The Teammates

April 14, 2003
Famed journalist and baseball aficionado Halberstam (Summer of '49) presents a short but sweet account of the lives and friendship of four ballplayers from the legendary Boston Red Sox teams of the 1940s: Ted Williams, Dominic DiMaggio, Johnny Pesky and Bobby Doerr. Told in a series of flashbacks as DiMaggio and Pesky drive from Massachusetts to Florida to see an ailing Williams for what was probably their last time, Halberstam's story is less a biography and more a reverie for "men of a certain generation, born right at the end of World War I" who "had seized on baseball as their one chance to get ahead in America." The book tells the various ways each player "shared an era," from their childhoods to their first meetings through their long tenures with the Red Sox. As in his other sports books, Halberstam has a great eye for the telling detail behind an athlete's facade, whether it is Williams's sense of himself as "a scared, unwanted, unloved kid from a miserable home" or Pesky's stoic acceptance of being blamed for the Red Sox's loss in the seventh game of the 1946 World Series, when in fact—as Halberstam clearly shows—it was not Pesky's fault at all. Fans of Halberstam's work will be satisfied by his chapter-long description of that crucial World Series game. But that is merely the more obviously exciting part of a book in which the main pleasures are more quiet glimpses of the four friends, including Doerr's calming influence over the more explosive Williams, DiMaggio's heroic fight against Paget's disease and the friends' final, touching meeting with Williams in Florida.

February 1, 2003
Upon his death last year, Williams-arguably the game's greatest hitter-was bizarrely placed by his son into a state of frozen limbo at a cryonic facility. Halberstam here gives "Teddy Ballgame" the dignified commemoration he deserves through the memories of the 60-year friendship between Williams and Boston teammates from the 1940s-Bobby Doerr, Dom DiMaggio, and Johnny Pesky. The book, a portrait of both a particular sports era and a lasting friendship that transcended it, includes the men's moving final visit with their dying friend.

Copyright 2003 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2003
Lifelong friendships are as rare as they are treasured. This moving little book from celebrated reporter Halberstam tells the story of one such friendship among four teammates on the Boston Red Sox baseball team of the late 1930s and early 1940s. Ted Williams, Johnny Pesky, Bobby Doerr, and Dom DiMaggio were devoted to one another for nearly 50 years after their playing careers ended, and the friendship still exists today among the survivors. In late 2001, Ted Williams was dying. Pesky and DiMaggio wanted to see him one more time. In the aftermath of September 11, flying wasn't an option, prompting the two octogenarians to drive (with the help of a Boston TV personality) from New England to Florida to see their friend. (Doerr was unable to make the journey.) With uncommon sensitivity, Halberstam recounts the trip and celebrates the life of this memorable friendship. Williams was the dominant personality and the glue that held the group together. (The joke was that Dom's brother Joe's record 56-game hitting streak was insignificant compared to the 30,000 consecutive arguments Williams won within the group.) There are anecdotes of the four men's playing days and summaries of their satisfying lives in retirement, but what brings the story full circle and gives it added depth are the visits with the very ill Williams--visits in which the twinkle-eyed curmudgeon showed brief sparks of the man his friends had loved for almost 60 years. This account of good people living full lives and appreciating the experience will move readers in the same way that " Tuesdays with Morrie "did.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2003, American Library Association.)