5 comments about The Catcher Was a Spy.

1. I'd been anticipating reading this book for some time, but getting through it was a chore. Dawidoff's writing and research are thorough. Berg left behind a wealth of personal material and many who knew him were still alive and available by phone or personal interview to Dawidoff. Hundreds of anecdotes and details about Berg's life emerge from these resources, and Dawidoff marches them all past the reader. The question is "Why?" Berg never becomes very interesting. It is well-known that he was a mediocre major league catcher. He was not much better as a spy, excelling mostly at running up large expense accounts. His tradecraft was abysmal; making and keeping notes to himself about briefings he received is such a fundamental error as to be ludicrous. After more than 300 pages it remained hard for me to take Berg seriously in any of his endeavors. In the end this is the biography of a moderately interesting obsessive dilettante, whose avoidance of normal human contact except on his own often strange terms seems almost pathological. Dawidoff tries valiantly but a New Yorker profile of about one-tenth this length would have been a sufficient account of Moe Berg's mildly curious life.



2. Moe Berg is truly one of the most interesting, and enigmatic, characters in sports history. What always fascinated me was how, after WWII and no longer in baseball, Berg never worked. He would stay at friends and relatives' homes throughout the country, reading multiple newspapers, and maintaining strict control of those papers. My guess, and this would make for an interesting investigative study, is that he stayed on the OSS/CIA payroll and was working for them, in some capacity: Dissecting the news, dealing with Communist espionage - or who knows, maybe he was working with foreign elemnets. Berg was something. He has to be considered a major hero. Surely the fact that he was an ex-ballplayer makes him stand out from the other heroes under "Wild Bill" Donovan, as does the fact that a Jew was sent to Nazi-controlled Finland to get German scientists. This is a terrific story. (...)



3. Moe Berg was completely unpleasant. I found myself wondering why I should care about his life. He was a mediocre ballplayer, a mediocre scholar and a mediocre spy. His talent was that he was pleasant to be around. Why write a book about him?
   
   Why read about him? I wondered that. My reaction was, "So what?"



4. This interesting biography covers a most unusual person. Moe Berg (1902-1972) was a talented linguist, ballplayer, and U.S. espionage agent for the OSS (forerunner of the CIA) before and during World War II and briefly for the CIA after the war. Author Nicholas Dawidoff describes Berg's mysterious life, including New Jersey boyhood, studies at Princeton and Columbia, and years as a second-string catcher for the Dodgers, White Sox, Indians, Senators and Red Sox. Even as a player Berg was better know for his linguistic skills and stealth than for his baseball exploits. Then readers learn of Berg's years as a spy, which probably began when Berg toured Japan with other big leaguers in 1934. The author describes Berg's secret wartime activities, including his 1944-45 mission to ascertain the status of Nazi nuclear research. We also read of his later years, when except for brief CIA assignments, Berg chose to freeload off relatives and friends rather than employ his superb linguistic and legal talents (he had a law degree). A Overall, Berg was an enigmatic man, and this biography, written two decades after his passing, fails to uncover much about him - perhaps Berg would have wanted it that way. Still, this is an interesting and nicely researched biography.



5. I felt like I was reading the sports pages for the first 140 pages. Too many stats, facts and figures. The storyline didn't flow, the plot was sluggish and languished for the most part. The story of Moe Berg's life should have packed some punch! I expected more pizazz. His life warranted it, but the book didn't deliver.

5 comments about What Do You Think of Ted Williams Now? : A Remembrance.

1. This book is deceptively short, yet like Ted Williams swinging at a baseball in his prime --- it packs one hell of wallop! Amazingly, the reader gets a very well-rounded picture of Williams the man, Williams the out-sized legend, Williams the S.O.B. and of course in his most famous guise as baseball's "greatest hitter who ever lived." The last man ever to hit .400 for a season with 521 career home runs to his credit (including one on his last ever time at bat), he was also the only man ever elected to both the baseball and fly-fishing halls of fame. His life was extremely rich and full and reads like it was five lifetimes rolled into one. A fighter pilot during WWII, many argue he may have even forfeited some of his best years in baseball to serve his country.... Considering his well-established contributions to the science of hitting, that's a scary thought! Anyway, if you're looking for a short and breezy read on one of baseball's all-time-greats look no further than this book by Richard Ben Cramer.



2. Richard Ben Cramer wrote a somewhat controversial but well-researched biography of Joe DiMaggio. The major difference between this excellent portrait, and the latter project, was that we see and hear the protagonist in his own words. At times, it is a loud, booming voice full of life, stories, regrets, and accomplishments of one of our sporting legends.
   
   Mr. Cramer does a masterful job weaving this interesting portrayal. This book is rather brief compared to the DiMaggio biography; however, it has more "life." The bulk of this work concentrates upon an interview that took place in 1986. It is written in such a way that the author fades into the background. In a strange sense, the reader feels present. As if we are sitting with Mr. Williams in his living room, and spellbound to imagine what will come next. The sheer force of his personality makes this a very entertaining and informative read.
   
   Compared to the modern day ballplayer, Mr. Williams was indeed a rare bird. He had interesting and intriguing opinions about hitting, fishing, flying jet planes, marriage, lemonade, fickle fans, and the traffic patterns of the Florida Keys. ;-) He is both arrogant and enchanting, if one can imagine such a thing. Mr. Cramer draws out Williams in a way that writers of his own era failed to do. He showed him respect and deference, but like so many of the fish that Williams loved to catch, didn't allow him off the hook on tough subjects. In a way, this interview perhaps was a cathartic exercise for Mr. Williams.
   
   The unfortunate circumstances that surrounded his death made this book quite pertinent. What do we think of him now? The best hitter to ever live, a true American patriot, a lover of the great outdoors, and a man who defined life in his own strike zone.
   
   Thank you for the opportunity to review this excellent work by Mr. Cramer.



3. Ted Williams lived the kind of irrepressible life that Hollywood tried to invent for its toughest actors; old-skool masculinity personified, he was the finest baseball player of a generation (if not all time), a fisherman worthy of Hemingway's prose, and a lifelong Marine who served his country in not one but TWO deadly wars, the second of which nearly cost him his own life.
   
   He was the eternal paradox, the New England sports hero with the "When Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Have Guns" bumper sticker on his pick-up truck, the all-time All-Star outfielder who practiced his swing while playing defense, the surly bane to those in the sports press charged with selling his image to the Boston public, and the eternal cynic who could never fully give himself to the public's adoration because he would always hear the 2 or 3 boos among the thousands of cheers his very presence on the field generated.
   
   This book does a fine job of encapsulating the highlights of Williams' career, covered sparingly among a (then) current interview of the man as living legend approaching his 70's. But the real joy and success of the book is the author's capturing the essence of the magnitude of Williams to the point that you can't possibly help but feel that you are listening to the man thunder away in your own living room, rather than from a far-off house in the Florida Keys (or from the more appropriate peak of Mount Olympus). Most enjoyable to me is the author's penchant FOR PRINTING WILLIAMS' QUOTES IN ALL CAPS (wherein I can't help but read them aloud -and at suitable volume- to my fiancee', much to her dismay).
   
   We have a suitable account of Williams' life after his time as an active player and manager, but before his health began to rapidly deteriorate. It is a full portrait, balancing the more infamous qualities of the man with those that Williams fiercely guarded during his lifetime; that he was, beneath the callous exterior, as warm and giving a soul that baseball would be far more fortunate than it deserves to have as an ambassador today.
   It's a joy to read, seemingly almost an afterthought in its brevity, but when considered that it was only ever supposed to be an article for Esquire magazine, it surely ranks among the finest sports writing of all time.



4. In a paper-thin volume, Richard Ben Cramer manages to capture the many contradictions of the greatest hitter who ever lived and the last man to bat over .400, Theodore Samuel (Ted) Williams. His book is must reading for any Red Sox fan, and for that matter anyone who wonders why baseball heroes like Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Pete Rose, Joe DiMaggio, and Williams lead such dysfunctional lives, often estranged from their own families.
   
   Contradiction: Williams respected authority (never argued with umpires and liked the military life), but he refused to conform to societal customs, e.g. wearing a necktie.
   
   Contradiction: He was an obsessive perfectionist, but often half-hearted on defense or while running the bases.
   
   Contradiction: He was a self-centered loner, but unfailingly generous toward charities.
   
   Contradiction: He resented the Boston sports press, but wanted no publicity for his unselfish work for the Jimmy Fund.
   
   Contradiction: He came from poverty, was poorly educated, yet became a dyed-in-the-wool Republican and establishmentarian.
   
   One thing Ted never lost was his potty-mouth, which he used to rail against the "knights of the keyboard," Boston's habitually self-righteous sports reporters who attacked him not only for his lackadaisical defensive habits but even for his failure to call his mother on holidays (she was a Salvation Army worker who wasn't home, anyway) or stay home for his daughter's birth (she was born two months prematurely, but he was supposed to have known it would happen). The more Ted cursed at his enemies in the press, the more they'd dig up irrelevant dirt to throw at him. Things never improved. He also refused to tip his cap for the fans after a home run, resentful of earlier booing.
   
   So why did Ted Williams enjoy such a renaissance in public aspect, especially in Boston? It wasn't because he changed as a person. On the contrary, as Cramer makes clear, his later life (with his life partner, Louise, whom he settled down with after three unsuccessful marriages), was filled with the same profanity, the same volatile temper, the same need to be right all the time that the younger Ted Williams exhibited.
   
   What happened, apparently, was that the public was no longer exposed to the constant friction between Ted and the press, and so remembered only the good stuff: his .406 batting average in 1941, his home run that decided the All-Star game that year, and the home run in his last at bat in 1960, all of which were replayed via TV highlights regularly. John Updike's dissertation on the 1960 home run helped, too.
   
   Cramer makes us understand Ted Williams. Like Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Pete Rose and Joe DiMaggio, he was no scholar. Also like them, he was able to cultivate a specific skill set on the baseball diamond. He became (arguably) the greatest hitter who ever lived. Still, his lack of education and lonely childhood left vacuums in his life...he compensated for the first by having to be right all the time, and for the second by finally admitting to Cramer, "I was a terrible husband and father."
   
   In the interest of full disclosure, the present writer met Ted Williams at two Red Sox fantasy camps.



5. This easy- to- read- page- turner provides new insight into a truly great man. I had admired him for years, but with reservations, due mostly to rumors. After reading this one-on-one report by a man who experienced the good and the bad of Ted Williams, I came away with tremendous insight into a sensitive, caring, loving, beautiful human being. Who knew?? I'm grateful for Richard Ben Cramer's memories of his thought provoking time with Ted Williams, so the rest of us can realize that there was SO much more behind this man than his remarkable life in baseball. I have purchased this book for many of my friends, due to its' uniqueness, and they have all loved it as much as myself. This little book can be read in an evening, but packs a powerful punch!

5 comments about Jackie Robinson: A Biography.

1. i'm not particularly interested in baseball, but i am particularly interested in American history from the human perspective. i could have read a much more dry account of the turmoils that dominated American race relations throughout the middle of the 20th century, but instead i've read this fascinating account of those terrible, backward days from the perspective of a true pioneer, Mr. Jackie Robinson.

   of course he is looked back on now as a symbol, a mythological figure. i always knew peripherally of Jackie as the same thing most people do: the first black man to play major league baseball, a step forward & up in the painful struggle of the times. but this book presents him as a human being, a fallible man who lived most of his life not on the baseball field, but in a relentless pursuit of his ideals and desire for a better life for himself and everyone around him.

   the reviewer before me questions the biographer's lack of judgement of Robinson. i am curious as to why he feels Rampersad should insert his own analysis; the biography presents analyses of Robinson by many of Robinson's contemporaries, and then presents the recorded facts available to clarify incidents & statements. yes, this is an intensely personal biography, perhaps too personal in places. it is very much centered on Jackie's private correspondences. it is absolutely told from Robinson's persepctive, as best can be reconstructed from his widow Rachel & the papers he left behind, but it feels very honest, not at all like an airbrushed bit of hero-polishing. it is in places very blunt about Jackie's shortcomings as observed by his peers & contemporaries.

   before i stretch this out any longer, i'll just say that this is the most engrossing biography i can ever recall having read. it's an account of a fascinating life in an amazingly recent time, in an America that seems so long ago but is still discouragingly recent. readers will learn not just about Jackie Robinson, but about two American eras as well.




2. This biography does an outstanding job of giving an overview of Robinson's life and times, from his early, awnry but talented years in Pasadena, through UCLA, then the military, and then the Brooklyn Dodgers and beyond. It paints a picture of a strong willed gentleman with enormous pride, dedicated to his family, and dedicated to the idea of racial integration and equality. The influences of his mother on his early, somewhat (understandably) confrontational character, that allowed him to ultimately be the individual who paired with Branch Rickey to integrate "America's Pastime" are clearly laid out.

   Some reviewers have faulted the author for not being more interpretive of Robinson's politics - specifically, that he was a Nixon supporter in 1960 and a Rockefeller supporter in 1968 (while also being a strong supporter of Civil Rights, active in almost every civil rights organization) and Humphrey supporter as well. I think the book lays out all the facts for the reader to see for themselves. Robinson's coming of age - in an era when a Dixiecrat from a Jim Crow state (LBJ) led the passage of the Civil Rights Act - was a time of a shifting political landscape that didn't settle out until near his death (he also broke badly with Nixon later in Nixon's career). The Republican party's mantra of self-reliance, and Robinson's determination to succeed in business in the same way he did in sports, made his attraction to the party not a big leap; the alienation of this country's African American establishment from big business was not a pre-ordained fact in the time Robinson lived.

   Finally, Robinson's own family struggles were also a reflection of the confusing and troubling times in which he lived.

   Robinson died too young for us all. This is a great book and I would highly recommend it..




3. I really liked this book and normally I dont like reading. Ijust wanted to keep reading to see what was going to happen next. I think Jackie Robinson is a vary good romodel because no matter what, you should never give up. Because Jackie never gave up he ended up being one of the best baseball players to ever play the game. But most of all he broke the color code for all professional sports.



4. It was a year of Fire and also the year of Grace for Jackie Robinson!! It is an amazing book to read about a great person who changed history and loves baseball!! It is more than just baseball and it has so many things to show that shaped Jackie's life so much. It is also spiritual and emotional book that leaves you to become a stronger person to make a great difference in the world.



5. After reading several excellent reviews of this book, I purchased it for
   my nepbew's birthday. I have not read the book myself since I lived through that period.

No comments about Willie Mays: Art in the Outfield.

5 comments about My Life in Baseball.

1. Robin Roberts' book, My Life in Baseball, along with his previous book, The Whiz Kids and the 1950 Pennant, transported this 62-year old back to my early childhood memories growing up in a Philadelphia suburb. Mr. Roberts' writing helped me recall a time when life was less complicated, a time of few worries, and a time when baseball was all about the game.
   
   Mr. Roberts' book is so detailed with the names of who hit what kind of pitch, in which inning, and to what part of the ballpark that it is like having been at the game or reading last night's box score. He provides a different perspective about baseball - of how the game used to be played back when players earned $5,000 a year and traveled long hours on the train going from one big league city to another.
   
   Mr. Roberts had a remarkable career as a big league pitcher. In just his third year in the Major Leagues, he won 20 games, which he did for six consecutive years. His record in his fifth year was 28 and 7, with 330 innings pitched. In 19 seasons, his overall ERA was 3.41. No wonder Mr. Roberts was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1976, at that time just the second Phillie ever elected to the HOF.
   
   Read about some of the stars and Hall of Famers who played alongside Mr. Roberts or who faced him on the field, players such as Ashburn, Simmons, Ennis, Jones, Hamner, Mays, Aaron, Robinson, Musial, Spahn, Koufax, and Campanella. And read about the spitball, the development of the Players' Association, and the creation of the players' pension fund. This is a must-read for anyone who has a passion for the game of baseball.



2. 
   
   To fully appreciate "My Life in Baseball", it would help if the reader knows what the "Hot Stove League" is. (The phrase refers to fans amusing themselves in the cold winter by talking baseball, looking forward to Spring Training- and presumably staying warm around the hot stove in a rural general store.) MLBB is set mostly in Major League Baseball's golden era, from 1946-1960 when BB was comprised of the original 16 teams and St. Louis and Kansas City were the western outposts. Robin Roberts played from 1948-1966 but his most productive years were in the early to mid 1950s with the Phillies. The author has an encyclopedic recall of old games, former teammates, managers, coaches, front office staff and opponents. His musings on individuals are more absorbing than the play by play in games of long ago. This reviewer was more taken with Roberts' less productive years in the early to mid 60s as he struggled to hold on with the Orioles, Cubs and Astros. The reader follows with admiration as Roberts invents a life for himself outside of Major League Baseball. He was highly instrumental in the formation of the Major League Players Association, though he disagrees with some of the actions that organization has taken. MLBB is an intelligent sports biography by a thoughtful and serious athlete. Roberts attained success on and off the playing field but had his struggles as well. He tells it like it is and, as another reviewer noted, does not use MLBB to settles old grudges. If one is over 50, or a die-hard Phillie fan of any age, MLBB is a safe choice. One dig at the author: How did he not know that Sal "The Barber' Maglie of the New York Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers didn't shave on days he was scheduled to pitch? (It made him more intimidating to the batters!) Every school kid in New York City knew that one! Those who fondly remember Sal will enjoy MLBB.



3. Robin Roberts was a great pitcher, arguably the greatest right-handed pitcher ever for the Philadelphia Phillies. In 1950, the Philadelphia Phillies won the pennant over the Brooklyn Dodgers. The Phillies went on to lose in four straight to the New York Yankees in the World Series. Although they had a nucleus of very good, young ballplayers (Roberts, Richie Asburn, Curt Simmons, Granny Hamner, etc), they never seriously contended again.
   Roberts fills you in on every painful detail of the Phillies demise.
   As a life-long Phillies fan, but one born after Roberts career had ended it was good to read about his insights. I suggest that those who never saw Roberts play read this book. Roberts is very even-handed. Complimenting others and admitting his mistakes.
   He discusses the failings of baseball in general and the Phillies in specific, but still keeps it light. He laments the Phillies reluctance to sign black players - missing out on Roy Campenella as well as others. He recalls his involvement in the Player's Union. He let's the reader know how the players were not treated fairly, but now it is the fan who is not treated fairly.
   This book is a good easy read. Very close to a 5 star rating, but just not enough juicy and/or unique information.



4. I read-read-read baseball books. This is one of the best. Ranks right behind Roger Kahn's "Boys of Summer" and David Halberstams "October 1964". This includes an excellent description of how the players became organized into a union and the reasons why.



5. ROBIN ROBERTS DOES A GREAT JOB TELLING US ABOUT HIS LIFE AND CAREEER IN BASEBALL. SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS (THERE ARE MANY) ARE: 1950 WHIZ KIDS, RELATIONSHIPS WITH EDDIE SAWYER, INVOLVMENT IN THE PLAYERS UNION AND FINALLY HIS JOB LATER IN LIFE AS A STOCK INVESTOR. HE HAS MANY INTERESTING AND FUNNY STORIES. IT IS ONE OF THOSE BOOKS THAT IS HARD TO PUT DOWN. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS FOR BASEBALL AND EXPECIALLY PHILLIE FANS WHO REMEMBER THIS GREAT PITCHER.

5 comments about Baseball's Great Experiment: Jackie Robinson and His Legacy.

1. I have a better understanding of integregation and how it affected every American no matter what his race or beliefs. Baseball was a pioneering vechicle for social questioning and challenged many men other than Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson into greatness. They were courageous men who had to fight convention and who lead other Americans to follow their example. I realize the impact integration had on everyone involved Black or White: the team owners, the players, broadcasters, vendors, and families. Many individuals sacrificed to improve their freedom and the freedom given to other humans. Mr. Rickey and Mr. Robinson are not portrayed as mythological figures but rather as real men I can respect more because they are like all of us. I am convinced that Mr. Robinson endured because he had strong character and determination and he believed in "the experiment." I feel I know him better now that I know more about his struggles and triumphs. I kept reading because everything was explained simply and with logic and with an absence of bias.



2. This scholarly yet readable look at baseball integration from 1947-1959 goes well beyond the inspiring story of Jackie Robinson and Branch Rickey. Author Jules Tygiel also informs about such secondary figures as Larry Doby, Bill Veeck, Hank Aaron, Pumpsie Green, etc. Tygiel shows that integration proceeded slowly and in the face of strong resistance - the Boston Red Sox didn't add a black player until 1959, three years after Jackie Robinson retired. We also see how baseball integration spurred civil rights, while hastening the end of the Negro Leagues. I'd have liked more coverage of baseball's declining attendance after 1949 (probably caused by television), and the suspected correlation between athletic dominance and underclass poverty. Still, BASEBALL'S GREAT EXPERIMENT is a well-researched look at an interesting period in sports history.



3. I purchased this book to learn more about Jackie Robinson and his relationship with Branch Rickey. Jules Tygiel gave me that (in an unbiased, thorough manner with great historical perspective) and then some! I gained an increased appreciation for the role of the Negro Leagues in the development of Major League baseball. I gained insight into the changing perceptions of baseball management, players and fans toward African-Americans and their contributions to the game. I was momentarily transported to that time, not as long ago as I would have thought, where non-white players were treated as second-class citizens. It was really an eye-opener. In addition, Mr. Tygiel's style was so honest and even-handed that I can't wait to read his book, "Past Time: Baseball As History," which I ordered today!



4. THis is a wonderful book that I can't praise enough. If you - like me - have been putting off reading about Jackie Robinson and the other black baseball pioneers of the late 1940's and 1950's, this is the book for you. It's a shocking description of just what life was like for blacks at that time. It's a real eye-opener that needs to be read by all baseball fans and all students of American history.



5. This is the book from which John McCain and his ghost writer "borrowed" most of the content, both of facts and of rhetoric, for the first chapter of McCain's "Hard Call". The ghost does acknowledge Tygiel, but merely in passing.
   
   And this is surely the deepest historical biography of any sports figure ever written. Jules Tygiel is a professor of history at San Francisco State University, and the author of a fine dispassionate biography of Ronald Reagan, as well as the book "Baseball As History", which quite brilliantly examines the culture of America in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries through the lens of baseball.
   
   You can read "Baseball's Great Experiment" simply for pleasure, as a baseball lover, or you can read it for historical insight, which it offers aplenty. It's a great irony that baseball and the army were integrated meaningfully long before corporate business, the mainline Christian churches, the federal bureaucracy, or academia!
   
   Tygiel writes firm straight-forward prose, with a minimum of sermonizing (McCain's big fault as a writer) or academic pomposity. His portrayals of Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson are well-rounded and believable, with both their strengths and their weaknesses. Even if you have a total indifference to baseball, you'll find the human drama fascinating.
   
   As for yours truly... Do it again, Red Sox!

5 comments about Shoeless: The Life and Times of Joe Jackson.

1. As a thirteen year resident of Greenville, South Carolina, I have finally found a biography about "Shoeless" Joe Jackson that captures his life story rather than the many myths surrounding the man. As any baseball player or fan knows, the likes of Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb and other baseball greats have been immortalized in a plethora of biographies, but Joe has been little more than a footnote. Perhaps, this is due to his involvement in the 1919 Black Sox Scandal, perhaps not. This book, however, finally captures the life and many facets of Joe Jackson. Though I do not subscribe to one theory or another in regard to his involvement in throwing the 1919 World Series, I am pleased to have finally found a book that addresses this issue without glamour, intrigue, or writer's license. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in baseball, the history of our National Past Time, or the life of one of baseball's greatest hitters, Joe Jackson.



2. Baseball biographies come in all types, from boring descriptions of the player's performance in games, to tantalizing disconnected details of the player's life outside the lines, to full-fledged development of the player's life history and personality. This new book by David Fleitz falls more toward the latter. I recommend it to all baseball fans, especially ones (like me) who are fascinated by the lesser-known stars of the pre-Ruthian world.

   Much of the book is devoted to Jackson's role in the Black Sox scandal, putting it into historical context and digging into the actions and motives of some of the key figures. The passages involving Charles Comiskey are especially revealing.

   The road between city life and country life was much longer back then. Early baseball has many stories of the difficulties rural men faced when thrust into MLB's urban landscape. Because of his great physical skills, the illiterate Jackson is a highly compelling example of these stories. I now feel like I've met Jackson. Among the best baseball biographies I've read.




3. Great book. Separates the myth and the legend of Shoeless Joe Jackson from the "average Joe" and looks at his banishment from baseball in an honest, objective light. Author does an outstanding job of dissecting Jackson's behavior and possible motives throughout the scandal of the 1919 Black Sox.
   But more importantly, more personal information about Joe is available on Joe throughout the pages of this text than any I have ever seen. This is a fantastic accomplishment as there is a lot of sappy, sentimental fluff out there about Joe Jackson and this book really made me feel as though I knew Joe, in addition to understanding what he was about.
   This book is by far and away the best baseball book of the year (along with Reed Browning's Cy Young) and is amongst the best and most important baseball books ever written. If you're a serious baseball fan, you will enjoy SHOELESS!!



4. There has been a lot said and written about Joe Jackson by a variety of people - baseball people, baseball historians, scholars of the 1919 World Series, residents of the South (particularly South Carolina), and others. There's also been a variety of books produced about Jackson, most with his point of view or the "point of view he would have had," whatever that might have been at any point in time. It was with some skepticism that I picked up Fleitz's book and started to read, half expecting to see the same arguments that I've read before - Jackson as a victim, as the greatest player not in the Hall of Fame but for one mistake, and how he went back to South Carolina and scratched out a living (or was very successful, depending on which book you read).

   Fleitz's book was a most pleasant surprise - it offers information that I haven't found anywhere else, and gives more "flesh" and substance to the person that was Joe Jackson than any previous account of his life that I had read. One point is the relationship that he had with his wife: always shown as the doting couple, Fleitz writes that this wasn't always the case. In baseball, he shows that Jackson wasn't the near-mythological player that he had been portrayed, and that he did fail at any number of clutch situations. By the same token, Jackson is also frequently mentioned as a batting role model to any number of famous players. The reactions of contemporaries thoughtout the book is also delightful feature.

   A primary focus of the book is in the 1919 World Series and Jackson's role in that. Through the years Jackson has garnered significant numbers of supporters claiming that he was innocent; Fleitz offers evidence and opinions that he may not have been that innocent at all. There is also the issue of his initial acceptance of the gamblers' money. As with many people, I have my opinions of the World Series fix and Jackson's involvement. Prior to Fleitz's book, the opinion was a little fuzzier; after reading the book, it's become a little clearer. Was he innocent or guilty? Read the book and make your decision - it's well worth your time.




5. Fleitz does a fine job of describing the atmosphere of the early days of baseball and is usually objective in his treatment of Jackson as a player and as a person. I recommend the book for anyone who is a Jackson affectionado and/or enjoys human drama in a sports context. However, I was very disappointed in the final pages where Fleitz offers his opinion that Jackson wouldn't have cared about the Hall of Fame anyway because he was basically a Southern, good old boy from a poor background who cared only about hanging out with friends and family near the old homeplace. My great uncle worked in those same Greenville, SC cotton mills as a 9-yr old boy for almost no wages but ambition did not die there among the textile looms.

No comments about Major League Dad: A Daughter's Cherished Memories.

2 comments about Dock Ellis in the Country of Baseball.

1. Dock Ellis was a frustratingly inconsistant pitcher with excellent stuff. He pitched for the Pirates from the late 60's to the mid-70's, moving to the Yankees for one last terrific season before a seeming lack of dedication/interest left him wasting away in Texas. He had a less than glorious return to Pittsburgh in 1979 before calling it a career. This is not your usual sports bio. Donald Hall brings his poetic style to the narrative and Dock brings his own strange blend of stubborness,talent & inconsistancy to the table. While the book does hit some sluggish spells, you should be able to overlook its flaws to learn more about a man who pitched a no-hitter following a night of LSD (talk about performance enhancing), was maced by security before a start, made a surreal trip to Vietnam with should-be-Hall of Famer Bobby Bonds & began one game with the sole purpose of trying to drill every Reds batter he faced. There are also clubhouse & field tales involving such greats as Gaylord Perry, Willie McCovey, Willie Stargell, Roberto Clemente, Thurman Munson, Reggie Jackson & Jim "Cy or Cry" Palmer. Dock angered many people during his career, but he was often delivering the truth in an absurdly blunt package. This is not a great book by any stretch of the imagination. It is, however, a very entertaining and revealing look at one of the most colorful players of his generation. Ellis does not pull any punches on personal issues, but, unlike Jim Bouton, he and Donald Hall have gone to great lengths to make certain that their inside stories don't bring harm, in a personal manner, to those who played alongside or against Dock. It is not a reckless tell-all tome, but it does tell quite a bit about the talented enigma that is Dock Ellis, who wore out many a pair of spikes loping from the penthouse to the doghouse and back again...and again...and again- ad nauseum. --R.H.Conner



2. Now that Donald Hall has been named poet laureate of the United States, maybe Dock Ellis in the Country of Baseball will get a little of the attention it's long deserved. This is one of those fun books (like David Foster Wallace's A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, or Nicholson Baker's U and I, or Steve Almond's Candyfreak) that Hall wrote because he had come to a place in his career where he could. It doesn't aspire to art, but by taking seriously baseball's class clown Dock Ellis, it achieves it. Ellis took himself very seriously, and his on-the-field antics and the contemporary newspaper accounts that made light of them did not begin to account for the articulate, interesting, complicated character Hall found while following him around baseball diamond after baseball diamond.
   
   Now, these many years removed from the book's immediate post-Civil Rights era setting, the book goes a long way toward helping younguns like me understand what it was like to live and breathe and be in those fragile years.
   
   It's amazing that this little gem is still in print, and who knows how long it will be so? I'm grateful to the publishers, and I hope more readers will become acquainted with the pleasures of Dock Ellis in the Country of Baseball.

5 comments about Musial: From Stash to Stan the Man (Missouri Biography Series) (Missouri Biography Series).

1. Giglio, a professional historian, spent many years researching his subject and produced, in my view, the first serious examination of Musial's life.

   Given Musial's well-desrved reputation as a perfect gentleman and role model, many biographical accounts of his life slip into hagiography, but Giglio carefully avoids this trap. He cuts through much of the Musial mythology, and assesses the facts (laboriously compiled from archival research and interviews with many of Musial's contemporaries) in order to present Musial as a real human being.

   You wont find much dirt in this book--Musial really was a good guy for the most part. About the only blemish Giglio uncovered from Musial's personal life was that he impregnated his wife 6 months before they were married--a mere peccadillo by contemporary standards, especially considering that Stan and Lil Musial have remained happily married for over 60 years.

   Musial's only serious character flaw, according to Giglio, was an unwillingness to take provocative and controversial positions publicly on important issues of his time. For example, although Musial personally detested racism and bigotry, he never publicly condemned racist teammates like Enos Slaughter. According to at least one second-hand account, Musial and Slaughter once came to blows over the matter in private, but Giglio couldn't substantiate this, and publicly Musial has always denied that he and Slaughter, who died just a few weeks ago (12 August 2002), fought over the issue.

   The only criticism I have of Giglio's book is his embarrassingly amateurish statistical analysis. In comparing Musial to the other greats of his era (Joe DiMaggio, Ted Williams, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron and Mickey Mantle), Giglio uses a simplistic ranking methodology incorporating some common statistics like batting average, home runs and RBIs among others, but he ignores walks and on-base percentage completely, and he doesn't even attempt to account for fielding statistics or ballpark affects. Anyone familiar with serious scientific analysis of baseball (e.g. the work of Pete Palmer, Bill James or the gang at Baseball Prospectus) will laugh out loud at obvious lack of sophistication in Giglio's analysis. Mercifully, Giglio's statistical analysis only takes up a few pages.

   Overall though, I give Giglio high marks for producing an excellent biography of Musial. I feel I know Musial much better than I did before, and ultimately that's the best test of any biography.




2. Author James Giglio did not receive the blessings from Stan Musial to write this book, and Stan apparently discouraged others, at least according to the author, from aiding in this book as well. I found the book to be enjoyable and portrays Stan as both the baseball icon he so deservedly is along with frailities that make him human like the rest of us. I found it to be disappointing that he and Joe Garagiola, who are godfathers to each other's children, had a falling out that has apparently ended their friendship over problems involving their Redbird Lanes bowling alley partnership. According to Gigllio, Garagiola has tried to mend the friendship, but Stan wanted no part of it. Stan is not one to get involved in controversial matters such as race relations and the reserve clause which bound players to one team. Musial, while not against integration, did not use his superstar status to speak in support of it. In like manner when Bob Feller wanted him to support revisions to the reserve clause, Musial backpeddled when he (Musial) had suggested free agency after ten years of service and then stated he was satisfied with the status quo. He was in his element when he was in a relaxed atmosphere among people, but controversy made him back off. I did find a few errors in the book, primarily with first names of former players. Hall of Fame Cincinnati manager Bill McKechnie is referred to as "Joe". Former Chicago Cubs catcher Elvin Tappe is referred to as "Ted". Former Brooklyn Dodgers pitchers Chris Van Cuyk and Ben Wade are referred to as "Johnny" and "Jake" respectively. One additional error I found takes place during Stan's retirement party sponsored by the St. Louis chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America. Ernie Banks spoke and pretended to read a telegram from the NAACP which he said stood for "the National Association for Advancement of Colored Pitchers." Banks actually said, the "National Association for the Advancement of Cubs' Pitching." I have a copy of the highlights of the St. Louis BBWAA on a phonograph record and this portion of the speech is on it. These are errors I caught in the book that I felt should not be there. Four well known players of the time period should have their first names listed correctly, in addition to the error in the speech by Banks. There are probably others, but these are the ones I found. In any case I enjoyed the book, and it was worth my time.



3. The book covers all phases of Musial's life, including his personal life and post-baseball life. Unlike many baseball bios, it covers some weaknesses in the personal characteristics of this great star, although there were very few in Musial. What I especially liked about the book is that the author contacted and obtained interesting information from numerous former major league players and others who knew Musial. The author had apparently written letters to more than 500 former major leaguers.

   I couldn't put the book down. I'd rate it even better than the recent book I read about Ted Willimas, which I rated as the best baseball bio I had ever read. Stan Musial was my favorite ball player wehn I was growing up in the 1950s, and I wasn't disappointed.

   If anything, I would have liked to hear even more about Musial's post baseball life, although there's a lot in the book. However, I understand Stan did not cooperate with the author.




4. This book is head and shoulders above the average baseball biography. Most sports biographies fall into one of two categories: either they're superficial, hero-worshiping treatments that present the subject as a faultless paragon and give little space to anything other than the subject's on-field exploits, or they're efforts to tear down the hero image and dig up as much dirt on the athlete as possible.
   
   Giglio's study of Musial avoids both these pitfalls. Since Giglio is a professional historian, rather than a sportswriter, he brings a historian's thoroughness and depth to his research on Musial. We learn a great deal about Musial's ethnic background, his family, and his personal attitudes and character. Although the author emphasizes what a genuinely good man Musial was and is, he presents a nuanced portrait that accepts and analyses his subject's faults and foibles as well as his many virtues.
   
   Unfortunately, there are always a few hard-core sports fans who flee in horror from this kind of book. All they want to read about is their hero's exploits on the playing field. There are others who live and breathe statistics and sneer in contempt when a book about a baseball star isn't full of Sabrmetrics. It's true that this book is statistically unsophisticated, but the author makes no claims that he's writing that kind of book. This is a book about a MAN who PLAYED baseball-- not a "baseball book."
   
   I give it a four-star rating only because the writing is at times a little dry and professorial--but only a little. This is a great read for anyone who dreams of getting to know a baseball immortal, and one of baseball's genuine gentlemen.



5. The St. Louis Cardinals are a storied Major League Baseball franchise, second only to the New York Yankees in the number of World Series championships they have taken. Like the Yankees, the Cardinals have employed some of the most exceptional ballplayers ever, and the penultimate Cardinal has to be Stan Musial. Although Rogers Hornsby, Dizzy Dean, Bob Gibson, Lou Brock, Ozzie Smith, and a host of other Hall of Famers were Cardinals for the bulk of their careers, it is Stan "The Man" Musial who defines the team and its place in baseball lore. This fine biography by historian James N. Giglio explains why this is the case.
   
   A sore-armed left-handed pitcher whose retreading into an outfielder might have been the most fortunate transformation of any player since Babe Ruth moved from the pitcher's mound to leftfield for good in 1919, he proved to be the greatest Cardinal of them all. In a stunning 22-year career, The Man (and no other identification is necessary) wracked up a .331 career batting average and won the batting title seven times, hit 475 career home runs, hit safely 3,630 times, was named Most Valuable Player in the National League three times, enjoyed perennial all star game appearances, and upon retirement held 17 major league, 29 National League, and nine all-star game records. While Musial played with the Cardinals it won National League Pennants in 1942, 1943, 1944, and 1946, and took three World Series championships in 1942, 1944, and 1946.
   
   His career represented the pinnacle of all the great players produced by the Cardinals farm system. Musial's was also a career of great dignity and poetry both on and off the field, and he remains an icon in St. Louis more than forty years after his retirement.
   
   Equally important, Musial epitomized the American heartland with its virtues of rusticity, small towns, Protestant beliefs, and hard-working. Hailing from the backhills of Pennsylvania's mining country Musial strode across the National League as a giant for more than twenty years, but one who never forgot that hard work, good manners, and honorable actions brought him to greatness. His streak of 895 consecutive games played stood as a National League record until broken by Billy Williams of the Cubs in 1970 and was one record that Musial especially prized, for it demonstrated his commitment to working-class values in the everyday task of showing up and playing the game of baseball. This is a fundamental part of the story told by James Giglio in "Musial."
   
   But there is another side of Musial that Giglio finds less compelling. He was never a crusader and remained apart from the efforts to integrate MLB and to challenge the reserve clause that bound players to one team indefinitely. With his stature in the game and the society around him, with his secure place as one of the premier major leaguers of his era, he might have offered leadership in helping to end those injustices. He failed to do so. To his credit he did not oppose integration, but the Cardinals were one of the teams that put Jackie Robinson through hell in 1947 and Musial was essentially absent from the controversy. Personally detesting segregation, Musial might have mitigated the situation as the team leader. Likewise, Bob Feller asked for his support in forcing changes to the reserve clause to grant free agency for veterans with ten years experience, but Musial backed away in favor of the status quo.
   
   While he was very much a man with quirks and faults, and a real aversion to engaging in controversy, Giglio shows a Stan Musial who was genuinely a nice, upstanding gentleman. Far from the fatally flawed anti-hero so common to Major League Baseball, it is refreshing to read such a book about a great player when so much about the game seems sordid with doping and other new scandals announced almost daily in the media. Of course, I still wish "the Man," as well as hundreds of other MLB players and owners, had recognized the racism present in the game and pressed to end it.