Books in Brief: Stengel

Stengel, by Robert W. Creamer (Simon & Schuster, 349 pp., $16.95)

Casey Stengel was not born old, mugging for cameras and marching around after old-timers’ dinners crying “Metsies! Metsies! Metsies!” He played the game, and at his peak he played it in the outfield for John McGraw’s New York Giants. From McGraw he learned the imprecise science of managing a baseball team. In 1949 he became manager of the Yankees, and in 12 seasons he piloted them to ten pennants. He told a friend: “I never had so many good players. . . . I’m with a lot of real pros. When I think of some of those other teams I had, I was wondering whether I was managing a baseball team or a golf course. You know what I mean—one pro to a club.” Casey was talented, but he was also funny, and a lot of people overlooked the talent for the humor, choosing to believe that given such a team as the Yankees, anybody could have compiled Casey’s record. Mr. Creamer takes pains to describe the genius of Casey’s managing; but he doesn’t forget the humor, either. “Being with a woman all night never hurt no professional baseball player,” Casey advised. “It’s staying up all night looking for a woman that does him in.” More advice: “Good-pitching will always stop good hitting, and vice versa.” And for real connoisseurs, here’s a sample of thickest Stengelese (the subject is Roberto Clemente): “Now he’s an outstanding player, he can do everything and it’s like Kaline did and I studied outfielding so much I can’t understand how a man where I can play the best or in center field why a man what’s right-handed shouldn’t be in left field because a left-handed man in left field and he’s out of position so half the time himself, yessir?” Not even Creamer can figure this one out.

JM

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Joe Mysak

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Stengel, by Robert W. Creamer (Simon & Schuster, 349 pp., $16.95)

Casey Stengel was not born old, mugging for cameras and marching around after old-timers’ dinners crying “Metsies! Metsies! Metsies!” He played the game, and at his peak he played it in the outfield for John McGraw’s New York Giants. From McGraw he learned the imprecise science of managing a baseball team. In 1949 he became manager of the Yankees, and in 12 seasons he piloted them to ten pennants. He told a friend: “I never had so many good players. . . . I’m with a lot of real pros. When I think of some of those other teams I had, I was wondering whether I was managing a baseball team or a golf course. You know what I mean—one pro to a club.” Casey was talented, but he was also funny, and a lot of people overlooked the talent for the humor, choosing to believe that given such a team as the Yankees, anybody could have compiled Casey’s record. Mr. Creamer takes pains to describe the genius of Casey’s managing; but he doesn’t forget the humor, either. “Being with a woman all night never hurt no professional baseball player,” Casey advised. “It’s staying up all night looking for a woman that does him in.” More advice: “Good-pitching will always stop good hitting, and vice versa.” And for real connoisseurs, here’s a sample of thickest Stengelese (the subject is Roberto Clemente): “Now he’s an outstanding player, he can do everything and it’s like Kaline did and I studied outfielding so much I can’t understand how a man where I can play the best or in center field why a man what’s right-handed shouldn’t be in left field because a left-handed man in left field and he’s out of position so half the time himself, yessir?” Not even Creamer can figure this one out.