Expanding the Strike Zone

An interesting, smart, and informative book. Daniel Gilbert effectively melds a transnational and multicultural approach to understanding broad and important themes in the late twentieth-century baseball world—and by implication the larger world—by focusing on events laden with contested cultural meaning.'—Daniel A. Nathan, author of Saying It's So: A Cultural History of the Black Sox Scandal
'In this deft blend of labor history and cultural studies, Dan Gilbert shows how the history of major league baseball's labor relations policies provide a rich repository of evidence about the full magnitude of the enormous changes that have taken place in the nature of work, consumption, marketing and management in our lifetimes. Carefully researched, engagingly written, and brilliantly conceived, this book shows how the business of baseball is one of those places where the nature of work and reward is learned, legitimated, negotiated and arbitrated.'—George Lipsitz, author of How Racism Takes Place
'As that last bit from the book suggests, Expanding the Strike Zone is perhaps not for fans looking for discussions of who should be in the Hall of Fame. Those inclined to be curious about the way various economic, social, and cultural developments have been apparent in baseball's increasingly complex world will find the book rewarding.'—It's Only a Game, NPR
'An admirable and convincing attempt to place pro athletes in the wider context of the international struggle for labor rights.'—The Boston Globe
'Professional baseball is more than sport--it's entertainment and a business with a transnational reach. Gilbert's book thoroughly explores both topics and leaves one wonderfin at the end--will there ever be a real 'world' series?'—Grand Prairie Union News
'Expanding the Strike Zone will appeal to scholars who think deeply about baseball's connections to deep cultural trends in American history. Recommended.'—Choice
'The overriding theme of Daniel A. Gilbert's Expanding the Strike Zone is hinted at in his punning title: baseball is labor; it is work. . . . Gilbert focuses on politics, labor economics, hisotry, and ethnicity and does a great deal in this short book.'—Journal of American History
'Well-written . . . this distinctive, highly analytical industry study is likely to become the leading reference work in the field--and deservedly so.'—Perspectives on Work
'Gilbert very adroitly integrates cultural meaning and political-economic analysis in this meticulously researched examination of baseball. The book also clearly demonstrates the central importance of sport for understanding not only baseball but also the overall dynamics of the culture industry as a business whose goal is to produce meaningful commodities for consumption. Too often in sociology, the story of sport has been perceived as marginal to the discipline. Gilbert's book (cultural history though it be) should contribute to putting the sociology of sport 'on the map' in terms of demonstrating its salience for understanding sport and its connection to the dynamics of society in general, especially a postmodern society emphasizing consumption over industrial production.'—Contemporary Sociology