Smart Ball

Marketing the Myth and Managing the Reality of Major League Baseball

By: Robert F. Lewis II

Narrated by: Scotty Drake

Length: 6 hrs and 23 mins

Publisher's summary

Smart Ball follows Major League Baseball's history as a sport, a domestic monopoly, a neocolonial power, and an international business. MLB's challenge has been to market its popular mythology as the national pastime with pastoral, populist roots while addressing the management challenges of competing with other sports and diversions in a burgeoning global economy.

Baseball researcher Robert F. Lewis II argues that MLB for years abused its legal insulation and monopoly status through arrogant treatment of its fans and players and static management of its business. As its privileged position eroded in the face of increased competition from other sports and union resistance, it awakened to its perilous predicament and began aggressively courting athletes and fans at home and abroad.

Using a detailed marketing analysis and applying the principles of a "smart power" model, the author assesses MLB's progression as a global business brand that continues to appeal to a consumer's sense of an idyllic past in the midst of a fast-paced, and often violent, present.

©2010 University Press of Mississippi (P)2012 Redwood Audiobooks

Packed with great baseball business facts, but dry

Packed with great baseball business facts, but technical and dry. I would get another book by this author for informational purposes.

Smart Book with an Unfortunate Narrator

Lewis presents a provocative, scholarly argument that takes considerable focus to listen to and fully grasp (I've purchased the book to re-read his argument). And while I very much appreciated his perspectives, the narrator was extremely annoying in his frequently mispronounced words. Dominant among these words, and one that author Lewis uses throughout his book: "Pastoral." Pronounced "pas-TOR-al" by the narrator, every time he said it, I had to keep saying out loud: PAS-tor-al. grrrrr.... I went to online dictionaries to listen to audible pronunciations of this word, just to confirm that some new way of saying it hadn't entered the English language. It hasn't. So, the narrator (and whoever let him continue saying not only this word -- an especially important one when talking about the myth of baseball -- but the names of players as well) made this an even more difficult read. But I pushed on because I found the argument fascinating and, well, SMART.

Myth Buster

In "Smart Ball," author Robert F. Lewis II uncovers the shady methodology of Major League Baseball becoming a monopoly in the United States, and the economic motivations for signing Jackie Robinson, and finally ending the color barrier in the sport. Lewis sheds light on how the baseball owners were able to maintain the dreaded reserve clause until the 1970's, before the union and courts successfully removed it.

The author outlines the path baseball took to become the national pastime sport, creating its own mythology behind the birth of the game in the U.S. Lewis brilliantly demonstrates how baseball developed its own origins, continued the folklore over the years, and contrived its own history. The book also points out that by the 1960's, football (both professional and college) had passed baseball as the nation's favorite sport.

Lewis makes a compelling comparison between baseball to secular religion. The author points out that baseball players compare to church missionaries, both promoting the product to the masses. Case in point, when baseball organized a world tour during the dead ball era, it was used for marketing purposes. Back in the states, religious organizations maintained no baseball on Sundays until the 1930's, as it was perceived to be the Lord's day.

The author shows the comradery built between the country and baseball through the war years. Often times, players would pause their baseball aspirations to serve in the military. Lewis notes how teams sports grew in popularity after the second world war. "Smart Ball" also shows how Major League Baseball has utilized both soft power and hard power to achieve its many goals through the decades.