Reading a Book Together: Boys’ Club. Official vs. “True” Story

Reading a Book Together

My brother and I recently read a book together. Well, not exactly together, but more like around the same time. The book connected to our shared history, growing up “in baseball.” He sent me the copy he ordered that crossed in shipping with the one his son/my nephew ordered for his birthday. So, call this intergenerational family legacy, convergence, and perhaps a micro version of local library “one city, one book” projects? But we’ve narrowed down to just the two of us left, from an original four siblings who parallel played that phase of our lives.

Object and Reaction

The book is not about our father and his career. The book is about another, more well-known, man and his career with the same ball club, the Baltimore Orioles (John W. Miller. The Last Manager: How Earl Weaver Tricked, Tormented, and Reinvented Baseball. Avid Reader Press. c2025). No financial outlay on my part, but there was emotional baggage. After the box arrived, I put it aside and didn’t open it for over a week. Then, when I did, I had to remove the dust jacket, a very bright orange to which I had a visceral reaction. Orioles orange, my brother pointed out. But tempered by surrounding white or gray of uniforms, I countered. The hardback cover under the jacket is white, with black lettering.

Can’t Be Objective

Not a story I can approach “objectively,” so I started thinking about how I’d have written it differently. Put in more of the context and texture I still carry within. Visuals: ballparks were often painted dark forest green, as if sourced from some central commissary. Even in the lower minor leagues, diamonds had a dynamic geometry , green grass framing the sweep of the basepaths and leading up to the pitcher’s mound. And soundscapes: balls smacking into mitts, the thwack of wooden bats hitting balls. The ping of metal bats doesn’t carry the same satisfying resonance. And there were players calls to the pitcher. Sounded to me like “Hom, Babe,” but was probably “Come on, Babe.” Haven’t been to a ballgame in many years. So, I don’t know if players still use the same mantra, but baseball’s traditional, so it’s probably passed down. Most important, I’d include and give more credit to the fascinating cast of surrounding characters, not just our dad, but other genuine old time baseball men—Fred “Bootnose” Hoffman (those great nicknames!), George Staller, Ray Scarborough, Vern Hosheit, etc., etc. Some scouted and signed players before, others would manage them in the minor leagues after. In between, at spring training, the old pros came together to school their picks in skills like pitching, catching, bunting, sliding. But this is not the book I’d have written. Going back to the dustcover, it shows Earl floating on the sea of orange, as if he did it, got there, all on his own.

Same Family, Different POVs

My brother, 5 years older, often shares more detailed memories. And he supplements with online research. I don’t delve that deep and sometimes disagree when I have specific physical memories of times and places. But I don’t push my points. Memories are frangible and as personal as our own skins. To paraphrase Anais Nin, we don’t see the world as it is; we see it as we are. And of course, gender makes a big difference. He could be batboy, going into clubhouses and dugouts, and traveling along on road trips, while our two sisters and I could not. Downside for him were disillusioning moments like seeing a former major leaguer, whose baseball card he owned, selling signals to the other team. I, lifelong observer, listener, story collector and teller, have my own tales around places like the spring-training “family barracks,” where we’d spend Easter weeks. Off the field, but only semi-domesticated: we’d overhear voices-raised, late night, drunken gatherings in the “Bird’s Nest” lounge—telling stories, arguing fine points, rating and ranking players to keep or cut and send home. Not sure whether I heard or just became aware that a physical fight broke out one night. Think a gossipy aging boy’s club, of mostly heavy drinkers, who though past their primes, remained highly physical. And they never thought to tone it down “in front of the kids.” Think more like unfiltered, uncensored, “take the kids to work” days.

Mythology

Children accept and accommodate as given what we’re born into. My siblings and I knew too much to ever succumb to “field of dreams” fan nostalgia. But for those less steeped in the realities, baseball can lend itself to legend-making and mythologizing, and a kind of boyish hero worship, especially among those who never played for a living. Think the “equipment-manager-nerd” model, guys who could never make the team but wanted to hang around those who did. Back to the dustjacket, which features a blurb/quote from superfan intellectual/commentator George Will: “Baseball books don’t get any better than this.” Oh, really?! I can think of two “right off the bat.” Roger Kahn’s masterful Boys of Summer (Harper Collins. 1972) traced the arc of the careers of the Brooklyn Dodgers team of the watershed seasons when Jackie Robinson broke the color line, and then what came after, finding their ways into regular life as their bodies aged. The title, which Kahn fought publishers to keep, is from a Dylan Thomas poem: “I see the boys of summer in their ruin.” Happens to even the best. More controversially, think Jim Bouton’s Ball Four (MacMillan. 1970), which chronicled his own desperate deterioration, a pitcher with a failing arm, trying to hang on, even as he lifted the veil on what goes on in dugouts and clubhouses.

Alternate Truths

Of course, organized baseball has never needed any help embellishing and protecting its own legend. Bowie Kuhn, then Commissioner of Baseball, tried to force Bouton to sign a statement that his book was all a lie, made up. But the author refused, because it was neither. And like that, he was essentially thrown out of baseball. This is in line with the silly whopper about Gen. Abner Doubleday “inventing” the game during the Civil War. “America’s pastime” had to have patriotic American origins rooted in that rupture in national history, right? There was even a commission set up to fabricate the myth: very George Washington not telling a like after chopping down the cherry tree. In fact, it was most likely a development on the English game of rounders. Further embroidering led to locating the Baseball Hall of Fame in Doubleday’s hometown, tiny Cooperstown, NY. Telling that, for years, sports writers did the electing. When Kahn broke out in praise, one of the old-timers told him not to talk like a sportswriter. Now, there’s a veterans’ committee it’s presumed adds a more realistic perspective to the voting.

Questions of Luck and Timing

So, two careers intersected yet differed. Both men played in the minor leagues, but didn’t make the majors. Both were short: Earl reportedly around 5 foot 7, our dad around 5 foot 8. So, could there have been a bit of Napoleon complex? Both were known for arguing with umpires. It wasn’t unusual to see our dad thrown out of games. He was 15 years older; a country boy, a quintessential “baseball man” purist, almost Victorian in his feelings and attitudes toward “the game.” He had a gift for bringing young players along focusing on the future and specialized in fixing teams in trouble—mustering failing and flailing players to stumble through and finish the season, replacing managers who had flamed out. He is not in the Baseball Hall of Fame. Earl was, as the book’s subtitle indicates, a newer model, a scrappy, opportunistic, crafty, urban street-kid, with a low-level Mafiosi connection who introduced him early to gambling and games of chance. That apparently started his insight into the odds of the game. He favored veteran and proven players, focused on what they could do now rather than the future. Crucially, these factors converged with a whole lot more luck. Without that combination, there would be no book, and I would not be writing this piece. That combination put him in the Baseball Hall of Fame, as a manager.

What Else Bothers Me About This Book

No surprise that “the winner” gets the press and the book. But I note signs of minimal, slipshod, research. How could Miller omit Pee Wee Reese and Honus Wagner from his list of great shortstops when he praised Earl’s putting Cal Ripken, Jr. in that position? Except for Cal, Sr., Bootnose, and our dad, the other guys don’t even rate a mention. And there are factual errors regarding our father. Miller writes that he and Earl were “buddies,” when in our family we know for a fact he did not like Earl but had to work with him. The mention of our dad is contained in a throwaway line, apparently lifted from an anecdote told by Orioles pitcher Jim Palmer. His love-hate relationship with Earl does make the book. But including our dad is pointless to the progress of the narrative, so, why even bother to put it in? Miller also writes that Earl ran the Thomasville spring training camp, when in fact our dad did, and everyone knew it. And, though Miller reportedly conducted multiple background interviews, he failed to root the narrative in informants’ words and voices. Kahn, on the other hand, included portions of his conversations with the retired players, who spoke of having balls thrown at their heads for daring to play beside Robinson. And Bouton wrote, in journal form, of still looking and feeling like he was in his late 20s, while his arm (the pitcher’s asset and obsession) felt like it was 100. Miller does say Earl had demons, and you wouldn’t want him to “date your daughter.” But then he offers no evidence, mostly includes positive comments. A theory: biographers spend a whole lot of time on and with their subjects and thus come to either come to love or hate them. And it seems Miller had decided to like Earl or at least tow the official “party line” and avoid telling darker aspects of the story.

Flamboyance, Luck and Helping Hands

Roger Angell of the New Yorker called Earl the “best naked interview.” That loose-cannon sense made good copy for the generally non-physical men who wrote about sports and admired or felt intimidated by the men they covered. And then there’s the intangible element of luck. And this shows up in winning statistics and is recognized. But rising up the ranks is seldom an accident. Earl had the extra advantage of a sponsor in Harry Dalton, Farm Director and later GM of the Orioles, who noticed him early and brought him along. As I trace Earl’s progress/his rise through the minors, I note it appears our dad was often used to fill spaces he did not/had vacated. Dad was even pulled off a team that went on to win the league pennant to fix another. Couldn’t they at least have given him that? But such considerations did not fit the corporate business model and mindset.

Alcohol and Gambling

Baseball is a wickedly difficult game, a team sport based on individual skills that must mesh on the field. Players compete to win their places and then to hold onto them as they age. My brother and I agree they’ll use whatever they can to gain an edge. Witness the steroid scandal of the 1980s to around 2000 and batting records with asterisks. Managing is an even tougher job, blamed for losses but discounted when the team wins—talent could have done without. Enough to “drive to drink” men so inclined? And in my experience, many were. Miller quoted Bill James, baseball-guide maven, finding that 18 of the 25 top-ranked managers were alcoholics. Have to wonder if the other 7 were just better at covering up or had other vices. Growing up, though we only “visited” springs and summers, baseball and alcohol were intertwined constants, a fact of life we took for granted. Yet I still wonder how James arrived at that number. Did he ask, conduct a survey? More likely, he relied on always floating rumors and gossip. Palmer described Earl often falling-down drunk in the clubhouse after games. Some clubhouses, my brother tells me, even stocked beer. Pete Rose didn’t drink or drug, or so we’re told, but he bet on his own team. Baseball has a special horror of gambling, going back to the Black Sox Scandal and the throwing of the 1919 World Series. And so, Rose’s offense got him banned for life, no chance to make the Hall of Fame. As far as we know, Earl didn’t bet on his own teams, but we know that he played golf for money against his own minor league players. And resentful players on one team held back, almost throwing him into his first losing season. And again, our dad was called on to fix the problem. Not that he wanted to. Our sister recalled him dodging the calls. But eventually he gave in and put a stop to intra-team gambling. And after that, the team started winning again.

Karma?

A little research shows the Orioles, during their “golden age” (1966 to 1983), won three World Series and six American League pennants. In recent years, they have become a 2nd tier club at best. In a small market, they no longer invest in building their own stars or buying them. Earl won only a single World Series. Harry Dalton, later named “Baseball Man of the Year,” went on to be General Manager of the LA Angels and then the Milwaukee Brewers. But, as my brother notes, he never did as well in either post. And he too only won that single World Series. Can we attribute that to karma or the lack of the cadre of exceptional baseball men who created the systems that made the magic work?

Unparalleled at the End

Our father died just before he would have turned 51. The Orioles swept the World Series in four straight games that year. I view that as a testament to his years of work. Not another win for Earl, who was not managing the team yet. He died at 63. Notice, both went quite young: men who depended on their bodies, yet did not take good care of them. Think the alcohol, the stress. Earl died on the Original Baltimore Orioles Baseball Cruise, another profit-center chance to attract avid fans eager to hang out with their heroes/stars. But then he went and shuffled off before the fans could get their money’s worth. After Dad’s death, my brother had calls from many of his former players, who said they loved him. Some viewed him as like a second father. I doubt anything like that happened with Earl. A text from my brother: “Earl was a baseball innovator…wildly successful…. Many of his former players hated him but recognized his value in baseball.” My brother added that he had known similar people in business. Of course, love doesn’t win ball games. But a friend reminded me that, despite the saying, winning is not always the most important thing when you balance it with the rest of life. But I doubt either of these men knew how to find such a balance.