Episode 95: Jane Leavy

Jane Leavy is the New York Times best-selling author of Sandy Koufax: A Lefty’s Legacy, The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the End of America’s Childhood, and The Big Fella: Babe Ruth and the World He Created. She is also the author of the comic novel Squeeze Play, hailed by Entertainment Weekly as “the best novel ever written about baseball.”

A longtime sportswriter and feature writer for The Washington Post, Jane covered baseball, tennis and the Olympics during her tenure at the paper. She also wrote features for the Post’s “Style” section on sports, politics and popular culture. Her work has been featured in the New York Times, Newsweek, Sports Illustrated, Grantland, The Los Angeles Times, and Tablet. 

In her latest book—Make Me Commissioner: I Know What’s Wrong with Baseball and How to Fix It—Jane waxes philosophic and not-quite-catastrophic about the game she has loved her entire life, and asks readers to join her in re-imagining the way that game is played, and all the ways we might play it better, or more meaningfully, or more relevantly.  In the book, just published by Grand Central Publishing, she writes movingly and hilariously and insightfully on our national pastime, offering a thinking fan’s take on what the game has become, and what the game has lost over the years.

Join us for our Season 5 opener, as we visit with one of baseball’s biggest fans… and one of publishing’s finest storytellers. 

Learn more about Jane Leavy:

• Website
• Instagram
• Twitter 
• Threads

Please support the sponsors who support our show:

• Gotham Ghostwriters' Gathering of the Ghosts
• Ritani Jewelers
• Daniel Paisner's Balloon Dog
• Daniel Paisner's SHOW: The Making and Unmaking of a Network Television Pilot
• Heaven Help Us by John Kasich
• Unforgiving: Lessons from the Fall by Lindsey Jacobellis
• Film Movement Plus (PODCAST) | 30% discount
• Libro.fm (ASTOLDTO) | 2 audiobooks for the price of 1 when you start your membership
• Film Freaks Forever! podcast, hosted by Mark Jordan Legan and Phoef Sutton
• Everyday Shakespeare podcast
• .css-j9qmi7{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:row;-ms-flex-direction:row;flex-direction:row;font-weight:700;margin-bottom:1rem;margin-top:2.8rem;width:100%;-webkit-box-pack:start;-ms-flex-pack:start;-webkit-justify-content:start;justify-content:start;padding-left:5rem;}@media only screen and (max-width: 599px){.css-j9qmi7{padding-left:0;-webkit-box-pack:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;justify-content:center;}}.css-j9qmi7 svg{fill:#27292D;}.css-j9qmi7 .eagfbvw0{-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;color:#27292D;}