Gil Hodges was by almost all accounts a great man and baseball player. He became a legend first as a slugging star for the Brooklyn Dodgers in the 1950s, then added to it by managing the New York Mets to their first World Series championship in 1969. Too soon after, he died, and people seemed to forget about him.
Mort Zachter makes a case for why Hodges should be remembered.
Other sports legends made their mark with the aid of exploding tempers, selfishness, outsized personalities, and crafty gamesmanship. Think Ty Cobb, Pete Rose, Muhammad Ali, John McEnroe, Ben Davidson, the Iron Sheik. Hodges, as Zachter points out time and again, played it cool, maybe too much so.
Other sports legends made their mark with the aid of exploding tempers, selfishness, outsized personalities, and crafty gamesmanship. Think Ty Cobb, Pete Rose, Muhammad Ali, John McEnroe, Ben Davidson, the Iron Sheik. Hodges, as Zachter points out time and again, played it cool, maybe too much so.
He was gracious and even-tempered, friendly to fans, and accepted in a fuss-free way both direction from his managers and contract terms from his employers. The word one often sees associated with Hodges is "quiet." As Zachter notes, this was not always seen as a plus.
"If he'd ever blow up, if he'd push an umpire around, Gil would be the greatest," Zachter quotes Leo Durocher, the famously combative manager who ran the first Dodgers team Hodges played on and later led the club that battled the Mets to make the 1969 postseason.
As Zachter tells it, Durocher may have had a point. Sure, Hodges's team won it all in 1969, but Durocher is better remembered, for the famous saying "nice guys finish last" (which Durocher always claimed was a misquote, but it captured the spirit of the man), and for other things, among them his famous outbursts on the field and elsewhere. He was known to all in baseball as "Leo The Lip." With Hodges, both as a player and especially as a manager, it was hard for reporters to get much out of him at all.
Bottom line, Durocher is in the Hall of Fame. Hodges is not. Fewer and fewer people seem at all bothered by that these days. Hodges is remembered, yes, but in a warm and fuzzy way that tends toward "Boys of Summer" sentimentality and eschews hard statistics.
But Hodges did some incredible things statistically while playing the game. Zachter points out that when Hodges retired as a player, he led all but one [Jimmie Foxx] of baseball's other right-handed batters in career home runs, with 370. He drove in over 100 runs for seven consecutive years, hit for the cycle, hit four home runs in a game, hit a then-record 14 career grand slams, and also won the first three Gold Glove awards for his position. Zachter points out the first year they gave out the Gold Glove, 1957, they didn't give out a separate set of awards for players in the American and National Leagues. No question Hodges made a mark in his own time.
Add to that the story of the Mets, which Hodges took over as manager in 1968 and piloted through to his sudden death in April, 1972, and you have a pretty good case for someone who should be in the Hall of Fame. Instead, Hodges is a record-holder of another, less happy kind: the most votes for induction of any player not yet enshrined.
"Unfortunately, integrity, sportsmanship, and character are unquantifiable," Zachter writes in his preface. "They are also a challenge for any writer hoping to cut through the legend that surrounds Hodges hoping to find the humanity that lies beneath."
Zachter manages a solid account despite that challenge. He interviewed surviving players and coaches and apparently anyone else he could find with the most tangential connection to Hodges. He spent a lot of time researching old newspapers, team contracts, even the correspondence Hodges sent his family while serving as a U. S. Marine in the Pacific during World War II.
Throughout the book, a portrait emerges of a stolid, clean-living man who was directed by his sense of fair play and a quiet but abiding religious faith. Zachter relates how once, on a team flight, Hodges declined a steak dinner while picking at his salad. It was Friday and he was Catholic. A travelling secretary said he had heard there was a dispensation for players who needed to get up their strength.
Hodges replied by asking what altitude they were flying at: 21,000 feet. "I think I'll stick to this salad," he said. "We're a little too close to headquarters."
That Hodges had a keen sense of humor is one revelation in Zachter's book. During an exhibition series the Dodgers played in Japan, Zachter relates how Hodges, playing left field, entertained spectators by gesture-asking where they thought he should position himself and by imitating the motions of the pitcher in exaggerated style.
He also had quite a temper. Keeping it locked in the way he did may have contributed, along with a longtime smoking habit, to his early death from heart attack. Late in his first managerial stint, helming the old Washington Senators, he watched his team blow a lead to the Detroit Tigers and lose a key game. After, he went to the clubhouse and turned seven wooden stools into splinters. Even then, though, the players were kept outside while Hodges had his tantrum.
Zachter's book is particularly good at capturing his time managing the Senators, which was actually a longer tenure than the one he had managing the Mets. Incorporating elements such as a five-man rotation and aggressive platooning, he found a formula that helped the Senators overcome an acute talent deficit and reverse years of cellar-dwelling in the American League. Later, he would employ this same approach with the Mets, with even greater success.
Zachter also concentrates on the personal relationships Hodges formed, including one with a player Hodges talked off a bridge, and another (Ken Harrelson) who was one of the few people who had little good to say about Hodges. Most everyone else liked him, though it was tinged with more than a bit of fear. A long stare from Hodges the war veteran apparently had more impact than a tirade from almost anyone else.
"In New York, Hodges set an example for his players, rarely losing his temper," Zachter writes. "But when he did, the results were terrifying."
Lack of communication was a common problem, apparently. Hodges didn't talk much to his players, even though he was patient and developed mentor relationships with many of them. Zachter gets some good material from his interviews, particularly from Mets outfielder Ron Swoboda, who clashed often with Hodges until Hodges had him traded.
Gil Hodges the book suffers a bit from the same problem as Gil Hodges the man, or at least the Hall of Fame candidate. What made him special was not the same stuff that makes one legendary. Zachter's focus, at times off-putting, on Hodges' non-enshrinement tends to get lost in a lot of relativistic stats, the sort of thing Bill James likes to mock. For example, he points out how Hodges hit more home runs than any other World Series-winning manager, which is more like trivia than a credential. Zachter's approach, as he acknowledged in promotional material accompanying the book, was not to go too deep into game descriptions. As a result he too often skims seasons and just picks out highlights. It gets kind of bland.
He also uses the abbreviation "RBIs," which is something I learned the hard way is wrong. Like "deer" and "fowl," "RBI" is the operable term regardless of the number involved.
I have to confess a conflict of interest reviewing this book. Hodges was a good friend of my father's; I grew up in a household where Gil Hodges stories came thick and often and his name was revered. He had such big hands, Dad used to tell me, that one time when you were a baby he sat your butt on his hand and lifted you over his head. Dad knew a lot of baseball guys, but Gil was his favorite. As Frank Slocum had passed away in 1997, Zachter reached out to me. Only five when he died, I had little to offer him, and nothing I said got used, but I'm mentioned in the acknowledgments anyway.
Also, I have to confess he sent me a free review copy.
If I didn't like Gil Hodges I doubt I'd be reviewing it at all. But I did like it, often quite a lot. I felt Zachter, in his probing, sometimes uncomfortable, yet altogether respectful way, gave me a chance to meet a man I only knew as a vaguely familiar face. The positive on Zachter's book, the biggest for me, is the way he sheds new light on a legend that is growing stiffer and colder the more he passes from living memory. I enjoyed his company. I think you will, too.
"If he'd ever blow up, if he'd push an umpire around, Gil would be the greatest," Zachter quotes Leo Durocher, the famously combative manager who ran the first Dodgers team Hodges played on and later led the club that battled the Mets to make the 1969 postseason.
As Zachter tells it, Durocher may have had a point. Sure, Hodges's team won it all in 1969, but Durocher is better remembered, for the famous saying "nice guys finish last" (which Durocher always claimed was a misquote, but it captured the spirit of the man), and for other things, among them his famous outbursts on the field and elsewhere. He was known to all in baseball as "Leo The Lip." With Hodges, both as a player and especially as a manager, it was hard for reporters to get much out of him at all.
Bottom line, Durocher is in the Hall of Fame. Hodges is not. Fewer and fewer people seem at all bothered by that these days. Hodges is remembered, yes, but in a warm and fuzzy way that tends toward "Boys of Summer" sentimentality and eschews hard statistics.
But Hodges did some incredible things statistically while playing the game. Zachter points out that when Hodges retired as a player, he led all but one [Jimmie Foxx] of baseball's other right-handed batters in career home runs, with 370. He drove in over 100 runs for seven consecutive years, hit for the cycle, hit four home runs in a game, hit a then-record 14 career grand slams, and also won the first three Gold Glove awards for his position. Zachter points out the first year they gave out the Gold Glove, 1957, they didn't give out a separate set of awards for players in the American and National Leagues. No question Hodges made a mark in his own time.
Add to that the story of the Mets, which Hodges took over as manager in 1968 and piloted through to his sudden death in April, 1972, and you have a pretty good case for someone who should be in the Hall of Fame. Instead, Hodges is a record-holder of another, less happy kind: the most votes for induction of any player not yet enshrined.
"Unfortunately, integrity, sportsmanship, and character are unquantifiable," Zachter writes in his preface. "They are also a challenge for any writer hoping to cut through the legend that surrounds Hodges hoping to find the humanity that lies beneath."
Zachter manages a solid account despite that challenge. He interviewed surviving players and coaches and apparently anyone else he could find with the most tangential connection to Hodges. He spent a lot of time researching old newspapers, team contracts, even the correspondence Hodges sent his family while serving as a U. S. Marine in the Pacific during World War II.
Throughout the book, a portrait emerges of a stolid, clean-living man who was directed by his sense of fair play and a quiet but abiding religious faith. Zachter relates how once, on a team flight, Hodges declined a steak dinner while picking at his salad. It was Friday and he was Catholic. A travelling secretary said he had heard there was a dispensation for players who needed to get up their strength.
Hodges replied by asking what altitude they were flying at: 21,000 feet. "I think I'll stick to this salad," he said. "We're a little too close to headquarters."
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| Gil Hodges in his office as manager of the New York Mets during the 1969 season. According to Zachter's book, the stuffed rabbit was a gift from a fan who figured just sending the team a rabbit's foot wasn't enough. [Image from nydailynews.com.] |
He also had quite a temper. Keeping it locked in the way he did may have contributed, along with a longtime smoking habit, to his early death from heart attack. Late in his first managerial stint, helming the old Washington Senators, he watched his team blow a lead to the Detroit Tigers and lose a key game. After, he went to the clubhouse and turned seven wooden stools into splinters. Even then, though, the players were kept outside while Hodges had his tantrum.
Zachter's book is particularly good at capturing his time managing the Senators, which was actually a longer tenure than the one he had managing the Mets. Incorporating elements such as a five-man rotation and aggressive platooning, he found a formula that helped the Senators overcome an acute talent deficit and reverse years of cellar-dwelling in the American League. Later, he would employ this same approach with the Mets, with even greater success.
Zachter also concentrates on the personal relationships Hodges formed, including one with a player Hodges talked off a bridge, and another (Ken Harrelson) who was one of the few people who had little good to say about Hodges. Most everyone else liked him, though it was tinged with more than a bit of fear. A long stare from Hodges the war veteran apparently had more impact than a tirade from almost anyone else.
"In New York, Hodges set an example for his players, rarely losing his temper," Zachter writes. "But when he did, the results were terrifying."
Lack of communication was a common problem, apparently. Hodges didn't talk much to his players, even though he was patient and developed mentor relationships with many of them. Zachter gets some good material from his interviews, particularly from Mets outfielder Ron Swoboda, who clashed often with Hodges until Hodges had him traded.
Gil Hodges the book suffers a bit from the same problem as Gil Hodges the man, or at least the Hall of Fame candidate. What made him special was not the same stuff that makes one legendary. Zachter's focus, at times off-putting, on Hodges' non-enshrinement tends to get lost in a lot of relativistic stats, the sort of thing Bill James likes to mock. For example, he points out how Hodges hit more home runs than any other World Series-winning manager, which is more like trivia than a credential. Zachter's approach, as he acknowledged in promotional material accompanying the book, was not to go too deep into game descriptions. As a result he too often skims seasons and just picks out highlights. It gets kind of bland.
He also uses the abbreviation "RBIs," which is something I learned the hard way is wrong. Like "deer" and "fowl," "RBI" is the operable term regardless of the number involved.
I have to confess a conflict of interest reviewing this book. Hodges was a good friend of my father's; I grew up in a household where Gil Hodges stories came thick and often and his name was revered. He had such big hands, Dad used to tell me, that one time when you were a baby he sat your butt on his hand and lifted you over his head. Dad knew a lot of baseball guys, but Gil was his favorite. As Frank Slocum had passed away in 1997, Zachter reached out to me. Only five when he died, I had little to offer him, and nothing I said got used, but I'm mentioned in the acknowledgments anyway.
Also, I have to confess he sent me a free review copy.
If I didn't like Gil Hodges I doubt I'd be reviewing it at all. But I did like it, often quite a lot. I felt Zachter, in his probing, sometimes uncomfortable, yet altogether respectful way, gave me a chance to meet a man I only knew as a vaguely familiar face. The positive on Zachter's book, the biggest for me, is the way he sheds new light on a legend that is growing stiffer and colder the more he passes from living memory. I enjoyed his company. I think you will, too.
Bill,
ReplyDeleteThank you for reviewing my book. For many years, the working title was "The Team Game First: A Life of Gil Hodges." As the book was being finalized the publisher suggested "Gil Hodges: A Hall of Fame Life." I agreed. In retrospect, I think plain old, "Gil Hodges: A Life" would have been most appropriate.
Mort