Let's Play Two

January 15, 2019
A new biography of Major League Baseball Hall of Famer Ernie Banks (1931-2015).Sports journalist Rapoport (The Immortal Bobby: Bobby Jones and the Golden Age of Golf, 2005, etc.), who wrote for the Chicago Sun-Times for more than two decades, began his project as a collaborator with the baseball legend; however, after Banks died, the author decided to transform the intended autobiography into a biography. Banks is best known for his sterling play as a power-hitting shortstop, his nearly 20-year career with the hapless Chicago Cubs, and his eternally cheery outlook on baseball and life. Rapoport does not debunk the essential truths of those surface qualities, but he offers copious evidence that Banks was more complicated than most baseball fans know. Banks grew up as one of 12 children in Dallas, in a time of cruel racial segregation. Until he entered the Army in 1951 (he served in Germany during the Korean War) and then broke the color barrier on the Cubs two years later, he had no meaningful contact with open racism, leaving him deeply naïve about what he would face throughout his life. Intellectually curious and self-effacing, Banks may have lost his naiveté about racism, but he chose to avoid the crusader label. As a result, he faced a lifetime of puzzlement and occasional criticism for his refusal to speak out against segregation, especially from Chicagoans appalled by the virulent racism infecting the city. In his family life, Banks' sunny disposition hid his eventual alienation from his parents, siblings, wives, and children. Despite the author's periodic coverage of social issues, he devotes the bulk of the biography to baseball on the field and in the clubhouse. Dedicated baseball fans will appreciate Rapoport's coverage of dozens of Cubs players, field managers, and executives, including the complicated Wrigley family owners. One of the book's shortcomings is the author's attempts to cram in too much information about seven decades of baseball, but that's a minor quibble.A refreshing sports biography that punctures common myths about one of baseball's greats.

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Starred review from February 25, 2019
Rapoport, a 20-year veteran sports columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, delivers what is sure to be the definitive biography of Chicago Cubs baseball player Ernie Banks (1931–2015), a man known by fans as “Mr. Cub.” Through more than 100 interviews with Banks’s family, friends, and teammates, Rapoport traces a complicated life that was masked by a “constant public display of good cheer” during Banks’s career, summed up in his signature line: “It’s a beautiful day for a ball game, let’s play two.” Rapoport expertly describes the skills that made Banks a Hall of Famer in 1977, particularly how Banks “transformed the nature of power hitting” through a combination of upper body strength and a light bat, a practice that Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle copied. Rapoport reveals how throughout his life Banks masked his “tortured soul”—in his childhood of poverty in Dallas; while playing in the Negro Leagues in Kansas City; during the move to the Cubs in 1953, where he had to deal with the city’s segregation; and playing under hypercritical manager Leo Durocher during his final years. This marvelous look at the life of a beloved athlete should be essential reading for baseball fans, and Cubs lovers especially.

April 1, 2019

Ernie Banks (1931-2015) was, is, and forever will be Mr. Cub. In his 19 years with the team, he hit 512 home runs, drove in 1,636 runs, and was a 14-time All Star and two-time MVP while, sealing his place in the pantheon of baseball gods, consistently leading the league in smiles and goodwill despite playing on teams that were wretched also-rans or, in 1969, suffered one of the most storied collapses in baseball history, costing them their greatest chance at a pennant. In this well-documented biography, veteran sportswriter Rapoport (From Black Sox to Three-Peats) seeks to unveil the more complex person behind the mask of unwavering good humor. Counter to his public persona, Banks was distant to his siblings, his children, and his ex-wives. As presented, Banks appears to be a classic introvert, needful of downtime away from people, who adopted an outgoing facade, not to promote his "brand" but for self-preservation to keep others at bay. VERDICT Regardless if readers are interested in Banks's psychological makeup, those who grew up baseball fans in the 1950s and 1960s will not want to miss this account of him and his midcentury Cubs.--Jim Burns, formerly with Jacksonville P.L., FL

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2019
Yes, there are two biographies of Chicago Cub baseball legend Ernie Banks with the same title, appearing within a month of each other. Most Cubs fans won't mind the duplication one bit. First, because both books are fine sports biographies, and, second, because from the 1950s into the '70s, Ernie Banks was the Chicago Cubs and?for fans of a certain age?always will be. Banks had a Hall of Fame career, highlighted by two National League MVP awards, yet was often viewed nationally, particularly after he retired, with some sadness, given that he never played in the postseason. There is, of course, significant overlap between the two books, especially regarding Banks' on-field triumphs, but each title has its individual strengths, and both deserve places in most sports collections.The primary difference in the books? Rapoport, a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times for 20 years, knew Banks very well, and that relationship, as well as Rapoport's knowledge of Chicago sports, informs much of his account, including his coverage of Banks' early years in Chicago, at a time when the city was the most segregated large urban area in the country. Banks' excellence on the field quickly became apparent after the Cubs purchased his contract from the Negro League Kansas City Monarchs in 1953, and, soon enough, he was a celebrity on both sides of Chicago's de facto color line separating North Side from South. Rapoport shows both sides of that celebrity, too, noting that Banks tried to establish a future, post-baseball career for himself in the off-seasons, while he was still playing, but was unable to do so, mostly because whatever bank or government agency hired him traded only on his fame rather than grooming him to be a useful employee. So Banks' retirement years were spent largely as an ambassador for the Cubs. Despite the cheerful titular catchphrase associated with Banks, there was a great deal of sadness woven into his life, and Rapoport presents that aspect of the man sensitively, noting especially the toll that the Cubs' failures took on their star.Wilson is a former college baseball player, a member of the Society for American Baseball Research, and the author of four previous books on baseball. He's a serious student of the game, a meticulous researcher, and a fine writer. Like Rapoport, Wilson provides details of Banks' North Dallas youth, his stint with the Kansas City Monarchs, and his emergence in the fifties as one of baseball's first Black stars. Wilson's book is more analytical than Rapoport's, looking closely at the numbers, but he also does a fine job of using interviews with Banks' teammates to enhance the narrative. Both books offer fine accounts of the disastrous 1969 season, when the Cubs blew a large lead to the Mets in the closing weeks of the season. Like Rapoport, Wilson gets behind Banks' cheerful persona to reveal the man's deep-seated melancholy, again using interviews to bring out a complex personality. A well-constructed, empathetic biography.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)