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My Twenty Years in Baseball (Dover Baseball)

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It seems fitting that the idea for Tyrus Raymond "Ty" Cobb to write his autobiography in serial form came from a dispute over a book with a Detroit newspaper.

The iconic outfielder/manager for the Detroit Tigers agreed to pen 36 articles for publication from December 1925 to February 1926 in the New York Evening Journal after he reportedly squelched the release of an unauthorized biography by the Detroit News. My Twenty Years in Baseball (2009 paperback; Dover Publications, Inc.) includes the complete series in the newspaper and a wealth of photographs. It is edited by William R. Cobb, who is not a direct relation to Ty Cobb.

"To recall facts and incidents comes easy," writes Cobb, who was poised to enter his 21st and final season with the Tigers. He would end his career after playing in 1927 and 1928 for the Philadelphia Athletics.

The historical significance of the collection trumps the vital importance to baseball fans. This is Cobb in his own words - no ghost writer was involved - writing for a national audience through a major media outlet based in New York City. Cobb adeptly chronicles his ongoing career in Major League Baseball and delves into issues on the grand diamond of life.

"It's much easier for the man who doesn't have to think to say what the President of the United States SHOULD HAVE DONE," he writes. "If he had to tell the President what action he SHOULD take, he would probably be more generous, more thoughtful, anyway. First guessers are the men who make names for themselves.

"The man who is wise to his own ability is usually wise to that of his opponents."

Controversial signposts on Cobb's march to the majors are not sugarcoated. He discusses how family goals came into conflict with the signing of his first professional contract, the early disappointment on the field which ultimately led to a better opportunity in another uniform and a valuable lesson that was learned while eating popcorn.

Many stars come to life - Joe Jackson, Tris Speaker, Hal Chase, Roger Bresnahan, Clark Griffith, Walter Johnson, John McGraw - but Cobb especially digs into the dollars and cents of the game, while having a keen sense on how to market each installment.

"It is much easier to go out and buy an experienced ball player to fill a certain job than it is to train one for the job. Even the big newspapers of this country would hesitate to send a cub reporter to cover a national convention," he writes. "As I have said before, I have never been able to see the humorous side of baseball, even though I can laugh at the reminiscences of others. I was so deadly intent on mastering the game and everything struck me so serious that I failed to develop a baseball sense of humor.

"My days on the diamond have been rather stormy, due to my high-strung and rather fiery temper. Later on I will relate some of these rather sensational incidents and will present my side of them, but not in this chapter."

Cobb is brutally candid on the hazing he suffered in his early days with the Tigers, with one picture showing the professional consequences to his main antagonist. He also presents an intriguing angle to the 1920 tragedy of Cleveland's Ray Chapman being killed by a pitch thrown by Carl Mays of the New York Yankees. Though his assessment on various facets of the game is outstanding, Cobb is at his best when he delivers solid takes on the best team he has seen and the greatest game ever played, along with grabbing a few lineup cards and penciling in an all-time team and all-star squads for the American and National leagues.

"I don't want this autobiography to be considered my valedictory," Cobb writes. "I could name many things that twenty years in baseball have taught me and made the effort worth while. I am not alone in this. These educational benefits have come to scores of ballplayers.

"Yes, after all. I think it pretty well worth while."

I found, in reading this book, that Ty Cobb really shared his view on many things baseball and was not one to tow the politically correct line, as it were and is today. A rather refreshing read, even if at times what Cobb wrote seemed a bit over the top, in terms of the believability factor of "his view" to one's own sense to the common.

A worthwhile read and an insightful look at one of baseball's best hitters and self-motivated minds.

Ty Cobb was an unbelievably gifted baseball player who retired in 1928 with a .367 lifetime batting average, twelve batting titles, and some ninety different major league records. Most of that time he played for the Detroit Tigers, and led them to several pennants. Toward the end of his career he played for the Philadelphia A's. Always he wanted to be first, and his competitiveness and ferocious temper made him a lightning rod for ill feelings throughout baseball. He was also an unrepentant bigot (never moving past his youth in the Jim Crow South), inveterate brawler (even to the extent of going into the stands to take on heckling fans), and addictive personality (his pursuit of liquor, women, and gambling was legendary).

This book is an unabridged account of Cobb's life as he wanted to be remembered in the pages of the "New York Evening Journal." It was originally published while he was still playing baseball in 1925. There is a lot of discussion of hitting and performances on the field with a "field of dreams" patina surrounding it. There is only a little about the demons that inhabited Cobb and ultimately came to consume him. Even so, he does tip his hat to that side of his persona when he admitted, "My days on the diamond have been rather stormy, due to my high-strung nature and rather fiery temper." Whenever controversies do arise he explains away his actions, even commenting, "To this day I believe that under the same circumstances, I would do the same thing again."

Ty Cobb was an exceptionally nasty and unlovable human being, but he was a superb ballplayer. He is certainly not my hero--I expect them to be better at life than he ever was--but I have to give him credit when it comes to is ability to hit a baseball. Nothing in this memoir changes my perception of him, but having it available once again in print is a positive development. The introduction by Paul Dickson and the foreword and editorial notes by William R. Cobb help to place the narrative into context.

A positively delightful little book if you're a fan of `old-time' baseball. I read it in one sitting. And no doubt will dig it out and read it again when Spring Training comes around.

It is especially recommended if you appreciate or want insight into the mental aspect of the game, because who can describe that better than the greatest hitter of all time (or if you prefer, one of them). Highly recommended also if you just have an interest in the history and evolution of early baseball, because who can describe that better than a first-ballot Hall of Famer who also played against, or was a contemporary of, many of the other all-time greats that he describes in its pages.

Whether or not you "like" Ty Cobb, this book (which reproduces word-for-word a newspaper series written by him for the New York Evening Journal in the 1920's) rings true. I am confident that the Evening Journal would not have published these articles if it thought they wouldn't ring true to contemporary baseball fans everywhere (especially with New York at the time, as now, being a baseball mecca).

Let me also touch briefly on "liking" Cobb. Like most baseball fans, I suppose, I grew up "knowing" Cobb was some kind of psychopath who happened to be a marvelously gifted baseball player. These articles give Cobb's side of some of these negative stories. I was also very surprised to learn, while reading others' comments for another book about Cobb, that a major source of the anti-Cobb vitriol, Al Stump's biography of Cobb, is possibly a deliberate fraud. So I am re-evaluating what I thought I "knew" about Ty Cobb. However, even if Cobb was as cruel as his "reputation" alleges, no one who reads this book will have the slightest doubt that he was a highly intelligent man who directed his intelligence in remarkable ways toward finding ways to play his chosen profession on the highest imaginable level. How high? Look up the inaugural class of the Baseball Hall of Fame and see who Cobb's fellow inductees were.

Next, I plan to read Cobb's autobiography "My Life in Baseball - the True Record". It's in my Amazon Cart, and sometime between now and spring training I'll pull the trigger on that purchase. That autobiography was written jointly with Al Stump, but is a different book than the Al Stump biography of Cobb that I referred to earlier.