Michael K. Bohn

As the first month of the 2012 major league baseball season winds down in April, fans will recall that the game has long batted cleanup in the lineup of American sports nonfiction. The extensive history of the game provides a fertile field for authors bent on telling tales of memorable teams, players, pennant races, ballparks, and even scandals. Despite the game's obsession with statistics, baseball overflows with opportunities to tell stories about real people and real drama.

Although he struggled at The Masters, before that Tiger Woods' recent win at the Arnold Palmer Invitational in Orlando, Fla., brought joy to him, his many fans and, most importantly, television advertisers. Woods' 30-month victory drought in official events finally ended and the news media heralded the return of red shirts and fist pumps on Sundays.

Ah, the Super Bowl. The perfect name for America’s greatest sports spectacular. It just wouldn’t work if they called it the “championship.” Can’t sell Budweiser and Ford trucks with that. Plus, a big game like this needs some fancy numbers, like kings and Olympic Games.

Cursing the NFL for not offering a game every evening, Morty slapped his remote into warp drive and sped through the high-def channels looking for sports. He inexplicably paused on a tennis match long enough for his wife to plead, "Hold it there, dear." Morty, strictly a meat and potatoes sports fan, winced at the offering of steamed broccoli.

"This is the U.S. Open in New York," Bernice said. "Wud ja just look at the size of that crowd."

Just then, the TV announcer whispered, "Federer was down love-40, but Nadal double-faulted twice and netted a backhand drop shot, so now it's deuce."

"What the hell's this guy talking about?" groaned Morty.

Many in the Yankee Stadium crowd of 58,000 had headed for the gates as New York pitcher Bud Daley closed out the Cleveland Indians in the top of the ninth. It was a satisfied throng, one buoyed primarily by the Yankees' sweep of the Sunday doubleheader. There also was a considerable buzz that day, Sept. 10, 1961, about Mickey Mantle's 53rd home run in the second game, the latest highlight in what the news media had dubbed the "Home Run Derby."

American golf's premier tournament, the U.S. Open, started Thursday at the illustrious Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Md., a suburb of Washington D.C. Congressional's Blue course is a history-laden championship venue, but as in all things in or near the nation's capital, politicking played a role in the club's origins.

Two Republican congressmen from Indiana founded the country club in 1921. The avowed mission of the organization was two-fold, according to a 1924 article in the Washington Post. Superficially, it was to offer sporting amenities to government officials, including members of the U. S. Senate and House and their families.

More importantly, the club would offer the opportunity for congressmen to mingle on the golf course with businessmen and professionals. As the Post described, all concerned could "discuss freely the state of feeling in their respective communities regarding problems awaiting government action." In other words, playing a round of golf with congressmen would allow businessmen to cut through the bureaucratic red tape of the day and lobby about taxes, regulation and international trade laws.

A tumultuous crowd of thousands engulfed the South Bend train station on December 10, 1930 as the Notre Dame football team arrived from California. "Rockne's Ramblers," as the players were called more often in 1930 than the Fighting Irish, had beaten Southern Cal four days earlier in Los Angeles. That victory sealed the team's second consecutive unbeaten season, and the entire Notre Dame student body and most of the townsfolk loudly welcomed their gridiron heroes.