Bigger Than the Game: Restitching a Major League Life

by Dirk Hayhurst

Overview

The Toronto Blue Jays pitcher recounts his fateful season of injury, rehab, and reinvention in a memoir by “the best writer in a baseball uniform” (Tyler Kepner, The New York Times).

After nearly a decade in the minors, Dirk Hayhurst defied the odds to climb onto the pitcher's mound for the Toronto Blue Jays. Newly married, with a big league paycheck and a brand new house, Hayhurst was ready for a great season in the Bigs.

Then fate delivered a crushing hit. Hayhurst blew out his pitching shoulder in an insane off-season workout program. After surgery, rehab, and more rehab, his major-league dreams seemed more distant than ever. And from there things only got worse, weirder, and funnier.

In a crazy world of injured athletes, autograph-seeking nuns, angry wrestlers, and trainers with a taste for torture, Hayhurst learned lessons about the game—and himself—that were not in any rulebook. Honest, soul-searching, insightful, hilarious, and moving, Bigger Than the Game is an indisputable baseball classic.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780806536712
Publisher:	Kensington
Publication date:	03/19/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	933,864
File size:	902 KB

About the Author

Dirk Hayhurst is the New York Times bestselling author of The Bullpen Gospels, Out of My League, Bigger Than the Game, and the e-book Wild Pitches. Drafted from Kent State University in 2003 as a senior sign, Hayhurst pitched professionally for nine years on more than eight minor league teams and three major league teams: the San Diego Padres, the Toronto Blue Jays, and the Tampa Bay Rays. He has been a professional broadcaster and baseball analyst for the Toronto Blue Jays and Sportsnet Toronto, a contributor for ESPN on the Olbermann show on ESPN 2, and a panelist on TBS's coverage of the MLB postseason. Visit him at dirkhayhurst.com.

Editorial Reviews

02/15/2014
Most observers credit Cardinals and Reds relief pitcher Jim Brosnan with originating the baseball tell-all with his The Long Season (1960) and Jim Bouton with kicking the genre up several notches with his Ball Four (1970). In both cases the player-authors were accused of violating "the sanctity of the clubhouse" by revealing many of the not-so-positive sides of their teammates. Both were established major leaguers. Hayhurst was far from established when his The Bullpen Gospels (2010), detailing a season in the minors, was published. Thus he earned even less of a pass on being a tattler than did his predecessors. Now Hayhurst chronicles a season in hell, upon being picked up by the Blue Jays for the 2010 season and being treated as a pariah by teammates as he tries to battle back from a debilitating injury. At times funny, it is more often a sober story of someone who defies convention and is living with the consequences. VERDICT He's a former pitcher with a career major league record of 0–2, but Hayhurst gets a "W" with this one.—Jim Burns (JB), Jacksonville P.L., FL

Library Journal

2014-01-12
A revealing yet occasionally tedious, seasonlong account of a major league pitcher on the outs. Toronto Blue Jays broadcaster Hayhurst (Out of My League, 2012, etc.) began what would be his final season in 2010 training "like a beast" and anticipating the publication of his book, The Bullpen Gospels, on opening day. However, he had to win over skeptics who believed anyone who wrote from the inside violated the locker room code and therefore could never be trusted as reliable. Furthermore, talking to the press corps during spring training to garner publicity for his book caused teammates to question his motives, particularly a cocky, malicious pitcher who nicknamed him "Media," and encouraged several teammates to turn against him. Hayhurst wanted to prove he belonged, but he started the season relegated to the training room on the 60-day disabled list with an arm injury—and it only got worse. The combination of prolonged pain and social ostracism made him panicky, and the author admits, "it was a delicate balance of trying to get healthy physically and not unraveling mentally into some anxious, why-am-I-not-healthy mess." Rarely does an athlete admit publicly to feeling anxious, afraid or depressed, but Hayhurst candidly shows readers that he was fraying both emotionally and physically. (One line sums it up nicely: "Arm pain can make your whole life hurt.") However, the author draws out his emotionally honest story with unnecessary, lengthy accounts of interactions with coaches and trainers, as well as intimate conversations with his wife. Several chapters devoted to his rehabilitation program lend no insight or deeper understanding of his pain. A flawed yet unique, personal story of an athlete's anguish at the end of his career.

Kirkus Reviews