30 For The Books

Since the first pro baseball game between Cleveland and Fort Wayne was played on May 4, 1871, more than 1,500 cities, towns and burgs throughout North America have fielded teams either in the major or minor leagues. Some places hosted a team for only one season, others infinitely longer. All have had one common denominator: Numbers. Followed by more numbers and then even more numbers after them. Statistics all. No different in Harrisburg, Pa., where aspiring major leaguers have spent the last three decades playing on one patch of grass in the middle of the Susquehanna River. 30 For the Books is a 165-page look into the numbers following the first pitch from Jim Neidlinger in the Senators’ first game on the second Saturday in April 1987, the day of the rebirth of a franchise dormant for 35 years. Some of those numbers were, and remain, impressive on any level. Some, of course, have long been forgotten. Until now. They all are the byproducts of sifting through 4,337 boxscores that represent every regular season and postseason game the Harrisburg Senators have played over the first 30 seasons of their modern era. Harrisburg’s previously checkered, on-again, off-again history in the game from 1890 through 1952 is not part of this statistical tome. Too many boxscores from that era are incomplete. Some do not exist at all. No worries. What the Senators have done since their return in 1987 can fill a book. Just like this one.

Author Biography

Andrew Linker is an award-winning sports writer who has spent more than 35 years working for newspapers and magazines up and down the Susquehanna River. Most of that time has been spent covering the Harrisburg Senators since their return to City Island in 1987. He and his wife Michelle and their daughter Annie live in Palmyra, Pa., exactly 19.8 miles from home plate on Harrisburg’s historic City Island. He has written two other books on Harrisburg’s rich baseball tradition – One Patch of Grass that was published in 2012 and Clippings: All of the Other Cool Stuff That Didn’t Fit Into the First Book, which followed in 2013. He now spends his summers employed by the Eastern League as the official scorer for the Senators’ home games.