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Wrecking Crew: The Really Bad News Griffith Park Pirates
An award-winning journalist and co-founder of the cross-dressing band Christian Death documents the transformation of a drug-abusing, motley group of musicians, screenwriters, and wannabe actors into a competitive baseball team, an endeavor that enabled unexpected benefits. 15,000 first printing.
- GenresNonfictionMusic
288 pages, Hardcover
First published August 9, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
September 25, 2007
By John Albert, founding member of Christian Death and sometime drummer for Bad Religion.
Look, this isn't a piece of great literature. For example, the chapters (about 5 pages per chapter) have quirky titles like a book you might have read in 4th grade. Before you read this book, ask yourself: do you like...
baseball?
punk rock?
LA/SFV?
If yes, then by all means, read this book! It's a quick read, and an interesting true story about a bunch of former junkies and punk rockers who start an amateur baseball team. You know, "lovable misfits band together to stand up to Aryan-nation badasses and learn something about themselves in the process."
Just after the release of the book, I went with a friend to see Albert give a reading. It was in a church basement in Los Feliz. They had brownies and punch, which was pretty alright. So he gets up and reads a few pages, about one of his friends on the team who relapsed after a long period of non-use and overdosed. They discovered him in a coma and rush him to the hospital, where he's finally resusitated although he loses the use of his legs. There's actually this really gnarly part where he talks about how they tried to amputate his leg, but it wouldn't stop bleeding, so they just say "fuck it" and leave it on. So after he finishes reading, he goes, "Well, I'm sort of new to this, so, uh, I'd like to call up one of my friends to talk about the process of writing the book and everything." And, no shit, it's this guy -- the overdose guy -- and he hobbles up there on his crutches, you can plainly see he still has legs, but they're atrophied. They talked about the book, about how it feels to have your darkest moment rolled out in writing for the world to see. And then they talked about baseball, how all the great pitching in the world can't do shit for you if you don't reliably knock in a few runs every game, fucking Dodgers...
Look, this isn't a piece of great literature. For example, the chapters (about 5 pages per chapter) have quirky titles like a book you might have read in 4th grade. Before you read this book, ask yourself: do you like...
baseball?
punk rock?
LA/SFV?
If yes, then by all means, read this book! It's a quick read, and an interesting true story about a bunch of former junkies and punk rockers who start an amateur baseball team. You know, "lovable misfits band together to stand up to Aryan-nation badasses and learn something about themselves in the process."
Just after the release of the book, I went with a friend to see Albert give a reading. It was in a church basement in Los Feliz. They had brownies and punch, which was pretty alright. So he gets up and reads a few pages, about one of his friends on the team who relapsed after a long period of non-use and overdosed. They discovered him in a coma and rush him to the hospital, where he's finally resusitated although he loses the use of his legs. There's actually this really gnarly part where he talks about how they tried to amputate his leg, but it wouldn't stop bleeding, so they just say "fuck it" and leave it on. So after he finishes reading, he goes, "Well, I'm sort of new to this, so, uh, I'd like to call up one of my friends to talk about the process of writing the book and everything." And, no shit, it's this guy -- the overdose guy -- and he hobbles up there on his crutches, you can plainly see he still has legs, but they're atrophied. They talked about the book, about how it feels to have your darkest moment rolled out in writing for the world to see. And then they talked about baseball, how all the great pitching in the world can't do shit for you if you don't reliably knock in a few runs every game, fucking Dodgers...
August 31, 2010
This is one of my all-time favorite books. I read it over and over. I kind of feel as if it's a security blanket. I take it with me when I'm going places where I feel nervous. See? I'm a bit crazy. I admit it.
April 3, 2021
Although the book gets a little repetitive about 2/3 of the way through with yet another drug-addict, porn-addict, stripper anecdote, for the most part it's a fun romp through a life that's unimaginable for most of us. I haven't had one night in my life that seems to be a typical Friday night for the guys in this book. It's hard to keep all the guys straight in your mind, as their addictions blur together, but in the end it doesn't matter. While each has his own demons, they're similar enough that you get whole picture.
The story is a memoir by John Albert about how a friend of his suggested that they start a men's league baseball team in Los Angeles in the late 1990s. Since John and his friend were recovering drug addicts, former punk rock band players, and small-time criminals, that's who they knew from their rehabs and socializing, and that's who made up most of the team. Predictably, the story is a tale of how baseball is a form of redemption -- the beautiful green field, the feel of a ball hit just right, the joy of a victory, the camaraderie of the guys. But it's also a reality check, since baseball doesn't solve anyone's underlying problems. This author doesn't think he has all the answers.
The book is about 1/3 baseball and 2/3 drug and sex anecdotes. Both are told with a crispness that Albert learned from his work writing feature articles for music and culture magazines. He's really good at not letting a story go on too long and not ruining a story (most of the time) with a cute closing sentence. The anecdotes are hilarious, but also creepy; certainly not politically correct then and especially now. Example, a friend of his pretending to rape the mascot of a minor baseball team, which led to fans throwing objects at them, and Albert and his crew hustling out of the stadium. Or the description of one guy, Johnny, and his first time with a prostitute, who he then falls in love with and then has a boyfriend-girlfriend relationship with for a while. Or Albert's next-door neighbor's exploding toe, clearly a sign of the diabetes that would kill him a year later.
The baseball anecdotes are more anodyne. Albert had only played as a kid, so he writes about how bad he was. A few of his teammates were more experienced, including a Masahiro, a Japanese guy who came to Hollywood to become an actor and had played ball in college in Japan. Albert writes about their greater skills on the field briskly, and he quotes several of them on what it meant to, for example, pitch and get batters out.
As noted above, off the field this book is not sweetness and light. People have serious drug problems, and they relapse many times. People are taken to hospitals with heroin and cocaine overdoses. They lose tens of thousands of dollars gambling. They stagger around until dawn, sleep in their cars. They had each tried to make it as actors or musicians, and with one or two exceptions never had more than middling success. But they were hanging on in Los Angeles in their 30s and 40s, doing menial jobs on movie sets, landscaping, or writing bad scripts for bad movies. Everyone was living in crappy rental rooms in seedy parts of town.
The women are little more than foils. They are strippers and porn actresses. For the two who get the most coverage (figuratively, not literally), both of whom are girlfriends of one of the baseball players, the author holds conversations and interviews about what they were thinking and doing. I imagine he thinks he's giving them dignity by portraying them as much smarter and more in control of their lives than one would assume. This is one of the bigger cliches I've ever read about strippers, and I have no idea if it's true in this book or in any other circumstance. Most of the women don't have names or speak; they are just pretty blondes, strippers, etc. One is a fat chick, described by the author as a "manatee," who he runs away from when she wants to have sex with him.
Even though this book is short, by the end I'd tired of it. One masturbation reference after another, one more exotic sexual activity. One more drug relapse, and one more night at a strip club.
And the quotes are too perfect. Albert relates scores of conversations with actual quotes. It's doubtful he was taking notes when the ones he had were occurring, and even though he says he'd been sober for something like 5 years when the incidents in the book started, there's no way he could remember the conversations exactly. And for the other conversations, well, he wasn't even there. I give him credit for interviewing people about what happened when he wasn't there -- when a person overdosed, and how he/she was found and revived, and what happened in rehab or the hospital -- but it still comes out as too perfectly manicured.
Despite my reservations at the end, I enjoyed this book immensely. I didn't suffer from the alienation that led the author and so many others to take the dangerous, out-of-society path that he describes. I can see the attraction of it, in a sense. It's exciting. It's transgressive. There's lots of fun sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll. And at the same time, the author is aware that it comes from a place of sadness and leads down a longer path of sadness and loneliness -- and he says so at various times. He does a good job of glamorizing the freedom of that life and also of showing what happens when you realize it's tapped you out. For him and his friends, baseball is their link to a cleaner, simpler existence that has passed them by in many ways.
The story is a memoir by John Albert about how a friend of his suggested that they start a men's league baseball team in Los Angeles in the late 1990s. Since John and his friend were recovering drug addicts, former punk rock band players, and small-time criminals, that's who they knew from their rehabs and socializing, and that's who made up most of the team. Predictably, the story is a tale of how baseball is a form of redemption -- the beautiful green field, the feel of a ball hit just right, the joy of a victory, the camaraderie of the guys. But it's also a reality check, since baseball doesn't solve anyone's underlying problems. This author doesn't think he has all the answers.
The book is about 1/3 baseball and 2/3 drug and sex anecdotes. Both are told with a crispness that Albert learned from his work writing feature articles for music and culture magazines. He's really good at not letting a story go on too long and not ruining a story (most of the time) with a cute closing sentence. The anecdotes are hilarious, but also creepy; certainly not politically correct then and especially now. Example, a friend of his pretending to rape the mascot of a minor baseball team, which led to fans throwing objects at them, and Albert and his crew hustling out of the stadium. Or the description of one guy, Johnny, and his first time with a prostitute, who he then falls in love with and then has a boyfriend-girlfriend relationship with for a while. Or Albert's next-door neighbor's exploding toe, clearly a sign of the diabetes that would kill him a year later.
The baseball anecdotes are more anodyne. Albert had only played as a kid, so he writes about how bad he was. A few of his teammates were more experienced, including a Masahiro, a Japanese guy who came to Hollywood to become an actor and had played ball in college in Japan. Albert writes about their greater skills on the field briskly, and he quotes several of them on what it meant to, for example, pitch and get batters out.
As noted above, off the field this book is not sweetness and light. People have serious drug problems, and they relapse many times. People are taken to hospitals with heroin and cocaine overdoses. They lose tens of thousands of dollars gambling. They stagger around until dawn, sleep in their cars. They had each tried to make it as actors or musicians, and with one or two exceptions never had more than middling success. But they were hanging on in Los Angeles in their 30s and 40s, doing menial jobs on movie sets, landscaping, or writing bad scripts for bad movies. Everyone was living in crappy rental rooms in seedy parts of town.
The women are little more than foils. They are strippers and porn actresses. For the two who get the most coverage (figuratively, not literally), both of whom are girlfriends of one of the baseball players, the author holds conversations and interviews about what they were thinking and doing. I imagine he thinks he's giving them dignity by portraying them as much smarter and more in control of their lives than one would assume. This is one of the bigger cliches I've ever read about strippers, and I have no idea if it's true in this book or in any other circumstance. Most of the women don't have names or speak; they are just pretty blondes, strippers, etc. One is a fat chick, described by the author as a "manatee," who he runs away from when she wants to have sex with him.
Even though this book is short, by the end I'd tired of it. One masturbation reference after another, one more exotic sexual activity. One more drug relapse, and one more night at a strip club.
And the quotes are too perfect. Albert relates scores of conversations with actual quotes. It's doubtful he was taking notes when the ones he had were occurring, and even though he says he'd been sober for something like 5 years when the incidents in the book started, there's no way he could remember the conversations exactly. And for the other conversations, well, he wasn't even there. I give him credit for interviewing people about what happened when he wasn't there -- when a person overdosed, and how he/she was found and revived, and what happened in rehab or the hospital -- but it still comes out as too perfectly manicured.
Despite my reservations at the end, I enjoyed this book immensely. I didn't suffer from the alienation that led the author and so many others to take the dangerous, out-of-society path that he describes. I can see the attraction of it, in a sense. It's exciting. It's transgressive. There's lots of fun sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll. And at the same time, the author is aware that it comes from a place of sadness and leads down a longer path of sadness and loneliness -- and he says so at various times. He does a good job of glamorizing the freedom of that life and also of showing what happens when you realize it's tapped you out. For him and his friends, baseball is their link to a cleaner, simpler existence that has passed them by in many ways.
August 12, 2018
See Matt Evan's review.
Wrecked Crew. Nominally about baseball in and around Griffith Park, but more about people who live off their parents money and die from overdoses. It's heartbreaking, tears families apart. WAY more than I ever cared about on the subject of addiction, people struggling to recover, and failing. Will we ever get a handle on it? What about the Native Americans who can't handle alcohol at all? If / when they find the "addiction gene" and fix it, we'll all be SO better off.
Wrecked Crew. Nominally about baseball in and around Griffith Park, but more about people who live off their parents money and die from overdoses. It's heartbreaking, tears families apart. WAY more than I ever cared about on the subject of addiction, people struggling to recover, and failing. Will we ever get a handle on it? What about the Native Americans who can't handle alcohol at all? If / when they find the "addiction gene" and fix it, we'll all be SO better off.
June 28, 2009
My favorite excerpt:
Sports are rarely just a game. At their best, they are stories of triumph, failure, and transcendence. None of us could ever change the mistakes we'd made, but in some small way, it felt as though we were now being afforded an opportunity to become what none of us had ever really been before: winners.
Sports are rarely just a game. At their best, they are stories of triumph, failure, and transcendence. None of us could ever change the mistakes we'd made, but in some small way, it felt as though we were now being afforded an opportunity to become what none of us had ever really been before: winners.
June 24, 2024
Rather disjointed bunch of vignettes with not much of a take away. For instance: What's the point of telling us about how some guy had a couple bad relationships with sex workers, so he doesn't date anymore at all? My main take away is "heroin is bad", which I kind of already knew. I personally would feel very strange sharing other people's struggles and highly personal anecdotes when I don't actually have any meaningful thing to conclude from them. If the story was all about John Albert's own struggles, it would make more sense, but he's a minor character in his own book. He goes into excruciating detail about Johnny Nevarro's relationships, but breaks up with nameless girlfriends between chapters himself.This is a book of someone writing all the gossip that was confided in them over the years, just presumably with the permission of those it is about. I didn't hate it- but I question why it exists.
August 28, 2023
I enjoyed the article in LA Weekly so I was curious to see how the expanded story would play out. Plenty of back stories about the team members. I still find it hard to accept that Lifter singer and songwriter Mike Coulter shattered his arm in practice throwing from second to third base. So much pain and trouble from throwing a ball. The details about drug use/abuse by team members erase any glamour associated with the rock and roll junkie lifestyle. The team's practices and games seem to have been the brightest part of living for many of these men. Well written, but too bleak to recommend to readers with no particular interest in the LA club scene of the eighties.
January 18, 2010
http://archive.boulderweekly.com/0811...
This review originally appeared in the BOULDER WEEKLY
Punks in the outfield
by Vince Darcangelo
I don't recall how the final out was made, whether it was a ground ball or a pop fly. What I do remember is that when the game was over we were undefeated. We danced around the pitcher's mound and tossed our gloves in the air as Sister Sledge's "We Are Family" blasted from my dad's tinny cassette player in the dugout. It was 1980, and the pint-sized T-ball Pirates were champions, just like our namesake in Pittsburgh the year before (when Sister Sledge's disco hit was the team's theme song).
I didn't realize then that at 8 years old I had just experienced the pinnacle of my athletic career. In the following years I would have occasional moments of mediocrity, sometimes display elevated flashes of competence, but for the most part I was relegated to a career of bench-warming and "Team Spirit" awards after that first glorious season.
Not since those halcyon days of T-ball glory have I been a baseball fan. After my prepubescent affection for baseball passed, it gave way to a newfound interest in girls, intoxicants and loud music.
It is in this space—the intersection of baseball and decadence—where author John Albert makes his first appearance on the literary landscape.
Albert's stellar debut is Wrecking Crew, a memoir filled with comedy, tragedy, triumph, healthy doses of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll—and amateur baseball. Hitting the shelves on Aug. 16, it is the story of the Griffith Park Pirates, a team of former musicians, junkies and assorted misfits and miscreants, who came together on a baseball diamond in Los Angeles and traded in their addictions for America's pastime.
Eventually the team won a league championship, but that first season the Griffith Park Pirates had more tattoos than RBIs.
"At the end of the day, it's about joking around in the dugout and playing," says Albert. "I mean, it's better to win than to lose, for sure, but we're OK with it."
For Albert, the road from hardcore to hardball was long and perilous, with its origins in Los Angeles' early-'80s punk scene. While still a teenager, Albert co-founded the seminal hardcore group Christian Death, which propelled him into a world of hard drugs and dangerous behavior. Albert later joined legendary punk band Bad Religion before going into rehab in 1985. The road to recovery was long, and after years of battling with his demons, Albert realized he was also fighting the aging process and its accompanying identity issues for a would-be rock star.
"If you don't become incredibly rich and famous, and you don't die, you just end up 40 years old at a nightclub with a bunch of young kids," says Albert. "Once you grow older, you become more invisible, and you have less of a place. I think that's what a lot of us were trying to figure out. We were living like teenagers, but we weren't teenagers. I just think that what was romantic and glamorous in your 20s is kind of sad in your mid-30s."
But Wrecking Crew is not another gratuitous, self-serving jaunt into glorified drug use and self-centered awakenings. Addiction bats cleanup in this lineup, and Albert's portrayal is as accurate a depiction as you'll find outside of clinical journals. He doesn't attempt to shock with grisly heroin chic, nor does he offer a tidy ending with an appropriate ratio of heroes and martyrs. Having lived with addiction, he presents recovery in its true form: as a process, not an event.
"You definitely wouldn't be able to say that everyone lived happily ever after," says Albert. "People are still periodically destroying their lives and getting them back together."
For Albert, his life has come together in unexpected ways. After playing with the Pirates for a few seasons, Albert submitted a two-paragraph write-up on the team to the L.A. Weekly. The paper asked him to turn it into a feature story, which ultimately won the Best of the West Journalism Best Sports Writing award. Albert is now a regular contributor to the newspaper, along with other magazines.
Though new to the writing game, Albert is able to avoid many of the rookie errors that can tank debut outings, particularly with a book as self-involved as Wrecking Crew. As much a lead character as any of his teammates, Albert could easily have imposed too much of his own backstory into the book. Instead, he reserves his own indulgences for between-inning entertainment rather than the starting lineup. The result is an entertaining book that has been described as the Bad News Bears meet punk rock.
While this description touches on the basics, it leaves out the most significant element of the story: salvation. Wrecking Crew leads off with the line, "You never know what's going to save you." While it may not be a story of clear-cut happy endings and innocence regained, it is a reminder that salvation can be found in unexpected places—and that victory isn't measured by runs, hits and errors, but through smaller triumphs that don't show up in the box score.
The only thing missing from Wrecking Crew is a tinny cassette recording of "We Are Family." For Albert and the Griffith Park Pirates, you'd better make that a remix with the word "dysfunctional" added to the chorus.
This review originally appeared in the BOULDER WEEKLY
Punks in the outfield
by Vince Darcangelo
I don't recall how the final out was made, whether it was a ground ball or a pop fly. What I do remember is that when the game was over we were undefeated. We danced around the pitcher's mound and tossed our gloves in the air as Sister Sledge's "We Are Family" blasted from my dad's tinny cassette player in the dugout. It was 1980, and the pint-sized T-ball Pirates were champions, just like our namesake in Pittsburgh the year before (when Sister Sledge's disco hit was the team's theme song).
I didn't realize then that at 8 years old I had just experienced the pinnacle of my athletic career. In the following years I would have occasional moments of mediocrity, sometimes display elevated flashes of competence, but for the most part I was relegated to a career of bench-warming and "Team Spirit" awards after that first glorious season.
Not since those halcyon days of T-ball glory have I been a baseball fan. After my prepubescent affection for baseball passed, it gave way to a newfound interest in girls, intoxicants and loud music.
It is in this space—the intersection of baseball and decadence—where author John Albert makes his first appearance on the literary landscape.
Albert's stellar debut is Wrecking Crew, a memoir filled with comedy, tragedy, triumph, healthy doses of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll—and amateur baseball. Hitting the shelves on Aug. 16, it is the story of the Griffith Park Pirates, a team of former musicians, junkies and assorted misfits and miscreants, who came together on a baseball diamond in Los Angeles and traded in their addictions for America's pastime.
Eventually the team won a league championship, but that first season the Griffith Park Pirates had more tattoos than RBIs.
"At the end of the day, it's about joking around in the dugout and playing," says Albert. "I mean, it's better to win than to lose, for sure, but we're OK with it."
For Albert, the road from hardcore to hardball was long and perilous, with its origins in Los Angeles' early-'80s punk scene. While still a teenager, Albert co-founded the seminal hardcore group Christian Death, which propelled him into a world of hard drugs and dangerous behavior. Albert later joined legendary punk band Bad Religion before going into rehab in 1985. The road to recovery was long, and after years of battling with his demons, Albert realized he was also fighting the aging process and its accompanying identity issues for a would-be rock star.
"If you don't become incredibly rich and famous, and you don't die, you just end up 40 years old at a nightclub with a bunch of young kids," says Albert. "Once you grow older, you become more invisible, and you have less of a place. I think that's what a lot of us were trying to figure out. We were living like teenagers, but we weren't teenagers. I just think that what was romantic and glamorous in your 20s is kind of sad in your mid-30s."
But Wrecking Crew is not another gratuitous, self-serving jaunt into glorified drug use and self-centered awakenings. Addiction bats cleanup in this lineup, and Albert's portrayal is as accurate a depiction as you'll find outside of clinical journals. He doesn't attempt to shock with grisly heroin chic, nor does he offer a tidy ending with an appropriate ratio of heroes and martyrs. Having lived with addiction, he presents recovery in its true form: as a process, not an event.
"You definitely wouldn't be able to say that everyone lived happily ever after," says Albert. "People are still periodically destroying their lives and getting them back together."
For Albert, his life has come together in unexpected ways. After playing with the Pirates for a few seasons, Albert submitted a two-paragraph write-up on the team to the L.A. Weekly. The paper asked him to turn it into a feature story, which ultimately won the Best of the West Journalism Best Sports Writing award. Albert is now a regular contributor to the newspaper, along with other magazines.
Though new to the writing game, Albert is able to avoid many of the rookie errors that can tank debut outings, particularly with a book as self-involved as Wrecking Crew. As much a lead character as any of his teammates, Albert could easily have imposed too much of his own backstory into the book. Instead, he reserves his own indulgences for between-inning entertainment rather than the starting lineup. The result is an entertaining book that has been described as the Bad News Bears meet punk rock.
While this description touches on the basics, it leaves out the most significant element of the story: salvation. Wrecking Crew leads off with the line, "You never know what's going to save you." While it may not be a story of clear-cut happy endings and innocence regained, it is a reminder that salvation can be found in unexpected places—and that victory isn't measured by runs, hits and errors, but through smaller triumphs that don't show up in the box score.
The only thing missing from Wrecking Crew is a tinny cassette recording of "We Are Family." For Albert and the Griffith Park Pirates, you'd better make that a remix with the word "dysfunctional" added to the chorus.
February 9, 2025
Absolutely captivating. Funny. Profound. If this book wasn’t out of print I would be buying multiple copies for friends, especially those whose musical interests and love of baseball intersect. I am left wondering if this book has been optioned for a film adaptation. Loved it.
June 16, 2023
What a marvel. Somehow Albert made himself a minor character in his own memoir. He has a knack for nailing the last line in the chapter and I feel like his essence really comes through in his wry takes on baseball, punk rock, Hollywood, friendship, life. An underrated chronicle of LA life at the margins as if there's any other way to be. RIP
June 3, 2013
I knew this book would not be in the vein of the several others I have read on the subject of baseball. But just how unconventional it was I had vastly underestimated. Along with the historical retelling of the origins of the team of misfits, recovering addicts, social outcasts, etc., there are many more vignettes and anecdotes (the majority of them colorfully recounted) chronicling the lives of those who would become players on the team over the beginning years. Although the stories in the book often dealt primarily with the time period contemporary to the players and their games during their season(s), the author took several forays into the past of those involved. This provides a brief glimpse, but fairly detailed background, of each of them, introducing (a few too) many peripheral characters in some one of the players' lives and their interaction with them. These stories are told in this way so that we may see how each of the players got involved with the team, and they were nearly always eye-opening, entertaining and, sadly, sometimes too tragic. In some instances the experiences the author writes about do not turn out to be a story of how one of the players overcame a personal tragedy or weakness, but how they succumbed to it. The author is someone who writes with great creative expression, and he knows how to tell a good story - even if it is going to take a tragic turn. He writes painfully honest about his own life and does not use pretense within the pages of the book. I would recommend Wrecking Crew if you're interested in reading tales of recovery from addiction, or have witnessed someone close to you who has.
June 23, 2009
i struggled a bit with what to give this one based on what i was expecting when i started reading it and what i got out of it in the end. for a majority of the book, as john albert tells the tale of a bunch of outsiders, misfits, and drug addicts in LA who form a baseball team, it feels very fragmented.
where i expected there to be some sort of over-arching storyline, something to tie together the baseball and the addicts towards some sort of grand redemptive act, there wasn't one. instead, albert talks about the addicts' lives and talks about them playing baseball.
what i came to realize though was that, especially in real life, there isn't always a happy ending, and not everyone is redeemed in the end. there usually isn't some kind of arc tying everything together, and that's just how life is. instead, what i got from the book was not that somehow through the sport of baseball, these f$%k-ups suddenly had no problems ever again; that they were made better in the end. what they got from the game was a brief respite from their problems, and that's the point, that's the redemption. for the time that they were on the field, these lives, which under ordinary circumstances might not (and don't, as far as we know when the book ends) end happily, but while they're on a field, with their friends, they are happy, or at least, happier, even when they're screaming at the umpire. and sometimes, that's enough.
where i expected there to be some sort of over-arching storyline, something to tie together the baseball and the addicts towards some sort of grand redemptive act, there wasn't one. instead, albert talks about the addicts' lives and talks about them playing baseball.
what i came to realize though was that, especially in real life, there isn't always a happy ending, and not everyone is redeemed in the end. there usually isn't some kind of arc tying everything together, and that's just how life is. instead, what i got from the book was not that somehow through the sport of baseball, these f$%k-ups suddenly had no problems ever again; that they were made better in the end. what they got from the game was a brief respite from their problems, and that's the point, that's the redemption. for the time that they were on the field, these lives, which under ordinary circumstances might not (and don't, as far as we know when the book ends) end happily, but while they're on a field, with their friends, they are happy, or at least, happier, even when they're screaming at the umpire. and sometimes, that's enough.
February 12, 2018
I'll give this book a solid 3 stars. I like the idea of the book. A group of seriously dysfunctional people brought together by the game of baseball. There is something simple and comforting about it. But trying to follow the storylines of 9 different people was a bit exhausting, and there was no real resolution to the story. Just that life goes on and we should try to appreciate and enjoy the small things while we can. A good message, and a solid 3 star book.
July 14, 2008
Druggie and rehab flameouts start playing baseball and connect to life. It's competently written, as memoir, and I learned WAY more about Jane's Addiction's guitarist D. Navarro's personal life than I'd planned on, and to be honest, it (i.e., his life) depressed me.
April 9, 2009
Only nominally about baseball. Mostly about the struggle to find a reason to go on, even after you've made it really hard on yourself. But in a non-sappy, non-judgmental way.
October 6, 2010
You know how a book isn't very good but you still enjoy reading it? That's how I feel about this one.
November 13, 2011
This book ruled - glad I finished it Saturday night or I may have taken time off work to finish it...
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews