≡ Download Gratis Don't Look Back Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball Mark Ribowsky 9780306809637 Books

Don't Look Back Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball Mark Ribowsky 9780306809637 Books

Download As PDF : Don't Look Back Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball Mark Ribowsky 9780306809637 Books

Don't Look Back Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball Mark Ribowsky 9780306809637 Books

Growing up a baby boomer, Satch meant two things. Either Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong, or Leroy "Satchel" Paige. Both legends, both virtuosos, both masters of their domain.

This book covers the latter. The title was from his signature piece of wisdom "Don't look back, someone may be gaining on you".

Satchel Paige was born shortly after Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb. He toiled in the Negro Leagues for over twenty years before Bill Veeck finally brought him to Cleveland for the 1948 pennant winning season. His legend was made by playing to huge crowds in Pittsburgh, Newark, and throughout the Carribean. He also "barnstormed", playing with other Negro Leaguers against the major league all-stars.

What I didn't realize was that Satchel Paige was a first rate star, of the magnatude of Babe Ruth and later, Mickey Mantle. He was legendary not only for his performances, but also for his feats. He would pitch sometimes upwards of 120 games per year. He started almost every game for his teams at times during his career. There was no "catching up to the pitcher" after a hitter saw him three or four times. He was always one step ahead of his quarry. His reportoire was endless.

Most amazingly, Paige was a "rookie" at 42 years old, and an all-star at 44. He pitched for Charlie Finley's Oakland A's at age 59, and toiled three scoreless innings against the fearsome lineup of the Boston Red Sox of Yazstremski, Conigliaro, and Petrocelli.

He moved through life in his own rhythm, with his own inscrutable wisdom, and setting his own pace. He disarmed even the most virulent racists with his easy homespun humor.

Paige was a one of a kind star of stratospheric proportions. A household name.

This book is an excellent and informant treatment of his life and times.


Tags : Don't Look Back : Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball [Mark Ribowsky] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. <DIV>Some say Satchel Paige was the greatest pitcher ever—and and certainly his dazzling record of perhaps as many as 2,Mark Ribowsky,Don't Look Back : Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball,Da Capo Press,030680963X,XX-012-X3-5305305,Sports - General,Baseball,Baseball players,Baseball players;United States;Biography.,Baseball;United States;History.,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Cultural, Ethnic & Regional General,Baseball - History,Biography,Biography & Autobiography,Biography & Autobiography Sports,Biography Autobiography,BiographyAutobiography,Biography: sport,Black studies,Blacks And Sports,Cultural Heritage,History,Paige, Leroy,SPORTS & RECREATION Baseball History,SPORTS & RECREATION General,Sports & outdoor recreation,Sports - Baseball,United States,1906-,Paige, Leroy,

Don't Look Back Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball Mark Ribowsky 9780306809637 Books Reviews

Did you ever read a biography and decide it was a good read only when it avoided the subject himself? I felt this way reading Mark Ribowsky's 1994 biography of Satchel Paige.

Perhaps the greatest control pitcher of any era, Paige won a lot of games as a barnstorming Negro League veteran and lasted long enough to play a decade in the Major Leagues after the color bar was dropped. Yet old Satch made his fame truly outsized as much with his mouth. He told great stories and fed the press masterful sound bites that were equal parts whimsy and philosophy. "Don't look back, something might be gaining on you" was a famous one, the first half of which forms the title of Ribowsky's book. Yet a core thesis of this frustrating bio is how little Paige let people in on his real life.

"History has a hard, often cruel glare, and great men are never as great as they seem to be," Ribowsky notes in his introduction. "The lesson Satchel Paige never learned was that honesty could have been good for the soul, at least better for it than bitterness."

Certainly understanding his success as a pitcher proves elusive. Ribowsky has a frustrating back-and-forth manner in this and other matters. He notes with great sternness how the myth of the Negro Leagues as being a land of faulty record-keeping doesn't stand with the facts, yet he often pulls back from using those same records to make Satchel's case, noting Paige's entertaining tendency to push his own legend to absurd degrees. "Print the legend" is not Ribowsky's approach here, but in lieu of hard stats it is missed.

Paige was a unique character in many respects. For one thing, his fame was larger than the Negro Leagues well before World War II, when he went barnstorming in search of money. He played against white ballplayers as well as in other parts of the world where baseball was popular, impressing legends like Bob Feller and Dizzy Dean who spoke in open wonder of his talent. Dean went so far as to question why the sport wasn't making use of Paige in white ball, a comment which Ribowsky suggests had a good deal of cynicism to it.

The book's biggest problem is a lack of Paige himself at the center. Ribowsky was too late to interview the subject, and seems wary of the things Paige was quoted as saying. Either he was too bitter or too polite, so Ribowsky sounds off instead, noting Paige's difficulties both with women and his teammates in building his case of a fractured man.

Paige certainly had critics, black and white. "Double Duty" Radcliffe, who earned his moniker by both pitching and catching in the Negro Leagues, spoke of Paige's chronic failure to show up

"He's bigger than the game, man. You can't find him and you can't fire him. What are you gonna do with him?"

When Ribowsky leaves aside Paige, which he does for long stretches at a time, to discuss such matters as the precarious finances of the Negro Leagues or the shady characters who ran thing in "blackball," "Don't Look Back" becomes engaging, centered, and vibrant. When it meanders back to Paige, however, the book becomes more particular, either dunning Paige for his bad attitude (he resented Jackie Robinson for getting in the Majors before him) or else calling out white journalists for telling his story in the patronizing tones of the day. Both are easy targets, but neither approach really gives us a feeling for Paige as anything other than someone we are better off knowing less about.

That's not the book I was hoping to read here. Paige could be ornery, selfish, and a pill, but he was also an amazing character who changed the game he played like few before or since. Sometimes that Paige shows up to make a brief appearance, but "Don't Look Back" doesn't produce him nearly enough.
must read for every 'real' baseball fam
Very good condition, no marks or anything. My boyfriend was super happy to receive this as a gift.
I started out not liking this book, and ended up loving it! This book tells the story Satch "forgot" to tell in his Bio...
Satchel Paige is an enigmatic figure in american histroy. Mention his name, people inevitably think of the negro leagues,or thta terrible bingo long movie.In fact, Paige was ,in many repects, the first modern ballplayer. He played for a percentage of the gate, would only pitch a couple of innings in these contests,had no compuction about jumping from team to team{or country to country}The minstel show,stephifetchit aura that he calculated with the all too eager white press was, of course, a huge ruse. He was a sometimes bitter man{quite understandably so}He knew, instinctively, that he was the best pitcher in the world{although,curiosly, his peers voted Smokey Joe williams better in a 1950 vote in the Pittsburgh Courrier} He despsed the Jim Crow laws, and what he had to do to get around them. HIs civil rights stands were taken in the 20's 30's and 40's, when such things often meant death. He pitched for what might have been the greatest team of all time{the Pittsburgh crawfords of the early 30's] Dimaggio called him ethe toughest pitcher he ever hit against.All of these nuggets are in this book. Mr. Ribowsky did a fine job here. Paige is a figure who should be celebrated for what he wasan american original,a species often sighted but rarely seen. A wonderful book!
Growing up a baby boomer, Satch meant two things. Either Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong, or Leroy "Satchel" Paige. Both legends, both virtuosos, both masters of their domain.

This book covers the latter. The title was from his signature piece of wisdom "Don't look back, someone may be gaining on you".

Satchel Paige was born shortly after Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb. He toiled in the Negro Leagues for over twenty years before Bill Veeck finally brought him to Cleveland for the 1948 pennant winning season. His legend was made by playing to huge crowds in Pittsburgh, Newark, and throughout the Carribean. He also "barnstormed", playing with other Negro Leaguers against the major league all-stars.

What I didn't realize was that Satchel Paige was a first rate star, of the magnatude of Babe Ruth and later, Mickey Mantle. He was legendary not only for his performances, but also for his feats. He would pitch sometimes upwards of 120 games per year. He started almost every game for his teams at times during his career. There was no "catching up to the pitcher" after a hitter saw him three or four times. He was always one step ahead of his quarry. His reportoire was endless.

Most amazingly, Paige was a "rookie" at 42 years old, and an all-star at 44. He pitched for Charlie Finley's Oakland A's at age 59, and toiled three scoreless innings against the fearsome lineup of the Boston Red Sox of Yazstremski, Conigliaro, and Petrocelli.

He moved through life in his own rhythm, with his own inscrutable wisdom, and setting his own pace. He disarmed even the most virulent racists with his easy homespun humor.

Paige was a one of a kind star of stratospheric proportions. A household name.

This book is an excellent and informant treatment of his life and times.