Book review: Called Up: Ballplayers Remember Becoming Major Leaguers, by Zak Ford
Haven't done a book review in awhile, and this one belongs on The Knothole.
Of all the books I’ve bought over the years, there are few that I anticipated the receipt of more than this one. I waited weeks after pre-ordering Called Up to get it into my hands, and let me tell you it didn’t disappoint.
I think you can judge this book by its cover in this case. Just look at the subject matter of the photo - a ballplayer the viewer is looking up to, backlit from above in an angelic sort of glow. That’s the way we look at big league ballplayers when we are kids, placing them on a platform regardless of whether they are Babe Ruth, Mark “The Bird” Fidrych, Shohei Ohtani, or the fictional Joe Shlabotnik who Charlie Brown idolized.
Yet we also have to remember these guys are real, flesh-and-blood characters who are living out their dreams as well. Out of the 109 players featured in the book, who debuted at some point between 1961 and 2018, most of them had an idea they could make it but all of them had a story to tell about their experience. As Ford notes straight away, “This is a collection of first-person, human-interest stories.”
One thing I have to hand to the author is how he initially marketed the book, which obviously worked well enough to get me to buy it. I had already read a number of these stories on social media because he had put up a dozen or so as teasers. So he had a promotion budget and used it wisely. Ford also describes himself as “a chapter leader with the Society for American Baseball Research,” so he knows his stuff. If there’s one thing I can read, it’s player stories and biographies and this hits my sweet spot.
While it’s a series of stories about the same subject, and tends to drag just a bit with the earlier players because they’re not always as descriptive about events that happened half a lifetime ago for them, the end stories are much better - particularly the tale of Adam Greenberg, who waited seven years to get a real major league AB after being beaned the first time. His is one of a few stories where Ford “double dips” with players who debut, are sent back down for several seasons, and re-emerge as grizzled minor league veterans.
It is unfortunate, though, that time and fading memories didn’t give Zak an opportunity to add a couple “bonus babies” to the mix, since their stories are rather unique. The rules of the 1950s required a player signed to a large monetary bonus to be immediately placed on the major league roster, hence the term. Hall-of-Famer Al Kaline was a successful example of a bonus baby who never played a day in the minor leagues, but dozens of other players washed out after their required stint was up.
The other disappointment therein may be for fans of the Astros or Diamondbacks, who somehow never got one of their rookies into Ford’s volume. (It’s somewhat understandable for Arizona, since they’ve only been around since 1998.) I also don’t believe any former Delmarva Shorebirds made the cut, either. But the beauty of this volume and concept is that there are thousands of other major league baseball players who are still around, so there’s a great possibility Called Up can become a franchise as long as Zak Ford wants to carry it on. Buy the book and he just might be encouraged to do so.
Speaking of buying things: you can also Buy Me a Coffee, since I have a page there now. I don’t ask as much at The Knothole as I do my primary site, but I like to have the support nonetheless.