Brooks on Books: The Machine by Joe Posnanski

I want to share some thoughts on two baseball books I read this season. One is an all-time classic, one of the best sports books ever, and the other is merely excellent. Today we'll go with the merely excellent.

Joe Posnanski's "The Machine" is more proof of the author's consistent excellence as a writer. If you need more, check out his writing in "Sports Illustrated" or his staggering blog, in which he cranks out thoughtful pieces day after day, most about baseball but also about other sports, pop culture, and sometimes just daily life.

What drew me to "The Machine," though, was Posnanski's previous book, "The Soul of Baseball." After devouring that, I knew any future book by this guy would be on my must-read list. So the author was the big draw, not the subject matter, because really I had no particular love nor hatred for the 1970s Big Red Machine Cincinnati Reds. The 1975 season didn't stand out to me one way or the other. However, I will gladly check out any well-written book about a specific baseball team, and this one offered definite rewards. I'm still not a Reds fan, but I find the Big Red Machine much more vivid and enjoyable just as a topic, and I'm slowly watching the 1975 World Series games on DVD with my new knowledge of the participants enhancing the experience.

Posnanski structures the book as a diary chronicling the 1975 season, not a day-by-day chronicle, but a progression through the season (up to and including the legendary World Series battle with the Red Sox) with selected games and events highlighted as they occur. Posnanski also steps back often to fill in the back stories of the individuals on the team. Perhaps most impressive is his ability to integrate 1975 current events and pop culture into the narrative in a smooth manner. Many books that try to establish a sense of time and place are clunky about it; it's difficult to throw in facts about what the number one record was at a given time without stopping the momentum of the main story. Yet Posnanski generally avoids this trap, using the tidbits about the 1975 setting as springboards for the smaller stories he's telling to create the bigger picture.

These people do indeed come to life as more than just cogs in "The Machine." I see some guys much differently after reading the book (Johnny Bench, Sparky Anderson). I see some guys, period, that I knew very little about (George Foster). Posnanski even offers some new and intriguing angles on one of the most prominent baseball figures of the 20th century, Pete Rose.

"The Machine" offers a solid narrative of an amazing team season while serving up numerous fascinating stories about the individuals who made up those '75 Reds. It all adds up to an outstanding book that is a must-read for all serious baseball fans. It may not be potentially life-changing like "The Soul of Baseball," but so what? "Merely excellent" is more than good enough.