The Dad Report: Fathers, Sons, and Baseball Families

by Kevin Cook

Overview

An unforgettable look at how baseball families share our national pastime.

Baseball honors legacies—from cheering the home team to breaking in an old glove handed down from father to son. In The Dad Report, award-winning sportswriter Kevin Cook weaves a tapestry of uplifting stories in which fathers and sons—from the sport's superstars to Cook and his own ball-playing father—share the game.

Almost two hundred father-son pairs have played in the big leagues. Cook takes us inside the clubhouses, homes, and lives of many of the greats. Aaron Boone follows grandfather Bob, father Ray, and brother Bret to the majors—three generations of All-Stars. Barry Bonds and Ken Griffey Jr. strive to outdo their famous dads. Michael Jordan walks away from basketball to play minor-league baseball—to fulfill his father's dream.

In visiting these legendary families, Cook discovers that ball-playing families are a lot like our own. Dan Haren regrets the long road trips that keep him from his kids. Ike Davis and his father, a former Yankee, debate whether Ike should pitch or play first base. Buddy Bell leads a generation of big-leaguers determined to open their workplace—the clubhouse—to their kids.

Framing The Dad Report is the story of Kevin Cook's own father, Art Cook, a minor-league pitcher, a loveable rogue with a wicked screwball. In Art's later years, Kevin phoned him almost every night to talk baseball. They called those nightly conversations "the Dad Report." In time, Kevin came to see that these conversations were about much more than the game. That's what this book is about: the way fathers and sons talk baseball as a way of talking about everything—courage, fear, fun, family, morality, mortality, and how it's not whether you win or lose that counts, it's how you share the game.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393352856
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	06/14/2016
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

A former senior editor at Sports Illustrated, Kevin Cook is the author of Titanic Thompson, Tommy's Honor, Kitty Genovese and The Dad Report. He lives in New York City.

Read an Excerpt

"Dad and I didn't talk much for years. What was there to say? We weren’t about to discuss our feelings, our health, politics, or religion. In time, though, we learned that we could always talk baseball. 'Randy Johnson 15 Ks!' can be another way to say hello. We wound up talking on the phone almost every night, almost always about baseball. We talked baseball as a way of talking about everything else, and we named our nightly call the Dad Report."
—from the Introduction

Table of Contents

Prologue: He Galls His Shot 11

1 Golden Boy: Art Cook, Beginnings 17

2 The Talker and the Thinker: Ron and Ike Davis 33

3 Miracles: Dan Haren Sr. and Dan Haren Jr. 49

4 Cooperstown: Baseball's American Dads 61

5 Drilling the Muscle: Three Generations of Boones 85

6 Slumps and Rumors: The Davises 111

7 Looking for the Cure: Art Cook, Midlife 131

8 Daddy's Girl: Julia Ruth Stevens 149

9 The Dad Report: Art Cook, Late Innings 171

10 Giants with Grudges: Bobby and Barry Bonds 185

11 "My Father's Dream": Michael Jordan 211

12 A Pirate's Life: The Davises 223

13 Two Pennants and a Funeral: Bookies and Cooks 237

Epilogue: Home of the Ponies 251

Acknowledgments 257

Select Bibliography 261

Index 263

Editorial Reviews

"Kevin Cook, the son of a minor-league screwball pitcher, has just the right voice to explore how baseball connects fathers and sons. The Dad Report is a smart, fresh take on a timeless topic."

Tom Verducci

"Lyrical…an affectionate look at the diamond dads and their (mostly) sensational sons."

Wall Street Journal - David M. Shribman

"[T]he ultimate Father’s Day book, albeit one the sons will want to read, too."

Dallas Morning News - Allen Barra

05/04/2015
Having already explored the parent-child sports dynamic in Driven: Teen Phenoms, Mad Parents, Swing Science and the Future of Golf, Cook turns his attention closer to home as he shares the story of his father, Art, and how baseball lived at the center of their relationship. By juxtaposing his father's days as a high school star, minor leaguer, coach, and gambler/bookie with the up-and-down tales of major league fathers and sons like the Boones, Griffeys, Bells, and Davises (as well as Babe Ruth and his daughter), Cook creates a narrative that shows how sports can connect one generation to the next. What makes Cook special as a sportswriter is that he is able to balance the joy and pain of being a fan with the investigative and analytical skill of a professional journalist—which is especially important when featuring a polarizing figure like Barry Bonds, or when his own son's baseball field is destroyed on 9/11. The book's title comes from the nightly phone calls father and son shared discussing their fantasy baseball teams (and nothing else). Cook's prose has the perfect conversational style for combining baseball's childlike dreams and grown-up realities into a satisfying narrative. (June)

Publishers Weekly

"Cook is a gifted and kindhearted writer who has done his research…sure to be a good choice for most sports collections."

Booklist

"The part baseball plays in the bonds between fathers and sons has enduring appeal. Still, even worthy subjects can be exhausted. But wait—Kevin Cook finds a different way in. The distinctly different stories of fathers and sons who played in the big leagues—with just enough of the Cook family’s own connections to the game—make The Dad Report such an enjoyable and informative read."

Bob Costas

"[Cook] deftly interweaves sports and family stories…the book works on the same level the game does: as a time machine shuttling between childhood games of catch and wobbly video of Babe Ruth hitting a homer."

Boston Globe - Kate Tuttle

04/15/2015
Drawing on years of extensive conversations with Major League ballplayers as a sportswriter, Cook (Flip; Kitty Genovese) shares some of the stories he has collected about the relationships between fathers and their children in baseball families. They include the first three-generation big-league family (the Boones), the adopted daughter of Babe Ruth (Julia Ruth Stevens), Michael Jordan's attempt at baseball, and accounts of the Bonds, Davis, and Griffey families, among others. Cook does a commendable job chronicling in an honest fashion, with struggles and difficulties included. What makes the book truly enjoyable is the way in which the author weaves his own family story into the narrative, beginning with a home run his dad slugged off him at age 12 in a father-son match, and ending with a game of catch between Cook and his son. Although the author's dad never made it beyond the minor leagues, it is his experience that frames all of the others and helps bridge the potential disconnect between big league families and ordinary folks playing in their backyards. VERDICT This absorbing book will be of interest to all baseball fans, especially those who can draw upon their own personal family memories.—Brian Sullivan, Alfred Univ. Lib., NY

Library Journal

2015-03-17
Stories of fathers, their sons, and a way forward for the troubled game of baseball. Some of the shine has worn off of the sport in recent years. Major League Baseball has dealt with ongoing concerns about performance-enhancing drugs and has seriously considered changing some of the rules of the game to make it more fast-paced—a response to shrinking revenues. Fewer people want to be taken out to the old ball game. It wasn't always so, however, and Cook (Kitty Genovese: The Murder, the Bystanders, the Crime that Changed America, 2014, etc.) explores stories of the sport's connections in families, starting with his own. Cook's father, Art, supported his son's early forays into baseball. A minor league pitcher, Art, sporting a wicked screwball, had been "this close" to a big league career. The author discusses his father striking him out at a community game and the impact it had on his perception of himself years later. Cook also examines how in baseball families—from the Griffeys to the Boones—fathers help sons grow into the game and discover their best paths within it. The author marinates his tales in the details of the game, presenting statistics alongside nostalgic descriptions of late summer afternoons, sunshine-bathed fields, and do-or-die ninth-inning gambits. It's not all sunshine, however. Cook also reflects on some of the darker stories, like that of Barry Bonds, wondering how great his career would have been without the performance-enhancing drugs—and without his father's shadow hanging over him. On the whole, though, the author writes to enshrine the best aspects of baseball, combining a father's love of the game with a love for the son. An enjoyable exploration of baseball, fatherhood, and how "there's something special about the way families share the game."

Kirkus Reviews