Early Innings

A short story about Rickey Henderson's night after breaking the stolen base record. An interview with Mets legend Darryl Strawberry. An essay by a British fan about gravitating toward the Blue Jays Home Run Jacket. Art of a shirtless Henry David Thoreau swinging a bat in Walden Pond. A poem where the ghost of Moses Fleetwood Walker talks to Ernie Banks. A comic about the unheralded journeyman Matt Duffy. The Twin Bill's EARLY INNINGS (.406 Press, March 18, 2025) features all of these and more as it celebrates the rich history of baseball and the vibrant game of today with this anthology of their first four years.

With over 200 pages of baseball poems, short stories, creative nonfiction, and full-page color illustrations, EARLY INNINGS showcases the rich literary side of baseball. Featuring 29 poems, 16 pieces of creative nonfiction, nine short stories, two interviews, two comics, and cover art of Sidd Finch, EARLY INNINGS is sure to be a hit with any baseball fan.

The Twin Bill was founded in 2020 and publishes quarterly online at www.thetwinbill.com and in print. Over 18 issues, they've published 130 poems, 74 creative nonfiction pieces, 67 short stories, and 180 pieces of art. In 2023 they inaugurated contests for the E. Ethelbert Miller Poetry Prize, Sidd Finch Fiction Prize, and Jackie Mitchell Poetry Prize with the winners getting an engraved crystal baseball trophy. The following year, they began awarding trophies for the Best Baseball Fiction, Nonfiction, and Poetry books of the year.