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Rube Waddell: The Zany, Brilliant Life of a Strikeout Artist

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After Amos Rusie of the 1890s, Rube Waddell was the second pitcher in major league history to make his mark as a strikeout king. But he made an even bigger mark during his day for being the craziest, most entertaining player in an era that didn't cloak eccentrics. Rube really did sit his teammates down while he struck out the side, did cartwheels to the dugout, and made rude noises while throwing change-ups or coaching the bases. Off the field, he really did disappear when needed to join firemen to put out blazes, to go fishing, alligator wrestling, and mainly to go drinking.

This book's real value is the author's combing through the newspapers of the day to dig up every story of the crazy pitcher. We meet a fellow who never became an adult human, for all the good (love of dogs and all-round cheeriness), and bad (immaturity that could explode into actions like beating up his parents-in-law). This guy could charm anyone he wanted to out of the price of some drinks. Levy brings to the first half of the book an average of a guffaw-causing anecdote per page.

The flaw of the book is a big one- while as a teller of stories, Levy should take his own place at the corner tap, as a baseball historian he loses credibility. He becomes tedious in making excuses for almost every loss Waddell ever suffered. But the excuses don't hold water, because Levy, despite being a college professor, hasn't depicted baseball as it was played in the first decade of the 20th century. (for example-it was a dead ball era without much hitting, but Levy blames seasons-long lack of hitting support for Waddell's inability to lead the A's to more championships- even in years when the team was one of the league hitting/scoring leaders). He must not have ever picked up a Baseball Encyclopedia either, for all the straight factual errors. Just one example is his statement that in 1904 no other pticher had 200 strikeouts- Cy Young being closest with 180. Actually, four other pitchers had 200 strikouts, with Young the least of those at 200 exactly.

His need to pair Rube with Cy Young in the minds of readers, and to cover up the greatness of teammate Eddie Plank actually takes away from the true appreciation we should have for Waddell. He somehow has never heard of Amos Rusie, and is also unaware of a strange 40s movie starring the comedian Joe E. Brown as a Rube character who strikes out batters at will, cartwheels to the dugout, chases fires, and only differs from Rube in being innocent regarding women. For fun stories, buy it. To get a fun as well as clear picture of baseball at the time, and read about truly all-round great stars, read Scott Longert's "Addie Joss", Henry Thomas's "Walter Johnson,", the DeValeria's "Honus Wagner," David Anderson's "More than Merkle,", or Christy Mathewson's own "Pitching in a Pinch."

According to some, Rube Waddell was the greatest pitcher to ever play the game. In 1904, he struck out 345 batters, during a time when hitters choked up on the bat, just trying to make contact with two strikes. Rube was also the first great drawing card. Because of him, new stadiums were built in Brooklyn, Philadelphia and Boston. Levy says, "He was among the game's first real drawing cards, among its first honest-to-goodness celebrities, and the first player to have teams of newspaper reporters following him, and the first to have a mass following of idol-worshiping kids yelling out his nickname like he was their buddy."

Rube was also one of the game's all-time greatest "characters". He would call his infielders into the dugout and strike out the side. He would do handstands and cartwheels after a victory. He would make animal noises while pitching. Unfortunately, he would also get into bar fights, drink too much, and disappear on a whim.

Eventually, Rube's manager, Connie Mack, got tired of Rube's unreliability and shipped him off to the St. Louis Browns, where he lasted two mores years before being banished to the minors. He pitched for the Minneapolis Millers for two years after that, hoping to be noticed by a major league team. It never happened.

The Millers trained in Hickman, Kentucky, which was plagued by floods. Always the fireman, Rube pitched in, sandbagging alongside black laborers (Quite the no-no in those days). He contracted pneumonia and was told to move to a warmer climate. Dropped by the Millers, Rube played for a team in Virginia, Minnesota, his skills increasingly abandoning him. Rube refused to take care of himself and he eventually would up being arrested as a vagrant in St. Louis and was diagnosed with tuberculosis. He spent his last days in a sanitarium in Texas, his weight dropping to a hundred pounds. When some major leaguers who were in Texas for spring training came to see him he said, "I'll be over tomorrow and show you bums how to run. May weight is down to fighting trim now. I'm in shape."

Rube was married three times, during a time when divorce was almost unheard of, his last spouse leaving him because, "Rube's just too crazy."

Alan H. Levy is a history professor at Slippery Rock. I think he relied too much on newspaper accounts and not enough on interviews (albeit they're hard to find after almost a hundred years). He does quote from Connie Mack and Mugsy McGraw's biographies, but none of these characters really come to life, not even Rube. Rube's three wives are practically invisible. I also had a hard time with Levy's somnolent final chapter, possibly because the main point of interest was already dead.

Thanks to author Alan Levy we at long last have a biography about Rube Waddell, a great pitcher at the beginning of the 20th century. Contemporaries of Waddell such as Cy Young, Christy Mathewson,Grover Alexander, and Walter Johnson have at least one biography written about them and now Rube joins them in this respect. Author Levy states that Waddell had four loves in life which were pitching, fishing, fighting fires, and liquor not neccessarily in that order. Students of baseball history remember Waddell as a baseball zany for his antics both on and off the field, but what is often overlooked is that he was a very caring person who would give of himself to others. It was in this capacity of standing hour on end in cold water fighting back floodwaters by piling sandbags that led to pneumonia and eventually tuberculosis. Baseball was simply a game to Waddell whether he was throwing his fastball past major league hitters or playing with a bunch of ten year olds. Both Rube Waddell and Babe Ruth were alike in that they both were childlike in the body of an adult. Author Levy gives an excellent account of the scuffle which Waddell got into over a teammate's straw hat that led to him injuring his arm and prevented him from going up against Christy Mathewson in the 1905 World Series in which Matty pitched three shutouts. It would have been interesting to see what the matchups of Waddell and Mathewson would have provided us. It was traditional for straw hats to be destroyed after Labor Day and Rube wanted to destroy the teammate's hat. I don't see that there was any dark deeds involved between Waddell and gamblers who didn't want Waddell to pitch in the Series. Athletics manager Connie Mack gave Waddell some free reign when the two were together while Waddell gave Pirates manager Fred Clarke fits with his erratic behavior. It's true that Rube Waddell had destructive habits, but I also come away feeling that Rube Waddell had a caring side for other people that is too often overlooked.

Alan Levy has done a wonderful job at documenting the slighty tilted Rube Waddell. From the start of the book, where Levy tells of a three year old Rube wandering off from his home to live in the fire station, to his untimely passing, this is a wonderful read. Any fan of the deadball era of baseball knows of Waddell's peculiar ways. Levy brings them all to life. Was Waddell mildly retarded or chemically unbalanced, Levy makes no judgments, leaving that to the reader.

Waddell was an extremely talented pitcher, who usually was able to back up his boasts. He was also a talented mooch/con artist, who could scam a free drink whenever (which was often) he needed one. Levy has all the stories you can image on one of the most interesting players in baseball history. This is one of the best baseball books of the year.

'a great book about a lovable but flawed baseball legend. Levy deftly captures the day-to-day life of early 20th-century baseball through the many triumphs and catastrophes of an astounding and bizarre athlete and personality. An insightful story, Levy's bio. is also good baseball. The review by Brookner makes strange claims; Eddie Plank is hardly the victim of a cover up here, and Brookner's notion of "a dead ball era without much hitting" is flat wrong. Stephen J. Gould, Bill James, and various baseball encyc's all show batting averages to have been just as high back then. (It was slugging averages that were markedly lower in the dead ball era.) Levy gets it right. Rube comes forth in the endearing and exasperating ways he must have been to his teammates. This is one of the best new baseball books out there.

Being a big fan of turn-of-the-century baseball, I have waited a long time for a thorough treatment of Rube Waddell. I'm still waiting. Rube did some silly things during his lifetime, mostly to amuse himself and his teammates, who were often doubled over with laughter. For this, he has been called "crazy", and possibly semi-retarded. This author falls right in line with those conclusions.

What he briefly mentions, almost as an aside, are the several well-documented lives Rube Waddell saved, in addition to possibly countless others too difficult to estimate. From carrying an injured teammate on his shoulders to a hospital (while everyone else stood around), and staying with him all night, holding cold compresses to his injured head, to preventing a fire in a crowded department store by dragging a dangerous, fiery stove out of it, Rube Waddell was very serious and clear-headed when someone else's safety was at stake. Several times he jumped into rivers to save people from drowning, once when it was just a log in the water. No matter, Rube acted instantly when he thought someone needed help.

The author, like everyone else these past 100 years, mentions Rube's chasing after fire engines as evidence of his immaturity. Lost is the fact Rube wanted to get to the fires to help put them out, often at great personal risk. Connie Mack recalled the particular bravery of one firefighter combating a house fire, standing on the second story roof and pouring water down onto the fire. Suddenly he realized, that was his star pitcher!

In fact, Rube contracted the illness that eventually killed him by working for many hours in freezing water up to his armpits, helping restore a broken levee. He didn't take a break to go fishing, or wander off to play marbles with kids.

Other than doctors or possibly those who served in combat, probably no other Hall Of Fame player saved so many lives, took so many personal risks, and ultimately died in the effort to help strangers. I'm not saying Rube was a saint, and no author should treat him with that reverence, but to write Rube off as "zany", perhaps retarded, is really an injustice of large magnitude. Rube knew there was a time and a place to be zany, and a time and a place to be serious. When the chips were down, he was deadly serious.

So I wait for an author to come along and realize that throwing a little white ball past a guy with a stick, in the grand scheme of things, really isn't as important as chasing a fire engine, to get to the fire, to save someone's life. Rube understood that.

I read the reviews and at least was prepared ahead of time for what was to transpire. Although the previous review was somewhat harsh, honestly and truthfully so, he did make some solid statistical and fundamental points to which I cannot and will not dispute. Afterall, a book is a book and you make the most of it despite some flaws.

My review is this...I really enjoyed this book a lot more than I thought that I ever would. Knowing what I already knew about Rube Waddell; his eccentricities, his pure raw talent, his peculularities and on and on and on...this was a terrific read and is a terrific book.

The only chapter in the book that I found somewhat more than necessary, and a detractor from the overall effort, was the final chapter. This chapter was more the author injecting his sociological views on Rube and society in general, as it pertained to Rube's time and to our time. The general definition of the meaning of "Rube" and "Babe", and why it holds so much more intrigue and affection than "Iron Horse" and "Joltin Joe", as well as the personalities behind them. Compare this to that and that to this, is what this final chapter is all about. If I did not know any better, I'd say the author was stuck in too simple a style of writing and just had to let loose with his own pent-up intellect. Not saying this is a bad thing, but honestly the book stood very well on it's own without this chapter. Subsequently for me, this chapter brought the lightness and simplicity of the overall effort crashing to an abrubt halt. Where I seldom was forced to do any thinking other than to transport myself to Rube's time and world and enjoy the stories for the sheer fun they presented, this last chapter ruined that little world and forced me into a view beyond the previous chapters to a very heavy and honestly, too deep thinking end. The author did a terrific job at keeping the entire book very light and fun to read. The final chapter was in my opinion, not necessary.

Rube Waddell was a remarkably simple man in an uncomplicated way. Mr. Levy portrayed that beautifully and with enthusiasm. For that I commend him for entertaining me with style.

I have been fascinated with Waddell since boyhood when I read of his almost unbelievable antics in an era when baseball was not the big business it is today. This book documents the zany and troubled life of a one-of-a-kind American Original whom Ken Burns called "the strangest man ever to play." He died tragically young at age 37, never having won a World Series, missing the 1905 Series after injuring a shoulder wrestling for a straw hat a month before. If you like Waddell and are moved by his tragicomic spirit, read "Brass Bonanza Plays Again", a novel where Waddell returns as a guardian angel of another "goat", a hockey goon who causes his city (Hartford) not only to lose a championship but also its team.

Rube Waddell had a major league career that was not very long (13 seasons, but in three of those he played in 10 or fewer games), but as with Sandy Koufax, when he played in a full season, he could be dominating. Alan Levy makes the same argument in his book, and the record book bears this out: once leading the league in games pitched, once leading the league in wins, seven times leading the league in strikeouts (six consecutively) and a winning percentage of .574 despite playing for some bad teams (and some good ones, too). So why isn't he remembered as the Koufax of his day? Well, he played 100 years ago, so no one who saw him play is alive today. His contemporaries generally had longer careers with better teams, usually a single team (like Mathewson, Bender, Plank, Brown, etc.). And, Waddell seems to be looked at today as "a psychologist's dream," as someone who does sufficiently odd things or is odd himself, so that there is a question if we're dealing with a crazy person here. I don't believe that Waddell was "crazy" - I don't pretend to be a doctor, either, but the book does make a lot of mention to incidents that would seem to make Waddell out of the ordinary today. And that may be a fault of the world that we live in today, that characters aren't tolerated as much as they used to be. It's perhaps enough to go with Sam Crawford's assessment that Waddell was just a "big kid" and leave it at that. Read for yourself the exploits of Rube Waddell in this well-written book, and reacquaint yourself with a unique character with a precious baseball gift.

Rube Waddell: The Zany, Brilliant Life of a Strikeout Artist

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Rube was quite a charactor!

I'd put him up there with the likes of: Ruth, Satchel Paige, Jay Johnstone, Etc. I'd recommend this book to anybody. He may have been a charactor but he was a great pitcher.