It happens every spring. It’s time to play ball, so publishers fill out a new lineup card of biographies, team histories and other baseball scholarship. This season must begin by acknowledging the surreality that after 108 years, the Chicago Cubs are again World Series champions. “The Plan” (Triumph, $24.95), by David Kaplan, is a chronicle of the project to turn “one of the worst organizations in baseball” into “a dynasty in the making.” Kaplan starts with the 2009 purchase of the franchise by Tom Ricketts, and the subsequent wooing of Theo Epstein, the general manager behind two titles for the formerly cursed Boston Red Sox. Chicago’s farm system is stocked and Joe Maddon, the Tampa Bay Rays manager, is signed ahead of the 2015 season. Add youngsters like Kris Bryant and Kyle Schwarber, and free agents like Jon Lester, and a long-losing club is finally No. 1. There’s too much front-office esoterica — one appendix lists clauses from rooftop-seating contracts for buildings around Wrigley Field — but Cubs fans won’t mind.

As for New York teams, “Casey Stengel” (Doubleday, $27.95), by Marty Appel, is the ultimate biography: Stengel not only played for the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants, he managed the Dodgers before steering the New York Yankees to their greatest run of dominance and became the first manager of the New York Mets. Paul Dickson’s “Leo Durocher” (Bloomsbury, $28) chronicles the adventures of Leo the Lip, the colorful player (briefly for the Yankees, later the Dodgers) and manager (for the Dodgers, Giants and other clubs) who stayed in the sports pages for more than 40 years.

Steve Steinberg’s “Urban Shocker” (University of Nebraska, $32.95) recalls a Yankees pitcher who should be better known for his name alone. A spitballer who was traded to the St. Louis Browns, Shocker had four 20-win seasons before returning to New York in time to be part of the 1927 championship team. “Piazza” (Sports Publishing, $24.99), by Greg W. Prince, revels in a more recent and beloved player. The best-hitting catcher of all time, Mike Piazza was already a Los Angeles Dodgers star when he was traded twice in 1998, first to the Florida Marlins, then to the Mets. After all Piazza did for the team (and the team for him), Prince’s book explains why it meant so much to New York fans that Piazza went into the Hall of Fame last year as a Met.

Around the league, former players telling stories include Rick Ankiel, the St. Louis Cardinal who lost his ability to pitch. In “The Phenomenon” (PublicAffairs, $27), written with Tim Brown, Ankiel speaks of succumbing to the anxiety disorder commonly called the yips, then reclaiming his career as an outfielder. Ankiel has company. Dennis Snelling’s compelling biography, “Lefty O’Doul” (University of Nebraska, $27.95), tells of the pitcher who, after a sore arm, became one of baseball’s greatest hitters and hitting coaches before helping to establish the game in Japan. “Ballplayer” (Dutton, $27) is a confessional memoir from Chipper Jones (with Carroll Rogers Walton), the likely Hall of Famer who spent his entire 19-year career with the Atlanta Braves. Mets fans know he enjoyed beating their team so much that he named one son Shea, after Shea Stadium; they may not recall that Jones hit his first major-league homer there. He details that moment and many others, including off-field behavior that led to two divorces.