Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend [Hardcover]

Timothy M. Gay (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2006

A three-time World Series winner and an early inductee into the Hall of Fame, lauded by Babe Ruth as the finest defensive outfielder he ever saw and described as "perfection on the field" by the great Grantland Rice, Tris Speaker enjoys the peculiar distinction of being one of the least-known legends of baseball history. Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend is the first book to tell the full story of Speaker’s turbulent life and to document in sharp detail the grit and glory of his pivotal role in baseball’s dead-ball era.

 

Playing for the Boston Red Sox and the Cleveland Indians in the early part of the twentieth century, Tris “Spoke” Speaker put up numbers that amaze us even today: his record for career doubles—792—may never be approached, let alone broken. Tris Speaker explores the colorful life behind the statistics, introducing readers to a complex and contradictory Texan whose cowboy mentality never left him as he brawled his way through two decades in the big leagues.

 

Speaker’s career put him in the company of Ty Cobb and Christy Mathewson, Shoeless Joe Jackson and Honus Wagner, and in describing it Timothy M. Gay gives a rousing account of some of the best baseball ever played—and some of the darkest moments that ever tainted a game and hastened the end of a career. His four years of research on Speaker unearthed a document that suggests that cheating induced by gambling was far more widespread in early baseball than officials have acknowledged. Gay’s book captures the bygone spirit of the big leagues’ rough-and-tumble early years and restores one of baseball’s true greats—and a truly larger-than-life personality—to his rightful place in the American sports pantheon.

(20061201)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Tristam "Spoke" Speaker sits, statistically, alongside baseball's greatest sluggers and fielders, but his story and name have largely been forgotten. Gay, in his first book, has unearthed the colorful history of this ne'er say die Texas cowboy, giving baseball fans a fresh look at the Hall of Fame center fielder whose colorful personality and remarkable talent were overshadowed by contemporaries like Ty Cobb and Cy Young. (Even the Speaker-Cobb-Wood-Leonard betting affair of 1919 was eclipsed in disgrace by the Black Sox gambling scandal.) Speaker still holds the mark for most career doubles-792, as a member of the Boston Red Sox and Cleveland Indians-and the shallow position he occupied just behind second base revolutionized the way outfield was played. From 1910-15, Speaker centered Boston's Golden Outfield of Duffy Lewis and Cat Hooper, and nearly 30 years after their final game together (the Golden boys shared the Sox outfield for nearly six seasons), scribe Grantland Rice called the trio "the greatest defensive outfield I ever saw." The phrase "where triples go to die" was originally penned of Speaker's glove, but history somehow misplaced the attribution to Joe Jackson. Gay has insured the righting of history with this biography. A worthwhile read for any sports fan.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Hall of Fame outfielder Speaker was a contemporary of Ty Cobb and Shoeless Joe Jackson. He wasn't quite their equal as a hitter, but he was far superior in the field. Off the field, however, he had nothing to match Cobb's psychotic, racist personality or Shoeless Joe's involvement in the Black Sox scandal and, thus, remains relatively forgotten. Gay hopes to change that with this first serious biography of Speaker. It's carefully researched and documented, engagingly written, and very illuminating. Speaker was both saint and sinner but never long enough to have either term permanently affixed to his name. At one time, he was every bit as racist as Cobb but was seldom outspoken, and, in later years as a Cleveland Indians coach, he tutored the American League's first black player, Larry Doby. And like Jackson, he most likely had a hand in a few shady gambling deals, but he was smart enough to not get caught. Gay has filled a serious gap in baseball history, and his effort compares favorably with Charles Alexander's acclaimed biographies of John McGraw and Ty Cobb. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 318 pages
• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press; First Edition edition (January 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0803222068
• ISBN-13: 978-0803222069
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,269,763 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Home Run Gift for the Lover of Baseball or History, December 15, 2005

By 

Pat M (Vienna, VA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend (Hardcover)

A few years ago David McCullough brought John Adams out from the shadows of such better-known patriots as Jefferson, Washington, and Franklin. In much the same way Timothy M. Gay has cast a brilliant light on Tris Speaker, who has, unfortunately, languished in obscurity behind such greats as Cobb, Ruth, and even Shoeless Joe Jackson. In his chapters on Tris's playing days, Gay's language captures perfectly the voice of the early 20th century sports pages, and his well-researched and lively account of the gambling cloud that hovered over our National Pastime in its early years makes it clear that the Black Sox were just the tip of a corrupt iceberg. While he appropriately glorifies Tris's exploits on the field and at the plate, Gay's book is no hagiography. He brings important new research to the scandal that drove Speaker and Ty Cobb out of managing in the big leagues. He also addresses Speaker's undisguised jealousy of such younger stars as Babe Ruth and Joe Dimaggio. Gay not only gives us Speaker the player, he give us Tris Speaker the man, with all his contradictions. Gay explores how Tris's upbringing in a Texas town that revered its Confederate forefathers shaped his views on race and religion, leading to membership in the Klan and open warfare with his Irish-Catholic Red Sox teammates. Yet Speaker married an Irish Catholic girl and served as a mentor to Larry Doby, the American League's first African-American player. Whether you are a lover of baseball or a lover of American history, Timothy M. Gay's "Tris Speaker" will pull you in the way Spoke himself pulled in fly balls to center field.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Baseball History and One of the Game's Greatest Players, February 11, 2006

By 

C. W. Emblom "Bill Emblom" (Ishpeming, Michigan USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend (Hardcover)

A biography of Tris Speaker has been long overdue. However, the wait has been worth it. Autor Timothy Gay has provided us with the definitive biograhy of one of baseball's immortals. Speaker's best years were spent chasing down fly balls for the Boston Red Sox and the Cleveland Indians. The phrase "where triples go to die" was originally written regarding Speaker and later attributed to Willie Mays of the Giants. As were many ball players at the turn of the 20th century Speaker was a product of his environment and times. Many players such as Cobb, Hornsby, and Speaker were from the south and displayed attitudes that were anti-African American. To his credit Speaker served as a defensive tutor to the American League's first black player, Larry Doby of the Cleveland Indians. The author does a thorough job in covering the unfortunate death in 1920 of Ray Chapman, Speaker's teammate when player/manager Speaker led the Tribe to the pennant and World Championship over the Brooklyn Dodgers. In 1919 Speaker, teammate Joe Wood, along with Ty Cobb and "Dutch" Leonard of the Tigers met under the stands at Navin Field supposedly to discuss letting the Tigers win a game that would ensure the Tigers of third place money. Since Leonard refused to face those he accused Commissioner Landis dismissed the case although both Cobb and Speaker were to retire quietly to avoid any controversy and not serve as either a player or coach of any major league team. Both Cobb and Speaker did later play one forgettable year together with Connie Mack's Athletics in 1928 when both players missed several games due to injuries. Based on what is known and what will never be known, author Timothy Gay does a great job in wading through this incident along with other scandals that were festering throughout the major leagues during this period and were complicated by antagonistic attitudes between Landis, American League President Ban Johnson, and White Sox owner Charles Comiskey. I did find one minor mistake on page 215 in which former Indians' teammate Jack Graney is referred to as "Jack Grady" when Speaker had a fistfight with Steve O'Neill and Jack Graney regarding a matter involving the death of Ray Chapman. The incorrect name of "Jack Grady" is also listed in the index in the back of the book. Baseball has more books written about it than any other sport, and many of them are valuable as historical references. This book is one of them.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Baseball Bio of 2005, March 4, 2006

By 

Jonathan Brookner - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend (Hardcover)

Timothy Gay has cracked the code on how to write a good baseball biography. He blends the right amoung of baseball and personal life of his subject, who happens to be an interesting character, as well as one of baseball's greatest. Moreover, Gay has writing skills that put him at the top of the class for this genre of book.

Even having read many other bios of Spoke's contemporaries, and the classics like Glory of Their Times, I've never encountered much about Speaker's personality or background. Gay brings Spoke to life in all his glory (a champion rodeo rider as well as an initial Hall of Famer).

Maybe it helps that Gay has few axes to grind in choosing to write this book, unlike many whose purpose is to promote their subject into the HOF. He does go a bit over the top in blackguarding Ban Johnson. After all, Ban tried to cover up baseball's dirt, but punish the guilty, regardless of how famous they were (Cobb and Speaker's thrown game scandal). It was Landis who, to shame Johnson, made the scandal public until he suddenly realized he was harming the game. Then he diminished the punishment to scuff the ball that showed the crime (pardon the Tim Gay-like baseball phrasing).

I could have actually liked a few stories of Spoke's greatest games, but the World Series games he played in are almost the only ones described in detail. Still, I am grateful that Gay does not write his book from box scores. Notes: Chick Stahl committed suicide in Spring training, not mid-season (he couldn't bear the prospect of managing the Red Sox through another campaign), and Ray Chapman was a regular shortstop before Speaker arrived. 1916 was the only season he was shifted around the infield. Finally, Ruth's attempted steal in the seventh game of the '24 World Series is hardly as shady as Gay makes it. The game situation, Ruth's eleven steals during the regular season, as well as his having the only Yankee stolen base heretofore in that Series, argue that it was a mis-calculated gamble.