Fifty-Nine in '84
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Narrated by:
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Ax Norman
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By:
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Edward Achorn
About this listen
In 1884, Providence Grays pitcher Charles "Old Hoss" Radbourn won an astounding 59 games - more than anyone in major-league history ever had before, or has since. He then went on to win all three games of baseball's first World Series.
Fifty-nine in '84 tells the dramatic story not only of that amazing feat of grit but also of big-league baseball two decades after the Civil War - a brutal, bloody sport played barehanded, the profession of uneducated, hard-drinking men who thought little of cheating outrageously or maiming an opponent to win.
It is the tale, too, of the woman Radbourn loved, Carrie Stanhope, the alluring proprietress of a boarding-house with shady overtones, a married lady who was said to have personally known every man in the National League.
Wonderfully entertaining, Fifty-nine in '84 is an indelible portrait of a legendary player and a fascinating, little-known era of the national pastime.
©2010 Edward Achorn (P)2013 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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It was 1986, and the New York Mets won 108 regular-season games and the World Series, capturing the hearts (and other assorted body parts) of fans everywhere. But their greatness on the field was nearly eclipsed by how bad they were off it. Led by the indomitable Keith Hernandez and the young dynamic duo of Dwight Gooden and Darryl Strawberry, along with the gallant Scum Bunch, the Amazin's left a wide trail of wreckage in their wake-hotel rooms, charter planes, a bar in Houston, and most famously Bill Buckner and the hated Boston Red Sox.
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Maybe 3.5
- By Lifeisshort on 02-15-22
By: Jeff Pearlman
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Bottom of the 33rd
- Hope and Redemption in Baseball's Longest Game
- By: Dan Barry
- Narrated by: Dan Barry
- Length: 8 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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On April 18, 1981, a ball game sprang eternal. What began as a modestly attended minor-league game between the Pawtucket Red Sox and the Rochester Red Wings became not only the longest ever played in baseball history, but something else entirely. The first pitch was thrown after dusk on Holy Saturday, and for the next eight hours the night seemed to suspend its participants between their collective pasts and futures, between their collective sorrows and joys....
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I love baseball
- By Sher from Provo on 04-08-13
By: Dan Barry
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The Last Innocents
- The Collision of the Turbulent Sixties and the Los Angeles Dodgers
- By: Michael Leahy
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 15 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Legendary Dodgers Maury Wills, Sandy Koufax, Wes Parker, Jeff Torborg, Dick Tracewski, and Tommy Davis encapsulated 1960s America: white and black, Jewish and Christian, wealthy and working class, pro-Vietnam and anti-war, golden boy and seasoned veteran. The Last Innocents is a thoughtful, technicolor portrait of these seven players - friends, mentors, confidants, rivals, and allies - and their storied team that offers an intriguing look at a sport and a nation in transition.
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Reliving my youth
- By PJ on 05-24-17
By: Michael Leahy
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The Year of the Pitcher
- Bob Gibson, Denny McLain, and the End of Baseball’s Golden Age
- By: Sridhar Pappu
- Narrated by: Leon Nixon
- Length: 12 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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The Year of the Pitcher is the story of the remarkable 1968 baseball season, which culminated in one of the greatest World Series contests ever, with the Detroit Tigers coming back from a 3-1 deficit to beat the Cardinals in Game Seven of the World Series. In 1968, two remarkable pitchers would dominate the game as well as the broadsheets. One was black, the other white. Bob Gibson, together with the St. Louis Cardinals, embodied an entire generation's hope for integration at a heated moment in American history. Denny McLain, his adversary, was a crass self-promoter.
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Misleading Title
- By Paul on 01-25-19
By: Sridhar Pappu
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A Nice Little Place on the North Side
- Wrigley Field at One Hundred
- By: George Will
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 5 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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In A Nice Little Place on the North Side, leading columnist George Will returns to baseball with a deeply personal look at his hapless Chicago Cubs and their often beatified home, Wrigley Field, as it enters its second century. Baseball, Will argues, is full of metaphors for life, religion, and happiness, and Wrigley is considered one of its sacred spaces. But what is its true, hyperbole-free history?
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It's EEE-lia, not Ah-LEE-ah
- By Shawcago on 04-25-16
By: George Will
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Summer of '68
- The Season That Changed Baseball - and America - Forever
- By: Tim Wendel
- Narrated by: Mark Ashby
- Length: 8 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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From the beginning, ’68 was a season rocked by national tragedy and sweeping change. Opening Day was postponed and later played in the shadow of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s funeral. That summer, as the pennant races were heating up, the assassination of Robert Kennedy was later followed by rioting at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. But even as tensions boiled over and violence spilled into the streets, something remarkable was happening in major league ballparks across the country. Pitchers were dominating like never before, and with records falling and shut-outs mounting, many began hailing ’68 as “The Year of the Pitcher".
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Detroit Upsets St. Louis in 1968 World Series.
- By Matthew Tsien on 05-01-18
By: Tim Wendel
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1954: The Year Willie Mays and the First Generation of Black Superstars Changed Major League Baseball Forever
- By: Bill Madden
- Narrated by: David Drummond
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Jackie Robinson heroically broke the color barrier in 1947. But how—and, in practice, when—did the integration of the sport actually occur? Bill Madden shows that baseball’s famous black experiment” did not truly succeed until the coming of age of Willie Mays and the emergence of some star players—Larry Doby, Hank Aaron, and Ernie Banks—in 1954. And as a relevant backdrop off the field, it was in May of that year that the US Supreme Court unanimously ruled, in the case of Brown v. Board of Education, that segregation be outlawed in America’s public schools.
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Acumen bugaboo
- By steve finkelstein on 04-25-21
By: Bill Madden
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The Best Team Money Can Buy
- The Los Angeles Dodgers’ Wild Struggle to Build a Baseball Powerhouse
- By: Molly Knight
- Narrated by: Hillary Huber
- Length: 11 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2012 the Los Angeles Dodgers were bought out of bankruptcy in the most expensive sale in sports history. Los Angeles icon Magic Johnson and his partners hoped to put together a team worthy of Hollywood. By most accounts they have succeeded, if not always in the way they might have imagined.
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BOTH BOOK AND TEAM NEED TO BE BETTER
- By Ray on 09-06-15
By: Molly Knight
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Terror in the City of Champions
- Murder, Baseball, and the Secret Society That Shocked Depression-Era Detroit
- By: Tom Stanton
- Narrated by: Johnny Heller
- Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Detroit, mid-1930s: In a city abuzz over its unrivaled sports success, gun-loving baseball fan Dayton Dean became ensnared in the nefarious and deadly Black Legion. The secretive, Klan-like group was executing a wicked plan of terror, murdering enemies, flogging associates, and contemplating armed rebellion. The Legion boasted tens of thousands of members across the Midwest, among them politicians and prominent citizens - even, possibly, a beloved athlete.
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Interesting stories but oversold
- By Theron Schultz on 09-15-18
By: Tom Stanton
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The Captain
- The Journey of Derek Jeter
- By: Ian O'Connor
- Narrated by: Nick Pollifrone
- Length: 14 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Every spring, Little Leaguers across the country mimic his stance and squabble over the right to wear his number, 2, the next number to be retired by the world’s most famous ball team. Derek Jeter is their hero. He walks in the footsteps of Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio, and Mantle, and someday his shadow will loom just as large. Yet he has never been the best player in baseball. In fact, he hasn’t always been the best player on his team. But his intangible grace and Jordanesque ability to play big in the biggest of postseason moments make him the face of the modern Yankee dynasty, and of America’s game.
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Great book, terrible narrator.
- By Butter on 05-09-14
By: Ian O'Connor
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Pete Rose
- An American Dilemma
- By: Kostya Kennedy
- Narrated by: Ben Bartolone
- Length: 10 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Pete Rose played baseball with a singular and headfirst abandon that endeared him to fans and peers, even as it riled others--a figure at once magnetic, beloved and polarizing. Rose has more base hits than anyone in history, yet he is not in the Hall of Fame. Twenty-five years ago he was banished from baseball for gambling, then ruled ineligible for Cooperstown; today, the question "Does Pete Rose belong in the Hall of Fame?" has evolved into perhaps the most provocative in sports, a layered, slippery and ever-relevant moral conundrum.
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Good book, not so good production.
- By david d. on 05-01-14
By: Kostya Kennedy
What listeners say about Fifty-Nine in '84
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Brent W. Hunter
- 05-03-22
Excellent Book
The story of Charles “Old Hoss” Radbourn is a must read for baseball fans! No one will ever surpass his record. The stories of how tough the game was in the 1800’s are eye-opening.
The narrator was fine, just didn’t quite bring it to life considering the time period & how tough the players used to be. Definitely recommend this book.
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- Amazon Fan
- 08-22-15
A Baseball Record that will never be beaten
Where does Fifty-Nine in '84 rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?
It is one of the best. The book while recounting an incredible record also gives us a great history of the early game of baseball. The narrator does a nice job and of course the story is one of my favorite baseball books.
What other book might you compare Fifty-Nine in '84 to and why?
The Glory of Their Times: Another outstanding baseball book which does a great job on the history of baseball through the players themselves simply telling their stories.
Which scene was your favorite?
There are so many good scenes, it's hard to pick one.
Any additional comments?
Hoss was a local boy having lived and died in Bloomington IL. That makes this book even more special to me if that is possible.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Brian
- 04-29-18
Long forgotten era of baseball giants
Well researched and it keeps your interest. Radbourn(e) was a character of his times and his record of wins set in 1884 will never be broken. It was very interesting to learn about not only the amazing season of 1884, but what life was like for a ball player in the 1880s. And what life was like In this era In general. Lots of good info on Providence, RI here. If you are a baseball fan like I am, or I suspect even if you are not, you will appreciate this history and background of this mostly forgotten legend. The feats of ‘Old Hoss’ are still amazing to this day and symbolize the grit and determination of the American spirit.
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- Steven Gerweck
- 11-21-23
A MLB record that will never be broken
Fanatics of major league baseball often talk about records that may never be broken. Records that seem unattainable include Pete Rose's 4,256 career hits, Cal Ripken Jr.'s 2,632 consecutive games played, and of course, Cy Young's 511 career wins. In 1884, Charles "Hoss" Radbourn, the work horse for the Providence Grays, won 59 games in a single season. This remarkable achievement is distinguished author's Edward Achorn focus in "Fifty-Nine in '84."
Achorn takes the reader back to nineteen century baseball, where a coin flip determined which team would bat first. A single umpire would officiate a game, and as you might image, he was often under trained and scorned for making the wrong calls. It was certainly a different baseball landscape during this period, as pitchers stood a mere 50 feet from home plate surrounded by a rectangle.
During the 1884 season, Radbourn accepted the role as the primary pitcher after star hurler Charlie Sweeney was expelled from the club. Radbourn previously had a tirade of his own, but agreed to pitch the majority of starts in exchange for a pay increase and the ability to become a free agent at the end of the season. This was a significant concession granted by the Providence Grays, as players were locked to their teams under the dreaded reserve clause.
The author lists the mind boggling numbers Radbourn posted in 1884. Hoss, as he was commonly called, pitched 678 innings, in a single season. Radbourn faced 2,672 batters, and completed 73 games. The rubber armed thrower also struck out 441 batters, and posted a 1.38 earned run average (ERA). The future hall of famer led his team to a clean sweep of the New York Metropolitans, becoming World Series champions.
Achorn brilliantly details Radbourn's single season record that will never be achieved again. "Fifty-Nine in '84" makes for a great companion to Achorn's "The Summer of Beer and Whiskey," which relives the exciting 1883 American Association pennant race. If you are a fan of nineteen century baseball, there works are essential. Here's hoping that the stories "King" Kelly and the Delahanty brothers finally will be told in audiobooks!
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1 person found this helpful