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    The Big Bam: The Life and Times of Babe Ruth
    Unavailable
    The Big Bam: The Life and Times of Babe Ruth
    Unavailable
    The Big Bam: The Life and Times of Babe Ruth
    Audiobook15 hours

    The Big Bam: The Life and Times of Babe Ruth

    Written by Leigh Montville

    Narrated by Scott Brick

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    He was the Sultan of Swat. The Caliph of Clout. The Wizard of Whack. The Bambino. And simply, to his teammates, the Big Bam. From the award-winning author of the New York Times bestseller Ted Williams comes the thoroughly original, definitively ambitious, and exhilaratingly colorful biography of the largest legend ever to loom in baseball-and in the history of organized sports.

    "[Montville is] one of America's best sportswriters." -Chicago Tribune

    Babe Ruth was more than baseball's original superstar. For eighty-five years, he has remained the sport's reigning titan. He has been named Athlete of the Century . . . more than once. But who was this large, loud, enigmatic man? Why is so little known about his childhood, his private life, and his inner thoughts? In The Big Bam, Leigh Montville, whose recent New York Times bestselling biography of Ted Williams garnered glowing reviews and offered an exceptionally intimate look at Williams's life, brings his trademark touch to this groundbreaking, revelatory portrait of the Babe.

    Based on newly discovered documents and interviews-including pages from Ruth's personal scrapbooks -The Big Bam traces Ruth's life from his bleak childhood in Baltimore to his brash entrance into professional baseball, from Boston to New York and into the record books as the world's most explosive slugger and cultural luminary. Montville explores every aspect of the man, paying particular attention to the myths that have always surrounded him. Did he really hit the "called shot" homer in the 1932 World Series? Were his home runs really "the farthest balls ever hit" in countless ballparks around the country? Was he really part black-making him the first African American professional baseball superstar? And was Ruth the high-octane, womanizing, heavy-drinking "fatso" of legend . . . or just a boyish, rudderless quasi-orphan who did, in fact, take his training and personal conditioning quite seriously?

    At a time when modern baseball is grappling with hyper-inflated salaries, free agency, and assorted controversies, The Big Bam brings back the pure glory days of the game. Leigh Montville operates at the peak of his abilities, exploring Babe Ruth in a way that intimately, and poignantly, illuminates a most remarkable figure.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateMay 2, 2006
    ISBN9781415934890
    Unavailable
    The Big Bam: The Life and Times of Babe Ruth
    Author

    Leigh Montville

    Leigh Montville is a New York Times best-selling author of nine books on sports personalities ranging from Muhammed Ali, Ted Williams, and Babe Ruth to Manute Bol and Evel Knievel. He has been a columnist for the Boston Globe and a senior writer for Sports Illustrated. Montville is a member of the Hall of Fame at the National Sports Media Association and a member of the New England Basketball Hall of Fame. He lives outside Boston.

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    Reviews for The Big Bam

    4/5

    60 ratings8 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Pretty interesting and thorough biography of Babe Ruth, very readable.
    • 2/5
      This is a case where the biographer interferes with the subject of the story, much as Mr. Montville did with his bio on Ted Williams.
    • 3/5
      Every once in awhile I enjoy a sports biography. Babe Ruth is, by far, one of the most interesting, larger than life sports figures. Born at the tale end of the 19th century, abandoned to a boy's orphanage, he was in the right place at the right time engaged in the right sport to change the nature of the game and to ultimately take the second class NY Yankees and turn them into the greatest baseball team that ever played.
    • 5/5
      Leigh Montville's The Big Bam is an exhaustively researched book on the life and times of Babe Ruth. Even for the non-sports fan, this book reads like the best of fiction, with a huge personality at its center and a fascinating exploration of how that personality influenced a generation of post war Americans. Entertaining and informative, Montville never shirks from probing into the faults and flaws of this iconic athlete. The book's triumph is in its evocation of supreme glory fading away with time, age, and illness. A milestone biography of a fascinating and elusive personality.
    • 4/5
      I found the book a very interesting and truthful story about one the great and revolutionary sports heroes of our time. I specifically liked how the author calls attention to the mystery spots of Ruth's life (were facts can not be confirmed).Steve
    • 5/5
      This book shows that all the caricatures of Ruth pale next to the real thing. He was the first superstar, bigger than anyone around today, even Michael Jordan. I strongly recommend the book, even for non-sports fans. Ruth's story makes an interesting contrast to today's pampered athletes. It's interesting too that the Babe's womanizing, drinking, and gambling was kept out of the press by the sports writers who followed him. It was certainly a different era.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed this quite a bit. I haven't read any other biographies on Babe Ruth, and haven't read a ton of sports biographies so I have little to compare it to. But, it does compare favorably with biographies I have read on other public figures. It's an easy read and flows well! Helps if you are already a baseball fan, but non-fans may enjoy it too.
    • 5/5
      Serendipity is the art of finding something meaningful amid looking for something else; or at least, that is how I define it. It happened last week while perusing the Atlanta airport books. I was in the mood for Flannery O’Connor, a native Georgian, when I ran across his face. Who? None other than, "the Sultan of Swat, The Caliph of Clout, The Wizard of Whack, the Rajah of Rap, the Wazir of Wham, the Mammoth of Maul, the Maharajah of Mash, the Bambino. The Bam. The Big Bam." Yes, staring me in the face was The Big Bam by Leigh Montville.Skipping down the concourse and plopping into a seat next to hubby, I smile as I reveal my manly book. Ah, I can see in his eyes, he is impressed with my decision. He then tells me he has tickets to watch the Yankees at Yankee Stadium while in New York. He wants to see a game in the "House that Ruth Built" before they move across the street."Babe Ruth played for the Yankees and they built a stadium for him?"Yes, yes. Laugh away. It is a good thing this book called out to me! I obviously know nothing of the game of baseball. Maybe Babe’s ghost placed it in my ignorant hands to keep me from further embarrassing myself. The Babe’s early life is a mystery and author Montville calls it the fog. The book opens with father, George Herman Ruth, escorting his seven year old son to St. Mary’s Industrial School for Boys. The school housed orphans, truants, and delinquents; for some reason, a place Mr. Ruth thought better than his home above the family bar. Reasons are in the fog. It is at school Ruth learned how to pitch, hit, and field a baseball. At the age of 18, a scout for the Baltimore Orioles, Jack Dunn, stopped in for a look-see. He noticed as the large boy came to bat, "the right fielder moved so far back that he left the playing field, crossed a path, and stood in the next field, where another game was taking place." Next thing, the ball careened over the same fielder’s head.In the early 1900s, a home run was seen as a fluke, as unexpected as an ace in golf. The book states, "The balls were not made for home runs...scuffed up, roughed up, spit upon, and used for as many as 100 pitches in a game. The bats, heavy and thick through the handle, were not made for home runs. The mind was not made for home runs." Here, standing in front of Jack Dunn, was a miracle.For what ever reason, I’m glad I finally met Babe Ruth. Montville summed it up nicely, "He will be crude and rude and kind and approachable, sometimes all in the same ten minutes, and it all will be fine. He will be credited with miracles. Fine."