Strike Four A Baseball Novel

Sports & Outdoors

synopsis

Synopsis

Major League Baseball has been crippled by yet another players’ strike, and the fans have had enough, tired of paying to see ballplayers with seven-figure egos but ten-cent work ethics. When baseball’s commissioner floats the idea of enlisting the minor leaguers to keep revenues flowing, Lew Pearson, the aging player-manager of the Triple-A Indianapolis Outlaws, sees his chance to fulfill a lifelong dream. Having never had more than a “cup of coffee” in the big league, Lew leaves his wife and two young kids behind to play in the bigs, even though he knows he and his teammates will just be the pawns of the owners. Baseball runs deep in his blood – his father’s own professional dreams were trampled on many years before – and despite the big asterisk that will accompany every game, it’s an opportunity that beckons him. But no one, including Lew, the owners and the striking Major Leaguers, could predict how fans would embrace these farmhands, who take the field every day not for their big paychecks but purely for the love of the game. At first the crowds are small, but as the fan frenzy takes root in ballparks across the country, both sides of the strike confront a new normal, and an audacious plan takes shape in board rooms to determine once and for all whether the Major Leaguers or the minor leaguers will get the privilege of remaining in “the show.”

bio

Author Biography

Gary Frisch is a long-time sports fan with a special place in his heart for hockey and baseball. A lifelong writer and former journalist, he has contributed many articles and columns to a variety of newspapers and magazines. He was inspired to write Strike Four as a result of multiple player strikes and lockouts that marred baseball in the 1980s and ‘90s, during which the media frequently speculated that owners might bring up minor league players to fill the rosters. Frisch works in the public relations field, and has owned his own PR agency since 2007. In 2015, he was named to Linkedin’s inaugural list of “Top Voices of the Year” for his contributions to the business networking site’s blog. He lives in Gloucester Township, New Jersey, with his wife and two children, and frequently writes under the watchful eye of his cat and two dogs.

website

Author Insight

The Need to Keep Pushing On

It’s academic to say any goal worth achieving requires a ton of hard work, and probably some sacrifice. Nothing comes to us easily, and it’s up to each of us to determine how much we want to work for it, how hard to keep pushing. Sometimes, we want to prove something to ourselves. Sometimes, we seek validation from other important people in our lives, like our parents, or spouse, or children. Wherever we get inspiration from, the desire to keep pushing to a goal is a very personal emotion. In “Strike Four,” Lew Pearson, the aging player-manager of a minor league baseball team, wants desperately to return to the Major League, where he had “a cup of coffee” earlier in his career. But it’s not just a dream unrealized; he feels if he can get to the “Show” and stick around, he will somehow vindicate his father, whose baseball career was unceremoniously cut short. So despite knowing he’s a pawn of the owners, that there will always be an asterisk after his name, he pushes on for deeply personal reasons.

Book Excerpt

Strike Four A Baseball Novel

He looked at the view of Detroit out the west-facing 10th floor window. “Then you get to bat, and the fans call out your name. I don’t think I’ve ever once stepped up to that plate and not felt like a ten-year-old. You’d think playing a game for a living would get old, but it’s just the opposite. It keeps you young, like nothing else. You take away the crowd, the stadium, the announcers, and it’s sandlot ball, every time you step up to the plate.”

Renée looked at Lew wistfully. “It’s not just a game, though, is it? Not now at least…”

“Nah, it’s still a game, just a bigger game. We’re only the pieces. Sometimes the players can’t see it. That’s what did in my dad. Eight seasons with St. Louis. He was going pretty well – or at least he thought so. Had a regular spot in the lineup, a career two-seventy-five average. Wasn’t a star, but a respected player.”

He fiddled with his belt, which was laying on the bed.

“Then one day, out of the blue, management gave him his unconditional release. They’d found someone better. Not much better as it turned out, but younger, so they could pay him less. They told my dad he ‘didn’t fit into the team’s long term plans’ – great line, huh? It just so happened that at the time, St. Louis was in last place, so it was like the ultimate rejection. No other team went near him after that. Until then, it was a game for him, too. Christ, he can’t even bring himself to watch a ball game now, not even mine.”

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Gary Frisch

Strike Four A Baseball Novel

Synopsis

Author Biography

Author Insight

The Need to Keep Pushing On

Book Excerpt

Strike Four A Baseball Novel

Comment on this Bubble