New Ty Cobb Biography - "War on the Basepaths" by Tim Hornbaker

[Tabe]

Have just completed the latest work by Tim Hornbaker, and enjoyed it thoroughly. Thought I would share with all of you the review I wrote of it:

The last 15 years or so, coinciding with the meteoric rise in internet access and usage, have seen an explosion in books and other coverage of the early history of baseball. From Ken Burns's dynamic PBS miniseries to the incredible work from the folks at SABR, our knowledge of those long-gone days continues to grow every day. As a result, we have gotten fantastic, definitive biographies on many of baseball's greatest early stars - Walter Johnson, Babe Ruth, Christy Mathewson, Nap Lajoie and many others with one major exception.

Ty Cobb.

Over the last 50 years, Cobb has been the subject of two biographies and his own autobiography. Unfortunately, Ty's co-author on his autobiography (Al Stump), also the author of one of the two biographies, has been proven a fraud whose writings are highly suspect at best. The other biography, by historian Charles Alexander, is now 30 years old and suffers from factual inaccuracies and a reliance on the work of Stump. Thus we are left with a dearth of credible, in-depth coverage of Cobb.

Into that void has stepped Tim Hornbaker. Hornbaker first came to prominence as the author of a serious, scholarly tome on the history of pro
wrestling's National Wrestling Alliance. The depth and quality of his research for that title elevated pro wrestling writing to a level rarely reached in the realm of sports non-fiction. Unfortunately, while highly detailed, "National Wrestling Alliance: The Untold Story of the Monopoly That Strangled Pro Wrestling" suffered from being over-long, out of order chronologically, and a habit of using real names in places where performance names were better suited.

Thankfully, Hornbaker's newest work, "War on the Basepaths: The Definitive Biography of Ty Cobb" suffers from none of those faults. Hornbaker seeks to peel back the layers of Cobb mythology and reveal the true facts of his career and personality, a goal which he largely reaches. The Cobb of Hornbaker's telling is a nuanced, complicated man prone to wild fits of anger coupled with deep sensitivity to teasing and a difficulty in socializing at a young age. The sum is a more complete portrait of Cobb than ever seen before, one setting aside some of the fairy tales we have heard so often, while offering supporting information for other not-so-flattering stories, including seemingly dozens of fights, brawls, and near-altercations. Strong evidence is provided that Cobb was, indeed as he's been accused so many times, a racist, albeit not a hateful one a la the KKK. These revelations are balanced against tales of Cobb struggling with fitting in with his teammates who teased and hazed frequently as a young player, even sawing his bats in half.

Obviously, no biography of Ty Cobb would be complete without many, many stories of Cobb's feats on the diamond and "War on the Basepaths" certainly delivers in that respect. We are regaled with stories of Cobb scoring from first on singles, stealing home, making great catches, hitting five home runs over the course of two days, and more. These stories of Cobb are set in the larger context of early 20th century baseball, a place where many, many things are different than what we see today. A player choosing to stay in the field rather than walk past abusive fans while team bats? Players sitting in the opposing team's dugout? Fans on the field? They are all here.

For all its positives, "War on the Basepaths" is not perfect. There are a few places where an incorrect word is used ("viral" where "virile" is clearly intended, "weary" instead of "wary", "council" instead of "counsel", etc). Further, Hornbaker occasionally falls into a pattern seen in the works of so many other authors covering baseball's dead ball era - the use of dated wording reminiscent of writings of the early 20th century. For example, on occasion Hornbaker refers to Cobb as a "batsman" rather than the modern "hitter" that would be more appropriate. In addition, Hornbaker largely accepts Cobb's explanation of not seeking to injure opposing players on the basepaths (with two exceptions). This acceptance ignores a very famous photo of Cobb that features him leaping him into a catcher at home plate with what looks to be a flying kick to a very tender place for the unfortunate recipient of Cobb's "slide". There are also occasional statistical oddities (at various points in the book, Ty's career games played number is given as 3033, 3034, and 3035).

Still, these are (obviously) incredibly minor niggles in what is a fabulous work of baseball history. "War on the Basepaths" is a highly entertaining, very detailed yet eminently readable biography of the man once considered baseball's greatest-ever star (receiving more Hall of Fame votes than even Babe Ruth). Over its roughly 290 pages (supplemented by some 60 pages of footnotes), "War on the Basepaths" reaches the highest echelons of baseball biography previously reached by titles such as "The Big Bam", "Ted Williams: The Biography of an American Hero" and a handful of others.

With "War on the Basepaths", Tim Hornbaker sought to produce the definitive biography of Ty Cobb. With his voluminous research and entertaining writing, Tim Hornbaker has achieved exactly that. Well done, Mr. Hornbaker.

[clydepepper]

Chris

I do appreciate your review. I'll consider what you revealed when decided whether or not to add to my already-too big library. I have the autobiography and the Alexander book.

Using 'batsman' instead of 'hitter' is okay with me as that WAS what they were called at the time and that adds to the accuracy of the story.

I'm not fan, however, of books that have not been sufficiently edited, which your final lines showed. Sounds like he relied too heavily on WordPerfect and not the human approach.

You mentioned that there were what you see as definitive biographies of Wagner, Ruth, Mathewson, Johnson, and Lajoie.

The two I own that I consider absolute definitive biographies of Ruth and Johnson are Robert Creamer's 'Babe: The Legend Comes to Life' and our own Hank Thomas's ode to his grandfather, 'Walter Johnson: Baseball's Big Train.'

Both of these books are priceless and incomparable as far as I'm concerned.

What biographies of Wagner and Mathewson do you consider the best?

[Tabe]

For me, "The Big Bam" would count as a definitive for Ruth. I have not yet read Creamer's book but have heard it's great.

I heartily agree with you on the Johnson bio. That book was fantastic.

As for Wagner, "Honus Wagner: The Life of Baseball's "Flying Dutchman"" by Hittner is regarded as great.

For Mathewson, I would go with "Christy Mathewson, the Christian Gentleman: How One Man's Faith and Fastball Forever Changed Baseball" by Gaines.


We will agree to disagree on "batsman" It's an antiquated term that sticks out when used in modern prose, IMHO.

Don't let my couple of niggles on Hornbaker's book dissuade you from reading it. It really is terrific. In general, the book is well-edited and "tight" but those couple things did slip through.