Billy Martin: Baseball's Flawed Genius - Softcover

"All the notable moments are here . . . Baseball (and Yankees) fans will devour this like ballpark popcorn, and all will muse about the many what-ifs of Martin's motley life." -- Kirkus Reviews, starred review

"A motley cast of baseball Hall of Famers, including Casey Stengel, Mickey Mantle, Rod Carew, Ricky Henderson, Reggie Jackson, Tommy Lasorda, and Earl Weaver, make appearances in this must-read for fans of the great American pastime." -- Publishers Weekly

"[Pennington] provides what is likely to be the definitive profile, which, as such, belongs in most library sports collections, especially those where Yankee fans cluster." -- Mark Levine, Booklist
"His study of Martin is comprehensive and detailed, offering the reader rich details on his early years and his time as a player for several teams . . . Pennington expertly combines material from his subject's personal and professional life, leaving the impression of a complicated and flawed but unforgettable man." -- Library Journal
"Two words of advice: read this. Bill Pennington not only writes the sprawling, brawling, no-punches-pulled narrative Martin deserves, but also deftly illuminates the humanity of one of baseball's epic characters." -- Tom Verducci, best-selling author of The Yankee Years (with Joe Torre)

"The hair on my forearms was standing up by the end of the fifth paragraph of this book's introduction. I knew Billy Martin. I covered Billy Martin. But I never knew him like this. Congrats to Bill Pennington for the definitive work on baseball's flawed genius." -- Dan Shaughnessy, Boston Globe columnist and best-selling author of Francona (with Terry Francona) and Senior Year

"Billy Martin has been dead for twenty-five years? Wow. That means there's a generation or two that know nothing about this character of baseball characters, this incandescent ballplayer/manager/jerk/sweetheart, this irrepressible brawler with a grand mind for the game. Bill Pennington cures all that with Billy Martin: Baseball's Flawed Genius. This is a terrific tale about a roller coaster life. Pour yourself a cocktail and enjoy. The descriptions of the fistfights alone are worth the price of admission." -- Leigh Montville, best-selling author of Ted Williams, The Big Bam, and Evel

"It has been easy to think of Billy Martin as a cartoon--one created by the media and abetted by the man himself. But he was a great American, as important to understanding our game, and our nation, as Ted Williams or Joe DiMaggio. You'll never think of Billy Martin in the same way again, thanks to Bill Pennington's masterpiece of a biography." -- John Thorn, official historian, Major League Baseball

"The definitive biography of one of baseball's most celebrated, mercurial, and misunderstood figures Billy Martin is a story of contrasts. He was the clutch second baseman for the dominant New York Yankees of the 1950s. He then spent sixteen seasons managing in the big leagues, and is considered by anyone who knows baseball to have been a true baseball genius, a field manager without peer. Yet he's remembered more for his habit of kicking dirt on umpires, for being hired and fired by George Steinbrenner five times, and for his rabble rousing and public brawls. He was combative, fiery, intimidating, and controversial, yet beloved by the everyday fan. He was hard on his players and even harder on himself. He knew how to turn around a losing team like no one else--and how to entertain us every step of the way. Now, with his definitive biography Billy Martin, Pennington finally erases the caricature of Martin. Drawing on exhaustive interviews with friends, family, teammates, and countless adversaries, Pennington paints an indelible portrait of a man who never backed down for the game he loved. From his shantytown upbringing in a broken home; to his days playing for the Yankees when he almost always helped his team find a way to win; through sixteen years of managing, including his tenure in New York in the crosshairs of Steinbrenner and Reggie Jackson, Billy Martin made sure no one ever ignored him. And indeed no one could. He was the hero, the antihero, and the alter ego--or some combination of all three--for his short sixty-one years among us"--