Josh Gibson on a budget- let’s see your low cost alternatives

[ramram]

My low cost alternative is to collect team scorebooks. Fortunately, for my sake, there isn't a lot of competition (unlike score cards where there is a lot of competition). I enjoy being able to relive the entirety of a game, inning by inning, in what is often the only complete recording of some of these games.

Here's a page with Josh Gibson batting clean up.

Rob M

1931 Homestead Grays.jpg

[Jason19th]

I think Rob is correct that scorebooks are tremendously undervalued. You can argue that they are not much to look at, but I think that’s a lazy view. If you really look at them they let you see the entire game

[Smanzari]

Originally Posted by ramram

My low cost alternative is to collect team scorebooks. Fortunately, for my sake, there isn't a lot of competition (unlike score cards where there is a lot of competition). I enjoy being able to relive the entirety of a game, inning by inning, in what is often the only complete recording of some of these games.

Here's a page with Josh Gibson batting clean up.

Rob M

That's Super Cool - do you have other similar books? (lesser leagues?) Have you ever thought of digitizing them?! (I'm sure there isn't a ton out there). Despite LOVING to keep score, I have never thought of collecting these! You may end up getting some competition!

[ramram]

Originally Posted by Smanzari

That's Super Cool - do you have other similar books? (lesser leagues?) Have you ever thought of digitizing them?! (I'm sure there isn't a ton out there). Despite LOVING to keep score, I have never thought of collecting these! You may end up getting some competition!

Hey Stefan - I’ve got about 15-20 of them and mostly concentrate on official team or official scorer’s scorebooks or sport’s reporter scorebooks. I find those the most accurate but if you open it up to fan’s scorebooks you’ll find more selections. Similar to you, I started keeping the scorebook at my son’s games when he was young and that opened my eyes to how to understand and translate a scorebook. They can often be a challenge though as scoring methods can very over time and between different scorers. Worth the challenge though as they can be very unique. You just have to find your niche. I know Jason works the Caribbean arena pretty hard, for the items he collects, and has found many negro league related gems going that route too. I recently went that route and came up with an affordable team scorebook for Caguas-Guayama of the Puerto Rican Winter league which contained several negro league players.

Rob M

Page from an 1867 scorebook -

BC314909-5829-4FC7-9458-4EA75A8F69D3.jpg

[Smanzari]

Originally Posted by ramram

Hey Stefan - I’ve got about 15-20 of them and mostly concentrate on official team or official scorer’s scorebooks or sport’s reporter scorebooks. I find those the most accurate but if you open it up to fan’s scorebooks you’ll find more selections. Similar to you, I started keeping the scorebook at my son’s games when he was young and that opened my eyes to how to understand and translate a scorebook. They can often be a challenge though as scoring methods can very over time and between different scorers. Worth the challenge though as they can be very unique. You just have to find your niche. I know Jason works the Caribbean arena pretty hard, for the items he collects, and has found many negro league related gems going that route too. I recently went that route and came up with an affordable team scorebook for Caguas-Guayama of the Puerto Rican Winter league which contained several negro league players.

Rob M

Page from an 1867 scorebook -

That's Really Cool- Thanks for sharing! Yea, I figured they would vary in how they were scored. I bet some are fairly hard to decipher! I will definitely start keeping an eye out!