This is Who’s Who in Baseball – 1973 Edition. The primary cover photo is of pitcher Steve Carlton of the Philadelphia Phillies. He was the winner of the 1972 National League’s Cy Young Award. The inset photo is of Dick Allen of the Chicago White Sox.  In 1972, Allen won the American League Most Valuable Player Award and also won The Sporting News AL Player of the Year award. There is a team photo of the World Series Champion Oakland A’s on the back cover. The inside front cover has a photo of Johnny Bench of the Cincinnati Reds. Bench was the 1972 National League MVP. The inside back cover has a photo of Gaylord Perry of the Cleveland Indians, winner of the American League Cy Young Award in 1972.

The publication contains “Lifetime Records PLUS Photos of More Than 660 players.” It has 148 pages and measures approximately 5.25 x 8.25 inches.

Steven Norman Carlton (born December 22, 1944) played in Major League Baseball as a left-handed pitcher for six different teams from 1965 to 1988, most notably as a member of the Philadelphia Phillies with whom he won four Cy Young Awards as well as the 1980 World Series. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1994 in his first year of eligibility.

Nicknamed "Lefty," Carlton has the second-most lifetime strikeouts of any left-handed pitcher (4th overall), and the second-most lifetime wins of any left-handed pitcher (11th overall). He was the first pitcher to win four Cy Young Awards in a career. He held the lifetime strikeout record several times between 1982 and 1984, before his contemporary Nolan Ryan passed him. One of his most remarkable records was accounting for nearly half (46%) of his team's wins, when he won 27 games for the last-place (59-97) 1972 Phillies. He is the last National League pitcher to win 25 or more games in one season, as well as the last pitcher from any team to throw more than 300 innings in a season. He also holds the record for the most career balks of any pitcher, with 90 (double the second on the all-time list, Bob Welch).

During a 15-year MLB career Richard Anthony Allen (March 8, 1942 – December 7, 2020), nicknamed "Crash" and "the Wampum Walloper," played first baseman and third baseman, most notably for the Philadelphia Phillies and Chicago White Sox, and was one of baseball's top sluggers of the 1960s and early 1970s.

A seven-time All-Star player, Allen began his career as a Phillie by being selected 1964 National League (NL) Rookie of the Year and in 1972 was the American League (AL) Most Valuable Player with the Chicago White Sox. He led the AL in home runs twice; the NL in slugging percentage once and the AL twice; and each major league in on-base percentage once apiece. Allen's career .534 slugging percentage was among his era's highest in an age of comparatively modest offensive production. The Phillies retired Allen's uniform number 15 on September 3, 2020, a few months before his death. In 2025, Allen was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Johnny Lee Bench (born December 7, 1947) played his entire Major League Baseball career, which lasted from 1967 to 1983, with the Cincinnati Reds, primarily as a catcher. Bench was the leader of the Reds team known as the Big Red Machine that dominated the National League in the mid-1970s, winning six division titles, four National League pennants and two World Series championships.

A 14-time All-Star and a two-time National League Most Valuable Player, Bench excelled on offense as well as on defense, twice leading the National League in home runs and three times in RBIs. At the time of his retirement in 1983, he held the major league record for most home runs hit by a catcher. He was also the first catcher in history to lead the league in home runs. He hit 45 home runs in 1970, which was a single-season record for catchers until Salvador Perez hit 48 in 2021. His 389 home runs and 1,376 runs batted in remain the most in Cincinnati Reds history.

On defense, Bench was a 10-time Gold Glove Award winner who skillfully handled pitching staffs and possessed a strong, accurate throwing arm. He caught 100 or more games for 13 consecutive seasons. In 1986, Bench was inducted into the Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1989 in his first year of eligibility. ESPN has called him the greatest catcher in baseball history.

Gaylord Jackson Perry (September 15, 1938 – December 1, 2022) pitched for eight teams from 1962 to 1983, becoming one of the most durable and successful pitchers in history. A five-time All-Star, Perry was the first pitcher to win the Cy Young Award in both leagues. He won the American League (AL) award in 1972 after leading the league with 24 wins with a 1.92 earned run average (ERA) for the fifth-place Cleveland Indians, and took the National League (NL) award in 1978 with the San Diego Padres after again leading the league with 21 wins; his Cy Young Award announcement just as he turned the age of 40 made him the oldest to win the award, which stood as a record for 26 years. He and his older brother Jim Perry, who were Cleveland teammates in 1974-1975, became the first brothers to both win 200 games in the major leagues, and remain the only brothers to both win Cy Young Awards.

Perry gained notoriety for doctoring baseballs (e.g. throwing spitballs), and perhaps even more so for making batters think he was throwing them on a regular basis – he went so far as to title his 1974 autobiography Me and the Spitter, though he claimed that his use of the prohibited practice was in the past. He was the subject of two decades of controversy during which opposing managers, umpires and league officials frequently attempted to catch him in a violation, even revising rules and guidelines; despite the constant scrutiny, he was not ejected from a game for the practice until his 21st season in the majors in 1982. In the meantime, Perry firmly established himself as one of baseball's most accomplished pitchers. He won 20 games five times and struck out 200 batters eight times, leading his league in innings pitched and complete games twice each. He pitched a no-hitter in September 1968, three weeks after throwing a one-hitter and also pitched 13 two-hitters. In 1978 Perry became the third pitcher to register 3,000 strikeouts, and while pitching for the Seattle Mariners in 1982, he became the first pitcher in 19 years to join the 300-win club; he joined Walter Johnson to become only the second pitcher to reach both milestones.

During a 22-year career, with most of its second half spent with losing teams, Perry compiled 314 wins; upon his retirement, he ranked third in major league history with 3,534 strikeouts and his 690 games started placing him behind only Cy Young's 815. His 5,350 innings pitched ranked fourth; he had been the first right-handed pitcher since the 1920s to surpass 5,000 innings. He was the last pitcher to throw 300 complete games and was then the eighth-oldest pitcher ever to start a major league game. Perry was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1991 in his third year of eligibility, a delay widely regarded as resulting from his career-long controversies.