Baseball and writing.  It’s been said baseball is the most written about sport.  Baseball has a long, rich history.  Do yourself a favor.  Find a book about America’s pastime and learn more about the sport you love!

The New York Mets colors are orange and blue.  Do you know why?  When New York City lost the Giants and the Dodgers to the West Coast, MLB awarded NYC a new team.  The Mets put Brooklyn Dodger blue and New York Giant orange into their uniform to honor the past.  Sure, you can Google these facts, but it’s quite satisfying to discover a fact by delving into a book.

In a semi-occasional series, I will be reviewing my favorite baseball books on the Bullpen By Committee blog site.  Here is one book about a former New York Met that is enjoyable and heck, I even learned something new.

Title/Author:  Wherever I Wind Up: My Quest for Truth, Authenticity and the Perfect Knuckleball, R.A. Dickey with Wayne Coffey

Rating:  3 ½ out of 4 Bases (Solid Triple – Very Good)

Review:

R.A. Dickey is a geek athlete.  His book “Wherever I Wind Up” with Wayne Coffey is proof of that.  I use the term “geek athlete” as a compliment of the highest order.  I believe that some athletes that write books have a bit of nerdiness to them and Dickey is decidedly one.  How many professional ballplayers have a B.A. in English Lit and know who William Faulkner is?  In the book, the writers present Dickey as a smart, thoughtful person who also happens to be a ballplayer.  In the foreword of the book, Dickey writes that he has a fantastic memory and it is in evidence several times in this tome.

Dickey was a former first round can’t-miss prospect for the Texas Rangers back in 1996 who was offered a $810,000 signing bonus.  During his initial physical, team doctors found that Dickey had no ulnar collateral ligament in his right arm.  The Rangers could not deal with his new-found freakiness, so his signing bonus was immediately withdrawn.  After a long battle back to the big leagues, Dickey promptly served up 6 HRs in 3 innings in his first game back and set a major league record in the process.  Subsequently, Dickey burned out in his first shot at the majors.  Thus, began Dickey’s geek athlete journey.

During one minor league stop on his Odysseian tour, Dickey tests positive for an opiate. It turns out that he ate a poppy-seed chicken casserole made the night before by his chaplain’s wife. It’s kind of dorky, right?  A few years later, he attempts to swim across the Missouri River while his teammates watch, but chickens out mid-swim and has to swim back.  The geek factor is definitely high here!  He also talks about biking to the ballpark and liking Star Wars.  Welcome to the Geek Athlete Club Mr. Dickey, would you like to be our president?

R.A eventually pulls his geekiest move yet in an attempt to save his baseball career – he learns how to throw a knuckleball.  For those of you who might not know, the knuckleball is the most difficult and nerdiest pitch to throw.  It’s a hard pitch to throw and not easy to hit or catch either.  Dickey eventually masters the pitch, makes it to the big leagues and stays there!  He ends up becoming one of the top NL pitchers in 2012.

This was an excellent book!  After all, it was written by a geek athlete.  As a similarly frustrated athlete in my younger years, I very much identified with struggling with a sport.  I would recommend the book to any baseball fan, geek and non-geek alike.

Style:  Book has a good flow and writing often reads like listening to a conversation.

Stats:  Since we are sabermetrically-minded here at Bullpen By Committee, I have provided a link to RA Dickey’s career stat line:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/d/dicker.01-pitch.shtml

URLs to find Book:

Amazon

Barnes and Noble