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Dan Levitt
Award-winning writer Daniel R. Levitt is the author of Ed Barrow: The Bulldog who Built the Yankees’ First Dynasty. His previous book (co-authored with Mark Armour), Paths to Glory, How Great Baseball Teams Got That Way (Brassey’s, 2003), received a highly favorable critical reception. Joe Sheehan of the Baseball Prospectus called it, “The best baseball book I have read this spring…It’s simply an excellent book, one that can be both enjoyed and studied.” David Shiner concluded his review in Elysian Fields Quarterly, “Not everyone can write a great baseball book, although many of us try. Mark Armour and Dan Levitt have succeeded and they deserve our congratulations.”
For their research in producing Paths to Glory, in 2004 Dan and Mark Armour won the Sporting News-SABR Baseball Research Award, an award honoring those individuals whose outstanding research projects have significantly expanded our knowledge or understanding of baseball. Dan has been interviewed on more than a dozen radio shows and has participated in book signings with authors Michael Lewis, Bill James, and Rob Neyer.
Dan is a longtime member of SABR, the baseball research organization, president of the Minnesota chapter, and left fielder on the chapter’s vintage baseball team.
Dan has also published numerous well-respected and well-received articles and short biographies. In Deadball Stars of the National League, Dan contributed biographies for Vic Willis, Pat Moran and Noodles Hahn. In the article “Pitch Counts,” published in the 2000 Baseball Research Journal, Dan introduced new and convincing evidence that today’s pitchers throw just as many pitches per season as their Deadball era counterparts despite fewer innings pitched. In an essay in the 1996 Baseball Research Journal, he established that Ferdie Schupp should rightfully be credited with the single season ERA record.
As Vice President for Ryan Companies US, Inc, Dan manages the capital markets for Ryan-owned properties. Dan has over 20 years of direct finance experience and has developed a reputation for his thoroughness, clarity, creative problem solving and presentation skills.
Expertise
Baseball History and Biography
Baseball Operations/ Front Offices
innovation in Baseball
Available for
Public Speaking
Pod Cast & Radio Interviews
Media Quotes & Inquiries
Books
In Pursuit of Pennants
In Pursuit of Pennants–Baseball Operations from Deadball to Moneyball tells the story of the evolution of what we now call Baseball Operations, from the days when the owner or manager had responsibility for creating the roster, up to modern front offices staffed with several dozen people. Along the way we meet many interesting, innovative people -- from Barney Dreyfus, to Branch Rickey, to Gabe Paul, to Theo Esptein -- and discuss the major inflection points in the story -- the creation of the farm system, integration, the amateur draft, free agency, analytics, and more. The story teaches us that the game is always changing, and that successful organizations adapt to the changes, and in some cases create the changes.
Ed Barrow:
The Bulldog Who Built the Yankees First Dynasty
Before the feuding owners turned to Ed Barrow to be general manager in 1920, the Yankees had never won a pennant. They won their first in 1921 and during Barrow’s tenure went on to win thirteen more as well as ten World Series. This biography of the incomparable Barrow is also the story of how he built the most successful sports franchise in American history. Barrow spent fifty years in baseball. He was in the middle of virtually every major conflict and held practically every job except player. Daniel R. Levitt describes Barrow’s pre-Yankees years, when he managed Babe Ruth and the Boston Red Sox to their last World Series Championship before the “curse.” He then details how Barrow assembled a winning Yankees team both by purchasing players outright and by developing talent through a farm system. The story of the making of the great Yankees dynasty reveals Barrow’s genius for organizing, for recognizing baseball talent, and for exploiting the existing economic environment. Because Barrow was a player in so many of baseball’s key events, his biography gives a clear and eye-opening picture of how America’s sport was played in the twentieth century, on the field and off. A complex portrait of a larger-than-life character in the annals of baseball, this book is also an inside history of how the sport’s competitive environment evolved and how the Yankees came to dominate it.
The Battle the Forged Modern Baseball:
The Federal League Challenge and Its Legacy
ThIn late 1913 the newly formed Federal League declared itself a major league in competition with the established National and American Leagues. Backed by some of America’s wealthiest merchants and industrialists, the new organization posed a real challenge to baseball’s prevailing structure. For the next two years the well-established leagues fought back furiously in the press, in the courts, and on the field. The story of this fascinating and complex historical battle centers on the machinations of both the owners and the players, as the Federals struggled for profits and status, and players organized baseball’s first real union. Award winning author, Daniel R. Levitt gives us the most authoritative account yet published of the short-lived Federal League, the last professional baseball league to challenge the National League and American League monopoly.
Paths to Glory
Paths to Glory--How Great Team Got That Way is the story of many great (and lesser) historical teams and how they were put together. Using examples from throughout the games history, from the 1890s Baltimore Orioles to the 1990s Atlanta Braves, the book looks for common themes and lessons. It also delves into other changes in the game -- including a history of relief pitching, and the then recent attempts to understand player value -- to help tell all the stories. An award-winning and well-reviewed book, it helped launch the team building book as a genre.
