Game time A baseball companion

Review by Booklist Review

There is a lovely rhythm to these pieces, which are divided into "Spring," "Summer," and "Fall," depending on the time in the baseball year in which each is set (spring training, the regular season, the World Series). Half of the essays have not previously appeared in book form, and a few are new, brief as a one-two-three inning. Angell's prose is by turn courtly or sly, luscious or puckish, the occasional innocent pun or wicked metaphor causing one to choke on one's beer. What better thing to read in the ice and snow of a baseball-deprived winter than this sterling collection, which gathers pieces from 1962 to 2002. There's Joe Torre at third base for the Mets in 1975; here's a crystalline character study of pitcher Bob Gibson. A throwaway, you-are-there moment brings Bobby Bonds before us in high relief, readying us to meet his son Barry some pages hence. A long piece on Tim McCarver is both appreciation and analysis; a short, ribald Ted Williams story is worth the price of admission. Other highlights include Angell's incandescent report of the 1996 championship Yankees, "One for the Good Guys," and an account of the author's boyhood baseball memories, "Early Innings," which is both muscular and oddly touching. Now in his eighties, Angell distilled a lifetime of baseball observation into his brilliant book on David Cone, A Pitcher's Story (2001); this compilation reminds us again that he is our best writer on baseball and one of our best writers, period. --GraceAnne A. DeCandido

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Baseball, a linear game with undulating peaks and valleys, has always attracted more writers than other sports, and of those many writers few have captured the essence of the game better than Angell. This collection of new and previously published writings edited by sports writer Kettmann is a testament to Angell's unquestioned writing skills and love of the game. Chronicling unlikely people and places-a pitcher uneasy in his retirement, a struggling former star, Fenway Park from the bowels of the right-field grandstand, the faceless scout-Angell often eschews the stories in the glare of the spotlight to examine the core values of the national pastime. Like a switch hitter, he deftly commands poetic descriptions (describing Dan Quisenberry's delivery: "a swallowlike, harmless-looking thing that rose abruptly... then changed its mind") and insightful analysis (on records being broken: "this erosion of the game's most famous fixed numbers... makes baseball statistics seem alive and urgent") to create essays that rise and fall like the very action on the field. Unlike many baseball writers who remember watching the likes of Lou Gehrig play at the Polo Grounds, Angell is able to convey his love for the game of yesteryear while still appreciating the stars, achievements and intricacies of the modern game. He manages all of this by not hiding his passion for the sport under the guise of journalistic detachment. On the contrary, he wears his heart on his sleeve, rooting his way through this collection of poignant and personal slices of Americana. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

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Review by Library Journal Review

Instead of wonderfully summing up the previous five seasons, as Angell collections traditionally do, this one ranges over his entire sports journalism career-from spring 1962, the debut year for the comically bad New York Mets, to fall 2002, the championship year for the long deprived Anaheim Angels. The characters profiled in between include Pete Rose, Pedro Martinez, and two slugging Giant outfielders, Barry Bonds and his godfather Willie Mays. With an introduction by Richard Ford. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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SPRINGThe Old Folks Behind Home1962This winter, a local mortician named Willie Robarts sent Sarasota residents and visitors a mailing of cards printed with his name and with the schedule of baseball games to be played here by the Chicago White Sox, who conduct their spring training in Payne Park, right in the middle of town. This must be interpreted as a pure public service, rather than as an attempt to accelerate business by the exposure of senior citizens (or "senior Americans," as they are sometimes called here) to unbearable excitement; only last night I was informed that a Sarasota heart specialist has ordered one of his patients to attend every Sox game as a therapeutic measure. Big-league ball on the west coast of Florida is a spring sport played by the young for the divertissement of the elderly-a sun-warmed, sleepy exhibition celebrating the juvenescence of the year and the senescence of the fans. Although Florida newspapers print the standings of the clubs in the Grapefruit League every day, none of the teams tries especially hard to win; managers are looking hopefully at their rookies and anxiously at their veteran stars, and by the seventh or eighth inning, no matter what the score, most of the regulars are back in the hotel or driving out to join their families on the beach, their places taken by youngsters up from the minors. The spectators accept this without complaint. Their loyalty to the home club is gentle and unquestioning, and their afternoon pleasure appears scarcely affected by victory or defeat. If this attachment were deeper or more emotional, there would have been widespread distress here three years ago when the Boston Red Sox, who had trained in Sarasota for many years, transferred their spring camp to Scottsdale, Arizona, and the White Sox moved down from Tampa, but the adjustment to the new stocking color, by all accounts, was without trauma. The Beach Club Bar, out on Siesta Key, still displays photographs of Bobby Doerr and Dom DiMaggio and other members of the fine Red Sox teams of the forties, and at the ballpark I spotted a boy of ten or twelve wearing a faded junior-size Red Sox uniform (almost surely a hand-me-down from an older brother), but these are the only evidences of disaffection and memory, and the old gentlemen filing into the park before the game now wear baseball caps with the White Sox insigne above the bill.Caps are the preferred millinery for both male and female fans in Payne Park-baseball caps, long-billed fishing caps, perforated summer-weights, yachting caps with crossed anchors, old-fashioned John D. Rockefeller linen jobs. Beneath them are country faces-of retired farmers and small-town storekeepers, perhaps, and dignified ladies now doing their cooking in trailers-wearing rimless spectacles and snap-on dark glasses. This afternoon, Payne Park's sixteen-row grandstand behind home plate had filled up well before game time (the Dodgers, always a good draw, were here today), and fans o Excerpted from Game Time: A Baseball Companion by Roger Angell All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

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