As the anchor titles in a new “Time Machine” Lyons Press baseball series, The Ultimate Cleveland Indians Time Machine presents a timeline format that not only includes the Indians’ greatest moments—including World Series appearances and individual achievements—but would focus also on some very unusual seasons and events, such as the team’s 20-134 season of 1899 (the absolute worst in baseball history), the "Crybabies" of 1940 (who received this nickname after complaining about their manager to such as extent that fans even turned on them), or the infamous “Ten Cent Beer Night of 1974” (when thousands of drunken fans stormed the field and forced the team to forfeit). Of course there are other events to recall, like 17-year-old Bob Feller making his debut and striking out 17 batters in 1936, or Albert Belle famously pointing at his muscle after a playoff opponent claimed (rightly) that he had corked his bat and one of his teammates sneaked into the umpire's room to steal it back so the umps could not find out that it was corked. There are dozens of impressive, wild, wacky and wonderful stories over the years regarding Indians history and Gitlin is the perfect person to write it with his trademark humor and thorough knowledge of Indians lore.

MARTIN GITLIN is a veteran author and sportswriter. He has had about 150 books published since 2006, including A Celebration of Animation: The 100 Greatest Cartoon Characters in Television History (Lyons Press, 2018) with Joe Wos. His Great American Cereal Book (Harry Abrams, 2012) soared to No. 1 in both the Americana and Breakfast Book categories on Amazon.com immediately upon release and remained there for several months while his Powerful Moments in Sports: The Most Significant Sporting Events in American History earned critical acclaim. Gitlin won more than 45 awards as a sports journalist from 1991 to 2002, including first place for general excellence from The Associated Press for his coverage of the Indians-Braves World Series in 1995. AP also selected him as one of the top four feature writers in Ohio. Gitlin lives in North Olmsted, Ohio.