YOGI BERRA
Sat., October 17, 05:27 PM
Even though I don’t follow horoscopes, the following caught my eye the other day: “Your creativity opens a new ballpark professionally.” As it happens, I am neither creative nor professional, but my mind was in the ballpark.
One of the reasons I am so grateful to the public library is that I don’t have to feel bad when I choose a book that is not very good; at least I didn’t lose any cash on the deal. On the other hand, one of the stupidest things I do in a public library is to choose a book about baseball. I’ve done it often enough that I should know — these books will never bring back the days I remember.
As you know, I am often critical of journalists, and sports writers are at the bottom of the barrel. Like the commentators on most of these sports shows, they are so enamored with the sound of their own words that you have to wade through miles of garbage to find something good. Al Barra, who wrote Yogi Berra: Eternal Yankee, is no different. (I found myself wondering if he gets paid by the word.) He constantly wanders off his subject. He peppers his work with so many irrelevant statistics that it dilutes the effectiveness of the stats that pertain to whatever he is trying to prove. He repeats himself; I caught several instances, but neither his copy editor nor his indexer did so. Furthermore, he plays “what if” very badly.
“What if the Yankees had signed Willie Mays and he had played side by side with Mickey Mantle?” It’s fiction! It never happened. What if they had gotten their signals crossed and run each other at full speed, ending both careers right there? Thank goodness, that never happened either. The only baseball what if that ever enters my mind — and I recognize that it’s fiction — is, what if cars had been equipped with seat belts when Roy Campanella’s car turned over? It breaks my heart to this day.
Fortunately, Mr. Barra has chosen a subject that transcends his writing. Sixty years ago, when my little brother and I were just getting into baseball, the two best catchers in baseball, no argument, were in New York — Yogi Berra for the Yankees and Roy Campanella for the Dodgers. My brother and I argued all the time, of course, but you couldn’t prove anything. Statistics prove nothing, because one home run, more or less, is not a measure of a player’s worth.
There are always intangibles you can’t measure; I pointed out that Campy could speak Spanish to the Latino players who had no English. (The Yankees had no Latino players at that time.) From different leagues, they never played against each other except in a World Series or an All-Star game; they didn’t appear to consider themselves rivals. After the National League had left New York, after Ebbets Field had been torn down, a Roy Campanella appreciation day was held at Yankee Stadium. Confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life, Roy would become a spokesman for the disabled. Yogi recalls that “I waved to him, but it made me feel real bad to see him like that.”
You probably expect that kind of comment from Yogi, whose reputation has been that of a talented athlete, but funny-looking and maybe rather dopey. You don’t hear “Yogi-isms” as often as you used to, but he was never going to be the brilliant guy who used baseball to earn his way through med school. (No, that was his roommate, Bobby Brown, the Dallas cardiologist who eventually became the president of the American League.) Yogi quit school after eighth grade; all he ever wanted to do was play baseball. But he is not stupid; no one who understands the baseball rule book is dumb. (Go ahead, you explain the infield fly rule; I can’t quite do it myself.)
I guess I had assumed that Yogi had some military service. Men of his age, unless they were disabled, served somewhere during World War II. However, I had no idea how well he had acquitted himself. Not only was he in the European Theater of Operations, he was at D-Day. He also earned a Purple Heart, but he never applied for it, because he was afraid it would upset his mother.
Let’s see, what have we got so far? A responsible guy, who just wanted to play ball. Good-natured. Not too smart? When the Yankees decided they wanted Yogi to catch, they set Bill Dickey, one of the great old-time catchers to coach him. “Bill learned me all his experience,” said Yogi. As I’ve already mentioned, Yogi was a superb catcher, and catching is a very difficult position, both mentally and physically. Keep in mind, a man who can be taught is not so stupid. In later years, Yogi would “learn his experience” to others. Not only could he learn, he could impart his knowledge to others. Funny, maybe, but not stupid.
Very well, you may say, he knows baseball, but he has no business sense. I don’t know whether he does or not, but he certainly knows how to find good business advisors. Someone certainly told him how to handle his contract discussions with the Yankees, very low-key, but he got what he wanted. Don’t forget that until the late sixties, it was considered very disrespectful to hire a personal agent, and the ball club’s officers held just about all the power.
I could go on, but suffice it to say that I did enjoy the book, despite having to work my way through the excess verbiage to find out what was really in it. It may be the last good baseball book I find.
