Twilight Of The Long-Ball Gods

by Schulian, John

• ISBN13: 9780803293274
• ISBN10: 0803293275
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-05-01
• Publisher: Bison Books

Summary

A report from the true heart of baseball, this anthology leaves behind the bad boys and big names of the major leagues to take readers to the places where the spirit of America's game resides. These are a veteran sportswriter's dispatches from the bush leagues and the sandlot, his tributes to the Negro leaguers, mining-town dreamers, and certifiable eccentrics who give baseball its heart and soul, laughter and tears.John Schulian, a long-time Sports Illustrated contributor and former Chicago Sun-Times sports columnist, puts together a portrait of a disappearing America-a place inhabited by star-crossed Negro Leagues slugger Josh Gibson; by a vagabond player still toiling for the Durham Bulls at thirty-six; by the coach who created the Eskimo Pie League for kids in a Utah copper-mining town. When he does venture into the big leagues, Schulian gives us the underdogs and the human touches, from Bill Veeck peg-legging toward retirement as the game's last maverick team owner, to musings on Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe at Christmas, to Studs Terkel's reflections on baseball. In the end, though, this collection belongs to the kid at a tryout camp, the washed-out semipro following the game on his car radio, the players who were the toasts of outposts from Roswell to Wisconsin Rapids-and to the readers who keep the spirit of the game alive.John Schulian is the author of Writers' Fighters and Other Sweet Scientists, the writing in which has been compared to that of Red Smith and A.J. Liebling. His widely anthologized work has been included in The Best American Sports Writing 1994, ten editions of Best Sports Stories, and Sports Illustrated's Fifty Years of Great Writing.

Author Biography

John Schulian is the author of Writers' Fighters and Other Sweet Scientists, the writing in which has been compared to that of Red Smith and A.J. Liebling. His widely anthologized work has been included in The Best American Sports Writing 1994, ten editions of Best Sports Stories, and Sports Illustrated's Fifty Years of Great Writing.

Table of Contents

Introduction	ix
Of Stars and Angels	1	(16)
Laughing on the Outside	17	(16)
Hit and Run: Wings and Prayers	33	(16)
The Right-hander	35	(4)
Out in the Cold	39	(3)
Fathers and Sons	42	(3)
Baseball without Justice	45	(4)
Hit and Run: Last of His Kind	49	(15)
. . . And Checking It Twice	51	(4)
Prelude to Goodbye	55	(3)
Selling the Sox	58	(3)
To the Bleachers Once More	61	(3)
Twilight of the Long-ball Gods	64	(14)
The Wild, Wild Past	78	(7)
Hit and Run: The Human Factor	85	(29)
Beginner's Luck	87	(4)
The Buddy System	91	(3)
The Big Man Steps Up	94	(3)
A Little House That Built Ruth	97	(4)
Marilyn and Joe	101	(3)
The Clown	104	(4)
Rocky's Road	108	(3)
Last Licks	111	(3)
These Bees Are Bad News	114	(9)
Hit and Run: First Person	123	(14)
Beautiful Dreamers	125	(3)
K48	128	(3)
American Legion Summers	131	(2)
Basil	133	(4)
Hit and Run: Fans' Notes	137	(19)
Hilly and Garvey	139	(3)
Baseball Blues	142	(3)
A Mischievous Eye on Time	145	(3)
Wild Bill	148	(4)
On the Road to Sioux Falls	152	(4)
Morman's Mission	156	(13)
Bailey's Boys	169	(14)
Source Acknowledgments	183