On the Run: The Never Dull and Often Shocking Life of Maury Wills

by Maury Wills, Mike Celizic

The baseball hero who stole 104 bases in 1962 chronicles his life and the terrible price he paid for his success--cocaine addiction and a lifelong search for true love

Genres: Baseball, Sports

334 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 1992

Reviews

[Mark Bunch · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed Maury Wills -the ball player. this autobiography was a slow one. I did like the info on Ed Bailey-a Knoxville guy that played MLB in the 1950s and 1960s. I thought the fact he dated Doris Day- pre Civil Rights days cool. In general ok read for the die-hard LA Dodgers fan.

[Jason M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Based on the amount of drugs Maury Wills described taking in this book, it is almost impossible to believe that he lived to his 90th year, leaving us as recently as 2022. Wills' legend as one of the great base stealers of all time, lives on. This book is a somewhat linear but mostly stream-of-consciousness retelling of his life, as filtered through a white sportswriter from New York. I don't wanna pass judgement on what the late West Coast-based Mr. Wills' politics might have been, or speculate how much of the book Wills himself wrote, but the book goes out of its way to criticize Black players who refused to be treated like children (Alex Johnson, Dick Allen) or those who worked hard to help him get clean (Don Newcombe), while hero-worshipping Richard Nixon and Fred Claire. Wills also lashes out at how the media treated him during his disastrous tenure as Seattle Mariners manager (career record 26-56) and blames others for his first failed attempt at inpatient rehab. A *tremendously* entertaining read, but not always for the reasons the authors seem to think. Wills is feisty and drops tons of salacious details along the way. Fun read but also at times one wishes for Wills to take some responsibility, any responsibility, for his legion of mistakes...

[Michael Walker · Rating 2 out of 5]

First, a confession: I was a Dodgers fan as a kid, and saw Maury play in many exciting games, and years later I spotted him in the stands at Dodger Stadium, sitting by himself. I hastily bought a baseball ($5) and asked him for his autograph, which he gave me. Then we chit-chatted about his career: I, fumbling for words; he, remaining gracious throughout my conversation with one of my childhood heroes. I was giddy, as you can imagine.

Wills was a charismatic baseball player whose daring style of play excited whole stadiums of fans in the sixties. His pers.ona life, though, was a mess, and he doesn't exactly hide these excesses in this gossipy bio. Personally, his storytelling seems more a personal catharsis for all the cruel and unfair treatment he feels he received in his life. This aspect of the book ruins the work for me; sure it was sad that Wills suffered terribly in his personal life, but his story is not unique to the human race. He didn't try to offer readers who shared some of the debilitating life experiences some hope, or if he did they didn't resonate with this reader

A real downer. I will not waste any more time on re-readng this biography. Not recommended.