Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend

By: Timothy M. Gay

Narrated by: Dale J Hubbard

Length: 14 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

Tris Speaker: The Rough-and-Tumble Life of a Baseball Legend is the first book to tell the full story of Speaker’s turbulent life and to document in sharp detail the grit and glory of his pivotal role in baseball’s dead-ball era.

Playing for the Boston Red Sox and the Cleveland Indians in the early part of the 20th century, Tris “Spoke” Speaker put up numbers that amaze us even today: his record for career doubles - 792 - may never be approached, let alone broken. Tris Speaker explores the colorful life behind the statistics, introducing listeners to a complex and contradictory Texan whose cowboy mentality never left him as he brawled his way through two decades in the big leagues.

Speaker’s career put him in the company of Ty Cobb and Christy Mathewson, Shoeless Joe Jackson, and Honus Wagner, and in describing it Timothy M. Gay gives a rousing account of some of the best baseball ever played - and some of the darkest moments that ever tainted a game and hastened the end of a career.

The book is published by University of Nebraska Press. The audiobook will be published by University Press Audiobooks.

©2005 Board of Regents of the University of Nebraska (P)2018 Redwood Audiobooks

Critic reviews

“This should be required reading for any serious baseball fan.” (Sport Literature Association)

"A richly detailed biography, the first on Speaker to succeed in situating him within an epoch of great promise and of great shame." (Library Journal)

"Carefully researched and documented, engagingly written, and very illuminating." (Booklist)

This book is sort of about Tris Speaker

If you were to cull from the book the pages devoted to Tris Speaker, the book would be about half as long. The story would more accurately be titled, "The Dead Ball Era in Baseball, featuring Tris Speaker." The author spends a lot of time writing bios about a number of other players from the era. That would be fine if the synopsis of the story was more accurate in describing the focus of the book. I was continually frustrated by the amount of time the story was not about Speaker. Maybe there isn't enough source material to fill out a full book.

The book was published in 2005. Consequently, the author repeats several myths about Ty Cobb and his so-called racist and violent incidents that have been debunked by more recent bios of The Peach. "Ty Cobb, A Terrible Beauty," published in 2015, should be read if you want a more accurate telling of Cobb's story.

The presentation of the book was adequate. The reader mispronounces several words. The most egregious is referring to Nap Lajoie as "la-JOY." Ugh.

A great biography of a dead ball era legend

Tris Speaker might be the best player never mentioned among the listed baseball greats. If not for Willie Mays, he may have been the greatest center fielder to play the game. Speaker, or “Spoke” as many called him, was a defensive wizard (recording a record 449 career outfield assists), but was also deadly with the bat. He still holds the major league record with 792 career doubles. He finished his career with a remarkable .345 batting average.

However, off the field, “The Grey Eagle” was openly racist, and was allegedly a member of the Klu Klux Klan. He was a 32nd Degree Mason, and had strong religious convictions. As a baseball player, and later as a manger, Speaker often turned blue in heated arguments with the umpires. Author Timothy M. Gay chronicles his path from Texas, shortly removed from the “war of northern aggression, to becoming a World Series champion.

Speaker was a baseball natural, and wouldn’t allow an injury to break his stride. Following a horse related accident, “Spoke” taught himself to play baseball left handed. While in Boston, Speaker formed the golden outfield with Duffy Lewis and Harry Hooper. Speaker and Lewis didn’t get along. Speaker, being a staunch Protestant, resented Catholic players such as Lewis and catcher Bill Carrigan.

In 1913, Speaker went on a promotional world tour, with such stars of Sam Crawford and Jim Thorpe. They traveled 30,000 miles, visited 13 nations over a 4 month period, playing and promoting the game of baseball around the globe. Due to the emergence of a rival Federal baseball league, Speaker became the highest paid major league ballplayer. It would be the lucrative contract that made Boston management attempt to cut his salary, and when he refused, trade “Spoke” to Cleveland.

In Cleveland, Speaker helped to turn around the Indians, and lead them to the 1920 World Series championship. However, during the season, good friend Ray Chapman was struck in the head by a pitch, and would die from the damage to his brain. Chapman was only 29 years old.

It would be pitcher Dutch Leonard that presented game fixing charges against Speaker and Ty Cobb. The commissioner cleared both Speaker and Cobb of any wrongdoing. but both would step down as managers, and never manage again in the major leagues. Speaker was inducted into the baseball hall of fame, and despite his previous prejudices, mentored the talented Larry Doby, who became the first black in the American league.