The Bronx Zoo

 

The Bronx Zoo: The Astonishing Inside Story of the 1978 World Champion New York Yankees by Sparky Lyle and Peter Goldenbock

A diary of the 1978 New York Yankees baseball season told by 1977 Cy Young Winner Sparky Lyle. Such baseball books are not that uncommon.  I read Jim Bouton’s “Ball Four” about the 1969 season with the Seattle Pilots and Keith Hernandez’s “If At First” about the 1985 (not 1986) New York Mets. Bouton’s book, when released, caused an awful lot of controversy due to its supposed realistic off-color portrayal of the Major Leagues. Commissioner Bowie Kuhn was so upset about it, he tried to coax Bouton into claiming the whole thing was fiction. Bouton refused. It seems a bit silly when read now.  THIS was controversial?? It’s definitely mild by today’s standards.  Hernandez’s tale of 1985 was a lot more colorful, yet even that one was probably heavily censored.

Sparky Lyle’s account of the 1978 Yankees is PG rated at best (or worst) so don’t expect much dirt and gossip. It’s a pretty straightforward tale of a year in baseball.  There’s a few four-letter words scattered about, and some angry name calling against some of the lesser desired personalities, but it’s mostly baseball. Like a 162-season itself, this can wear on one a bit. We read a lot of the same things over and over again. There’s only so much that goes on during a baseball season that makes a reader want to sit on the edge of their seat and keep turning pages.

Some highlights: Lyle starts the season as the reigning Cy Young champion, yet overlord owner George Steinbrenner signs Rich “Goose” Gossage to the team during the off-season.  Huh?  Lyle is obviously frustrated, and remains so the entire year, but he mostly handles the situation with a shrug-of-the-shoulders mentality.  He accepts his new “bullpen role” better than most.  Then we read about the back-and-forth between the Yankees and the Boston Red Sox.  The Sox had what seemed to be an insurmountable lead in the division as late as August, yet the Yankees manage to climb their way into the top spot and manage to win the division on the last day of the season.

We then have poor Billy Martin who is let go mid-season and replaced by Bob Lemon.  Lyle and the team seem to like Billy Martin ok, and seem to think he takes too much unnecessary heat from meddling owner George Steinbrenner. For those that followed the Yankees during the Steinbrenner era know that you need a mainframe computer to keep track of all of the managerial changes that would happen.  I honestly lost track how many times Billy Martin was hired and fired during this time. Anyway, George Steinbrenner is definitely NOT liked by the team. Neither is Reggie Jackson.  Reggie Jackson comes across as an egotistical hot dog who only cares about getting acknowledged by the press, and if that means doing detrimental things to the team (both on and off the field), such is the price for stardom.

Most of the other personalities on the team blend in the pages, and other than guys like pitcher Ron Guidry who went 25-3 that year, it’s easy to get names confused unless you were a fan of the team 40+ years ago.  Recommendation to all jocks who want a write a book such as this: Include a “cast of characters” at the beginning or end of the book. Most of your readers, especially several years in the future, will have hard time juggling all of names other than the superstars. It doesn’t help when Lyle is always mixing in the players’ nick names as well;  Cat, Dirt, Gid, Count, and several others  I don’t even remember.

My only main frustration with this book is that once the regular season ends, Lyle basically gives up his narrative. He should have also included the post-season, yet he just throws in the championship and world series details as a quick afterthought. It’s a bit like when the teacher tells the students that time has run out during a test and they have to turn in their paper, so the remaining students quickly scribble one or two more hastily written sentences.  Other than a quick postscript of Lyle getting traded to the Texas Rangers at the end of the season, there’s no reflection, or summary included here. Since the season was so colorful and memorable, the post season deserved a bit more attention than what Lyle gave it.

To be truthful, 45 years later, I really don’t care THAT much, but had I been a diehard Yankee fan, I would have wanted more at the end. A lot more.  Anyway, it’s fun to read a bit about what the professionals endure during a season.  There have been better books.  Again, I would recommend Keith Hernandez’s “If At First” for a similar retrospective. Even though the Mets didn’t make the post-season in 1985, it’s still a much better tale.