“Small Ball Big Results” is a must read for all KC Royals fans

KC Royals Live Pre/Postgame host Joel Goldberg recently published his first book titled Small Ball Big Results. 

After 16 seasons of covering MLB (13 with the Kansas City Royals and three with the St. Louis Cardinals), Joel Goldberg opens up and reflects on covering the game he loves and the people he has met along his journey of telling stories as a broadcast journalist.

The book is broken down by innings to include extra innings where Joel often tells stories about individuals he has met throughout his career. This book does more though than just talk baseball though, as Joel tells stories about those in the world of business along with average everyday people who play a small role that has made a difference in the lives of others. Many times he compares the average everyday person to baseball players he currently covers or has covered in the past.

Often times Goldberg reflects on lessons he learned and how he was able to become one of the best and most respected reporters in baseball. It wasn’t always easy for him to get that important interview. He learned he had to gain trust and earn respect in the clubhouse.

The book also talks about the impact that the late Royals owner David Glass has had on his career as well as his dreams to become a public speaker and an entrepreneur.  The stories were very intimate and portray Glass as a very humbled owner that many Royals fans really didn’t know much about.

Scattered throughout the book are touching stories about “small ball” individuals from Kansas City who have overcome challenges. These stories are touching and bring out the human spirit and the intrinsic motivation it took for them to overcome their individual challenges.

As a Royals fan, this book gives an inside look into the critical moves that took the Royals from a habitual 100 loss team into back-to-back World Series appearances that transformed Kansas City. Goldberg explains how the culture immediately changed when Glass hired General Manager Dayton Moore to the closed-door conversation that took place between a young Royals team and veteran Raul Ibanez that helped the team realize their full potential.

The book tells emotional stories that include a relationship between former Royals pitcher Bruce Chen and a young Royals pitching prospect named Carlos Fortuna. Chen became a mentor and eventual best friend to Fortuna who was navigating the Royals system. Fortuna was diagnosed with cancer and eventually died in 2014. His legacy still impacts families of different socio-economic levels and sets priorities in low-income families in Latin America through the Carlos Fortuna Foundation.

Toward the end of the book, Goldberg tells another story about the late Yordano Ventura and how he was one of the most energetic and most respected teammates during the Royals’ multiple trips to the World Series.

Without a doubt, this book is a must-read for any Royals fan who likes to hear stories told from a fan’s perspective. It’s also a book that anyone from Kansas City will appreciate. It is the perfect blend of comparing business leaders and those who do the little things that impact their organization along with stories of how the small guy on the field produces results on the field.

The book at times might have a reader crying then immediately cause laughter a couple of pages later with a story about how Rusty Kuntz gets the most out of his “players”. Every reader will take something different from this easy reading well-written book.

The book can be purchase on Amazon by clicking here.