The Bronx Zoo: The Astonishing Inside Story of the 1978 World Championship New York Yankees, Sparky Lyle and Peter Golenbock

A day-by-day diary by Lyle, who won the Cy Young and then promptly got sidelined by Billy Martin and George Steinbrenner in favor of Goose Gossage. The book is interesting because you couldn't set up a plot like this in a movie and not have people booing in disbelief; the Yankees were behind by 14 games at the All-Star Break, Steinbrenner is certifiably nuts, and Reggie Jackson is... Well, he's Reggie. He had a candy bar named after himself.

I liked Ball Four better, as pitcher memoirs go; this one is more coherent and tells more of a story, but that one has a more likeable narrator. (Yes, I know, it's just Lyle being Lyle, but the way he brags about some of the shit he did... The 70's were a different time, but reading the stories about his reaction to women reporters being allowed in the locker room for the first time really wigged me out.)

Grade: C

originally posted 2006