Tales From Baseball’s Twilight Zone: Mostly About Bad and Ugly

Baseball is a funny game, right?

You bet. You’ve seen those hilarious blooper films of bad bounces, comic collisions and funny falls.

You’ve heard the anecdotes of Joe Garagiola and Bob Uecker and Vin Scully.

But the truth is, baseball isn’t always funny. It can also be cold, sad, dirty and mean.

Just ask Yogi Berra, or the Chicago Cubs.

This brilliant insight into baseball struck me while I was reading a funny, enjoyable book, “The Baseball Hall of Shame” (Bruce Nash and Allan Zullo, Wallaby).

It’s not often that I read that kind of book looking for dark undertones. It’s not often that I read a dark book looking for dark undertones, for that matter.

This book even has a cartoon on the cover. I was ready to chuckle.

In the introduction, the authors describe their book as “a way for fans across the country to pay a light-hearted tribute to the national pastime . . . We can all identify--and laugh about--each inductee’s shameful moment because each one of us has at one time or another pulled a ‘rock.’ ”

Right. We can all guffaw about Terry Felton, the Minnesota pitcher from 1979 to 1982 who made 55 appearances without winning and was waived from the big leagues with a 0-16 record.

We can howl with laughter at the fate of Fred Merkle, who was haunted and branded by a simple baserunning mistake he made as a 19-year-old.

“When I die, I guess they’ll put on my tombstone, ‘Here Lies Bonehead Merkle,’ ” he once said, bitterly.

Wouldn’t Neil Simon have a field day writing about funny Fred?

Want more moments to pay lighthearted tribute to?

How about the Topps baseball card people issuing a 1966 card featuring Kenny Hubbs, mistakenly identified as Dick Ellsworth? Funny thing is, Hubbs had died in a plane crash two years earlier.

I should have known what I was in for after reading the first chapter, on inauspicious major league debuts. Harry Heitman, starting for Brooklyn in 1918, pitched to five St. Louis batters, gave up two singles and two triples, threw his glove away and enlisted in the Navy that afternoon.

But my morbid fascination for losers, cheaters and cheatees wouldn’t allow me to stop reading.

The authors assured me that they really meant the book to be lighthearted and fun.

“We wanted to bring to life the real folk heroes of baseball,” Zullo said.

Folk heroes such as:

--Ty Cobb, who once jumped into the stands and punched, kicked and spiked a handicapped fan. “Don’t kick him,” screamed another fan, “he has no hands!” Cobb replied, “I don’t care if he has no feet!”

--Cap Anson, perhaps baseball’s champion bigot. For one exhibition tour, Anson--who refused to play on the same field with black players--hired a young black man as a mascot, to wear a silly costume and shuffle and dance.

--Whitey Ford, who used a specially made ring to secretly gouge baseballs and gain an illegal edge on the hitters. He even cut a ball while pitching in an old-timers’ game.

--Dizzy Dean, who gave up seven runs to the Giants, and in retaliation, hit seven straight Giant batters. In a spring training game.

--Billy Martin, who has a long history of punching out opponents, teammates and, of course, marshmallow salesmen.

If these are the folk heroes, I can’t wait for the villains.

The book, if nothing else, is an interesting concept. The authors simply set out to research the grand old game and come up with baseball’s most shameful and embarrassing moments.

It’s sort of like all those television bloopers shows, only these bloopers aren’t actors blowing lines during rehearsals. They are real people blowing games, reputations and careers.

The book isn’t great literature. It’s simply a collection of anecdotes, far from comprehensive and written in less-than-sparkling prose.

But I love the concept.

This may be the first baseball research project whose goal was simply to expose, or re-expose, as many of the game’s jerks, flops and buffoons as possible.

What next? The authors plan a follow-up book on baseball shame, and similar books on football and basketball.

But why stop there, guys? What about the folk heroes in other occupations, such as sportswriting and insurance selling? What about the most bumbling doctors and dentists of all time, or the zany rocks pulled by airline pilots and air traffic controllers?

What about a White House Hall of Shame, a light-hearted tribute to the worst presidential decisions in American history? I see it developing into a TV show, with Ed McMahon and Dick Clark as hosts, and a laugh track.

It would be a swell way for fans across the country to pay a lighthearted tribute to our light-headed leaders.

Why should baseball have all the fun?