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Title: Sandy Koufax : A Lefty's Legacy by Jane Leavy ISBN: 0-06-019533-9 Publisher: HarperCollins Pub. Date: 17 September, 2002 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $23.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.28
Rating: 4
Summary: Great Writing, great legacy
Comment: I have read a great many baseball books over the years and usually don't have a particularly high hope for the writing of most biographies, especially when the subject is still alive. Either the writing comes off as trying to impress too hard or the writer is trying to make his or her reputation off the subject. That is not true in this case. Ms. Leavy is a wonderful writer and she works hard to create an honest portrait of one of the all time great pitchers, Sandy Koufax. The style of the book, intersecting his perfect game with his life will delight baseball and non-baseball fans alike. Her discussion of Koufax and his faith is thought provoking and well developed. She also provides a glimpse into the 1950's in Brooklyn that is terrific. This book certainly ranks as one of the finest baseball related books to be published in some time, and unlike the Cubs who were silenced by Koufax on that great night in 1965, this book contains plenty of hits. Read it- give it as a gift. This is a winner.
Rating: 5
Summary: Koufax Rates 5 Stars
Comment: In 1965, I was a 14 year old eighth grade student living in Pasadena, about ten miles from Chavez Ravine. The voice of Vin Scully on KFI boomed from our AM radio every time the Dodgers played ball. I also had several opportunities to see Koufax and Drysdale pitch home games, including in the World Series. [Although it was always from the left field bleachers because my family couldn't afford better]. Along with the pitchers, we loved John Roseboro for being able to catch what sounded like rifle shots hitting his glove. These were my heroes in those days, and it was a wonderful time just before Viet Nam changed the climate and tore the fabric of the country. The background music was the Beach Boys and Beatles. This book, which I picked up on impulse as reading for a flight I was taking home out of LAX, brought back a lot of memories. I didn't expect the book to be as good as it is. It's not perfectly written or edited, to be sure. But it does take you back and enlighten you to the mid-sixties atmosphere that surrounded Koufax. It doesn't really overdo the Jewish angle the way some reviewers complain. When it was happening, it actually was a much bigger deal than the book plays it. Overall, a good read and well worth it for anyone interested in Koufax.
Rating: 2
Summary: Sloppily written but good info on the great Koufax
Comment: I'm glad someone finally wrote a book about Sandy Koufax, but I dearly wish it had been a better book than this one. It is sloppily written. Leavy often does not make it clear who is talking from one sentence to the next. In one case, talking about Pee Wee Reese and son, she gives a long quote, then follows it with "Reese said." Which Reese? In the next paragraph, she at last mentions Mark Reese, the son -- who presumably was the speaker in the text just above that. She'll give a last name, pair it with a first name in another chapter, and finally identify who the person is/was. This kind of sloppiness runs throughout the book. If you know your '60s baseball trivia, this may not bother you, but I think Leavy's editor let her down. Also, I agree with Publisher's Weekly that the author's interest in Koufax's Jewish heritage "borders on the obsessive." And at least three times, she uses the term "the Chosen People," a term that I and many other non-Jews find offensive. In another instance, she cites "Yom Kippur" followed by four digits. I know enough about Judaism to recognize that as the Jewish year, but why assume all readers will know that? She also goes on and on about whether Koufax did or did not attend synagogue on that famous Yom Kippur when he refused to pitch. His refusal to pitch on that holy day made big news; whether he attended synagogue or not (he says no) merits about one sentence. Again, where was the editor? Is this a book about the Jewish experience in sports or about a great athlete who is Jewish? This book tries to be both. Surely Koufax is proud of his millenia-old heritage, as he should be, but if he doesn't feel the need to make a big deal of that, neither should Leavy. The Jewish experience in major league sports might be a topic for another book. If Koufax is in it, I'll read it.
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Title: The Teammates by David Halberstam ISBN: 140130057X Publisher: Hyperion Press Pub. Date: May, 2003 List Price(USD): $22.95 |
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Title: Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game by Michael Lewis ISBN: 0393057658 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: 10 May, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: The Last Good Season: Brooklyn, the Dodgers, and Their Final Pennant Race Together by Michael Shapiro ISBN: 0385501528 Publisher: Doubleday Pub. Date: 18 March, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Koufax by Edward Gruver, Ed Gruver ISBN: 0878331573 Publisher: Taylor Pub Pub. Date: 01 April, 2000 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: What Do You Think of Ted Williams Now? : A Remembrance by Richard Ben Cramer ISBN: 0743246489 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Pub. Date: 02 October, 2002 List Price(USD): $18.00 |
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