Nolan Ryan: The Road to Cooperstown

The incredible thing about Nolan Ryan is not his longevity in pitching for 27 seasons. What is truly astounding is the fact that he never resorted to being a junk pitcher in the later years. Even at the age of 44, he was throwing fastballs in the high nineties. I also remember when he first came up with the Mets and once owned a copy of the Mets rookie stars baseball card where he appeared with Jerry Koosman. This book chronicles the baseball life of one of the best athletes to ever throw a baseball, in my opinion, the only two pitchers who could possibly be compared to him in terms of durability and quality are Cy Young and Leroy Paige. The opposing batters were still muttering about the quality of his fastball when he was over forty, and you read many of their quotes in this book. He is an amazing man, and I vividly remember watching him pitch in televised games. One in particular was a near no-hitter that was broken up in the late innings by Reggie Jackson. Even through the blurring effect of the television camera, you could see the defeatist body language of the batters as they stood at the plate. This is one of those baseball books that you buy and then take off the shelf and reread every few years just to admire his greatness.

This short (122pages) book commemorates Nolan Ryan's induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame by telling the story of his rise to baseball's elite beginning with his boyhood in Alvin, Texas, and ending with his remarks at the induction ceremony many years later.This really is similar to a family scrapbook. It includes family photographs, interesting stories, and information you may not have run across before. Newspaper excerpts and comments celebrate each of Ryan's seven no hitters and the game in which he set the all time strike out record. Also included is a section in which Ryan's contemporaries comment on their favorite memories of the hall of famer. The list of contributors in this section is extensive and includes such fellow Hall of Fame inductees as Sandy Koufax, Tom Seaver, Frank Robinson, and Henry Aaron.I found the two best features of the book to be the great pictures and the question and answer session which covers a variety of topics. Among the things the reader will learn are who Ryan's heroes are, what his greatest thrill was, how he wants to be remembered, and what advice he has for those who are running the game today.If you are a general baseball fan looking for an in-depth autobiography of this great pitcher, you will probably be disappointed. On the other hand if you are a collector of Nolan Ryan memorabilia or just a fan of the man himself, this is a must have book.