Joe Cronin: A Life in Baseball

From the sandlots of San Francisco to the power centers of the game, this book tells the story of Joe Cronin, one of twentieth-century baseballOCOs major players, both on the field and off. For most of his playing career, Cronin (1906OCo84) was the best shortstop in baseball. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1956. A manager by the age of twenty-six and general manager at forty-one, Cronin was the youngest player-manager ever to play in the World Series, and he managed the Red Sox longer than any other man in history. As president of the American League, he oversaw two expansions, four franchise shifts, and the revolutionary and controversial introduction of the designated-hitter rule, which he wrote himself.