"Teammates" by David Halberstam

For those who have not read this book, I highly recommend it.  It covers the lifelong friendship among Ted Williams, Dom DiMaggio, Johnny Pesky, and Bobby Doerr. 

There are some great baseball stories in that book.  A few years back, I read a biography on Ted Williams which was absolutely terrific.  One of the stories featured Joe DiMaggio's 62-game hitting streak in the 1940's.  In between innings, Ted used to strike up a conversation with the scoreboard operator at the base of the Green Monster.  During Joe's streak, Ted would go to the scoreboard operator and ask him about Joe's streak.  The operator, who was listening to the Yankees and keep up with other scores on his radio, would report that the streak was in jeopardy and Ted would run over to Dom to give him the update.  Later on, when Ted heard from the operator that Joe got a hit to keep the streak alive, Ted , the relay man,would run over to Dom and yell "the streak is still alive".  It was as if, despite their rivalry, Ted was rooting for Joe. 

I hope they never remove that Left Field scoreboard.  I think that there is great book that could be written about that scoreboard and the folks who kept score therein.  Perhaps it could be titled "Beneath the Monster" or "Monster Stories".  Maybe "southpaw" and I could collaborate on something like that.  The research would sure be fun. 

Another great story involves Ted and a rookie pitcher.  The first time this rookie faced Ted, he struck him out.  After the game was over, this proud rookie went into the 'Sox dugout to get Ted to sign the baseball with which he struck him out earlier.  The rookie went into the dugout with ball prominently in hand asking for Ted.  When LHP Mel Parnell found out what the rookie's intentions were, he knew that nothing good would come of this.  So, quietly left the dugout.  When the rookie found Ted, shared the baseball's importance, and asked for his autograph, the rest of the Red Sox dugout scattered like rats.  Ted immediately began to berate the young man to the point of bringing him close to tears.  Seeing what he had done, Ted grabbed the baseball, signed it, uttered some more expletives, and told the rookies to get out. 

A week or so later, Ted was facing this same rookie pitcher.  Ted promptly took one of his pitches and launched it high into the right field bleachers.  As Ted was rounding first base, he yelled out to the pitcher "I'll sign that one, too, if you can find the son of a [expletive].