We might as well start in on this author now, because we've got a lot of her books to get through!
Title: Foul Balls
Published: General Paperbacks, 1986 (expanded edition with a chapter about the 1985 Jays)
# pages: 223
Availability: out of print, and indigo.com can't help you, but used copies are plentiful.
Author: Alison Gordon
Who Is: Gordon was the Toronto Star's beat writer covering the Jays
from 1979 through 1983. She then went on to write a quintet of mystery
novels (which we'll get to!), and was, famously, the four-millionth fan
to come through the SkyDome gates in 1991; at the time this was a major
league attendance record. I wonder what she's up to now. I found a blog
comment by Gordon on a book review site circa 2004 that says she's
'living happily ever after', which I'm glad about, but that doesn't
really answer the question.
What It's About: It's about Gordon's experiences covering the
Jays in their early years. But it's important to understand Gordon's
approach here: she's not an analyst. Her interest is in the
*experience* of baseball, sensory, emotional and intellectual. She's
not trying to *figure out* baseball; she's trying to get at *what it's
like*.
Secret Hero: Earl Weaver, whose Orioles beat the snot out of the
Jays regularly during Gordon's tenure with the team, and who always
treated Gordon with professionalism and affection.
How's the Writing? It's good. Gordon's affection for the game
and its people come through in the prose, and she's got a sense of
humour, too. She's able to find something interesting about every
aspect of the game she touches on, and she casts her net widely. She
writes about the off-season, about winter ball, about stadiums, about
the difficulties of being a woman reporter (think about the title of
the book again!), about APBA, about the minor leagues. Man, this book
made me want to learn to play APBA. (Much the same way that the
novelization of E.T. made me want to learn to play Dungeons and
Dragons.) Never did, though...
One of the gaps in Blue Jays literature is an account of the 1983
pennant race, the one in which the Jays contended for the first time
ever, until the bullpen fell apart in August and Tippy Martinez picked
off the side in the tenth, inaugurating the Blow Jays era. Gordon's
account of that period in this book is probably as close as we're ever
going to get.
This is one of the better books ever written about the Jays. I've read
it lots of times and I have no doubt that I'll be returning to it again.
Sabremetric Corner: Gordon uses no more stats than she has to.
Won-lost record, batting average, that's about it. But then, she
doesn't really want anything *from* the stats.
In chapter 6, Gordon outlines the different classifications of baseball
writers. One of them is 'The Number Crunchers'. Gordon calls them "the
spiritual progeny of Bill James [...] and they would quantify all the
joy out of baseball if they could." Her real problems with
sabremetricians are that a) baseball might eventually take them
seriously, and b) they might figure out all of baseball and then
there'd be no point in playing the actual games. She finishes with,
"Let the number crunchers play with their computers. I'd rather go to a
ball game." Oh well; she doesn't get it.
Anecdote: As you might imagine, given her approach, Gordon has a
*lot* of anecdotes. My favourite is probably Tim Johnson's putdown of
Rico Carty: the team's poster that year was of Carty, kneeling on one
knee and leaning on a bat, flashing his famous charming smile. Johnson
put up the poster in the locker room, with the caption, "Here's Rico,
running out a ground ball."
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I think I need some more categories with which to discuss these books, and make these pieces a bit longer. Any suggestions?WW
https://www.battersbox.ca/article.php?story=20080516113642856