NONFICTION - June 1, 1986

GARVEY by Steve Garvey, with Skip Rozin (Times Books: $16.95; 16 pp. of black-and-white photographs). Steve Garvey is a freak; Dudley Doright in cleats. A common sight: 25 Dodgers get off a bus and walk through a crowd and only Garvey stops to sign autographs. His hair, smile and manners are always perfectly in place.

What does it get him? As Garvey says in his autobiography, “. . . somehow, along the road to becoming successful and popular, I managed to alienate my teammates, fail in my marriage, and, finally, even be rejected by the team I worked so hard to serve (the Dodgers).”

To the fans, Garvey was maybe the all-time most beloved Dodger. To many of his famous Dodger teammates, he was the all-time most resented guy, and here he analyzes where he went right and wrong. It almost brings a tear to your eye when, A.D. (after Dodgers), a Padre prankster stuffs a gooey brownie in Garv’s glove and he doesn’t get mad. In fact, he is quietly thrilled. “I had been too long left out.”

Gossip lovers will be disappointed with the paucity of juicy details of his breakup with Cyndy and of the clubhouse cold war. But Garvey, writing for his young adult fans, gives us an honest look underneath the hair spray.