"I believe in rules. Sure I do. If there weren't any rules, how
could you break them?"
The history of baseball is rife with colorful characters. But
for sheer cantankerousness, fighting moxie, and will to win, very
few have come close to Leo "the Lip" Durocher. Following a
five-decade career as a player and manager for baseball's most
storied franchises, Durocher teamed up with veteran sportswriter Ed
Linn to tell the story of his life in the game. The resulting book,
"Nice Guys Finish Last," is baseball at its best, brimming with
personality and full of all the fights and feuds, triumphs and
tricks that made Durocher such a success--and an outsized
celebrity.
Durocher began his career inauspiciously, riding the bench for
the powerhouse 1928 Yankees and hitting so poorly that Babe Ruth
nicknamed him "the All-American Out." But soon Durocher hit his
stride: traded to St. Louis, he found his headlong play and
never-say-die attitude a perfect fit with the rambunctious
"Gashouse Gang" Cardinals. In 1939, he was named player-manager of
the Brooklyn Dodgers--and almost instantly transformed the
underachieving Bums into perennial contenders. He went on to manage
the New York Giants, sharing the glory of one of the most famous
moments in baseball history, Bobby Thomson's "shot heard 'round the
world," which won the Giants the 1951 pennant. Durocher would later
learn how it felt to be on the other side of such an unforgettable
moment, as his 1969 Cubs, after holding first place for 105 days,
blew a seemingly insurmountable 8-1/2-game lead to the Miracle
Mets.
All the while, Durocher made as much noise off the field as on
it. His perpetual feuds with players, owners, and league
officials--not to mention his public associations with gamblers,
riffraff, and Hollywood stars like George Raft and Larraine
Day--kept his name in the headlines and spread his fame far beyond
the confines of the diamond.
A no-holds-barred account of a singular figure, "Nice Guys
Finish Last" brings the personalities and play-by-play of
baseball's greatest era to vivid life, earning a place on every
baseball fan's bookshelf.
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