than incompetence.”—Pat Corrales