You Know Me Al: A Busher's Letters

One of the classic baseball stories, You Know Me Al, first published in 1914, tells the story of the fictional Jack Keefe, a bush league baseball player who earns a trip to the majors to pitch for the Chicago White Sox. Set in pre–World War I, the book is comprised of letters that Keefe sends to his “old pal” Al. Through the letters, the self-centered Keefe reveals his regular struggles to maintain his position in the big leagues as well as his personal life and juggle his financial difficulties. Nevertheless, the tales from on and off the field as he travels with the team are full of wit, insight, and entertainment. They include Keefe’s encounters with baseball legends such as Ty Cobb, Charles Comiskey, Walter Johnson, and Eddie Cicotte.

In this edition of the book, which includes a foreword by acclaimed writer John Thorn, readers can relive all of the glory of this historic era of baseball through the eyes of one of Ring Lardner’s most comical characters, a century after his creation!

Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Sports Publishing imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in sports—books about baseball, pro football, college football, pro and college basketball, hockey, or soccer, we have a book about your sport or your team.

Whether you are a New York Yankees fan or hail from Red Sox nation; whether you are a die-hard Green Bay Packers or Dallas Cowboys fan; whether you root for the Kentucky Wildcats, Louisville Cardinals, UCLA Bruins, or Kansas Jayhawks; whether you route for the Boston Bruins, Toronto Maple Leafs, Montreal Canadiens, or Los Angeles Kings; we have a book for you. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to publishing books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked by other publishers and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

Ring Lardner was a sports columnist and acclaimed short-story writer. He worked for several newspapers throughout his career, including the South Bend Times, St. Louis Sporting News, Boston American, and Chicago Tribune. His stories were notoriously filled with satire, grammatical errors, and everyday events. Lardner passed away in 1933, at the age of 48.

John Thorn is the official historian of Major League Baseball. Apart from his creation, with Pete Palmer, of Total Baseball, he is often visible on ESPN, MLBTV, the History Channel, and other television outlets as a sports authority and commentator. He was also a major on-screen presence in and chief consultant to Ken Burns’s 18½-hour PBS film, Baseball. Thorn cowrote The Hidden Game of Baseball, which established alternative statistics later recognized and adopted as official by Major League Baseball, notably OPS. His many baseball books over the past three decades also include Treasures of the Baseball Hall of Fame, The Game for All America, and Our Game, a history of the game that also supplies the title for his twice-weekly blog at MLB.com. In 2011 Simon & Schuster published his major work, Baseball in the Garden of Eden: A Secret History of the Early Game.