RIP Jim Bouton

I knew him as a fill in sports anchor on local TV before I knew he was a baseball player. Loved Ball Four.

 

Also created Big League Chew, which was the bomb if you played Little League in the 1980s.

And let’s not forget, he was a pretty damn good pitcher in 1963 and 64.

 

Correct.

 

For anyone who takes sports publications seriously - and for those aiming to write one - "Ball Four" should be required reading.

RIP to a pioneer who never forgot his sense of humor and, thankfully, never seemed to take himself too seriously.

 

I'm still so saddened that Jim lived his remaining years with dementia following a stroke.

 

I first started reading Ball Four when I was in junior high study hall, where we weren’t allowed to talk to anyone and we either had to, you know, study, or read a book. I always felt like I was putting one over on the teachers by reading a book that had curse words and talked about sex.

Loved the book. Always wanted to try to do a paternity suit prank on someone, but never got the chance. I also used to read the “It Makes A Fellow Proud to be an Astro” song in Leaping Lanny Poffo’s voice, so I put a wrestling connection to it.

RIP, Bulldog. You spend most of your life gripping a baseball and in the end, it turns out it was the other way the entire time.

 

Also saddened that he lost his daughter about 20 years ago.

 

Every bit as good as his first book, too. Jim Bouton told great stories.

 

and shitfuck

 

In many ways the second one was funnier because it dealt with all the silly reaction by the baseball establishment to Ball Four.
My favorite part of the second book was when a journeyman, Mack Jones, was told Bouton was hanging around the cage at a game. He said, in words to the effect, "I better not be in that book (Ball Four) or I'll punch him in the face."
Bouton wrote: "You're in this one Mack, and my face is available."

 

“Dooley Womack? The Dooley Womack?”

 

After I won 21 games, I said, "This isn't that hard, actually. I can do this every year for maybe 10, 15 years." To tell you the truth, I thought I was going to be in the Hall of Fame. I really thought that. You feel so strong, so powerful, walking down the street. You know you can throw a ball harder than any man in the world, or certainly the top five. Sandy Koufax knocked all of us out of the box on that one, so we would think, "I'm the second- or third-hardest thrower in the game."