Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Mike Donlin: A Rough and Rowdy Life from New York Baseball Idol to Stage and Screen

Mike Donlin: A Rough and Rowdy Life from New York Baseball Idol to Stage and Screen

Steinberg, Steve
Spatz, Lyle

Hardcover

Entertainment & Performing ArtsAthletesBaseball & Softball

Publisher Price: $39.95

ISBN10: 1496238966
ISBN13: 9781496238962
Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
Published: May 1 2024
Pages: 368
Weight: 1.59
Height: 1.34 Width: 6.41 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
Winner of the 2025 Sporting News-SABR Baseball Research Award
Winner of the 2025 Larry Ritter Book Award
​Finalist for the 2024 CASEY Award

Mike Donlin was a brash, colorful, and complicated personality. He was the most popular athlete in New York and was a star on the powerful New York Giants teams of 1905 and 1908. Though haunted by tragedy, including the deaths of both of his parents as a boy, Donlin was a charming, engaging, and kind-hearted man who also had successful careers on the stage and in film.

One of the early bad boys among professional athletes, Donlin's temper and combativeness--compounded by alcoholism--led to battles with umpires and fans, numerous suspensions from the game, and even jail time. In 1906, when Donlin married vaudeville actress Mabel Hite, his life changed for the better, and their love story captivated the nation. Donlin left baseball after his sensational comeback for the dramatic 1908 season and joined Mabel on the stage, likely losing a Hall of Fame career. Then in 1912, at the age of twenty-nine, Mabel died of intestinal cancer.

After making a final comeback as a player in 1914, Donlin starred in baseball's first feature film. He became a drinking buddy of actors John Barrymore and Buster Keaton and married actress Rita Ross. The couple moved to Hollywood, where Donlin became a beloved figure and appeared in roughly one hundred movies, mostly in minor roles. Despite his Hollywood career, Donlin stayed connected to the game he loved and was seeking a coaching job with the Giants when he died of a heart attack in 1933. At the dawn of the celebrity era of sports, Donlin was one of the nation's first athletes to capture the public's attention. This biography by Steve Steinberg and Lyle Spatz shows why.

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