Six Good Innings by Mark Kreidler

4 stars out of 5

Kreidler takes a season-long look at a fascinating subject. He focuses on one team for one playoff season as they push to make the little league world series. These boys of little league are so young (12 and 13) but so determined to make it that they give more to training than most adults give to their full-time jobs. Kreidler does a great job of giving a balanced look at the situation, largely reserving judgment for the readers.

The book raises a number of great issues: Why are youth sports so competitive? Why do we push kids to achieve such specialization so early? Is it worth the potential cost in both injury and lost youth to have kids push this hard?

Overall, the book itself is written very well. It was entertaining enough that I read it within 24 hours of starting it. I was kind of annoyed by the numerous digressions and side stories (I wanted to find out what happened to the team!) but overall the book was very good and recommended to all baseball fans.