Professional baseball and its players are marked by
individual moments that act like bricks to build lasting legacies. They are
most commonly memorable teams, heroic plays and legendary displays of skill. Unfortunately,
they aren’t always positive, as John Roseboro and Juan Marichal can attest.
Despite their statuses as two of the best players to ever step on a diamond,
their baseball identities are indelibly linked because of a violent
confrontation they had during a 1965 game. However legacies can be changed, and
that happened in this instance as detailed in John Rosengren’s book, The Fight of Their Lives: How Juan Marichal
and John Roseboro Turned Baseball’s Ugliest Brawl into a Story of Forgiveness
and Redemption (The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group; Lyon’s Press;
http://www.fightoftheirlives.net).
On August
22, 1965, The San Francisco Giants hosted the Los Angeles Dodgers, as the
two teams battled for supremacy in the race for the National League pennant.
Marichal, pitching for the Giants, had a throw from Roseboro, the Dodgers’
catcher, buzz by his head. Perhaps the worst brawl Major League Baseball has
ever seen ensued over the next tense minutes. When it was over, punches had
been thrown and Marichal had struck Roseboro over the head with his bat,
creating jarring
images that resonate to this day.
Although Roseboro retired as a widely-respected multiple
All-Star selection, and Marichal eventually was inducted in the Hall of Fame,
the incident haunted both men. Rosegren’s work (which was published last year
in hard cover and has just been released in paperback) is a comprehensive examination
of the incident, not only covering the clash, but exhaustively detailing how
both men got to their particular boiling points that day and how their actions subsequently
impacted them.
As with any fight, the proverbial saying of “it takes two to
tango” aptly applied to the Marichal/Roseboro clash. Rosengren smartly gives
each man their own space in his story, which makes it all the more interesting
to see how they arrived at their ultimate collision point.
Once the stereotypical reasons for any baseball fight
(gamesmanship, competitive spirits and testosterone) are stripped away from the
incident, there are still a number of interesting factors that contributed to
this moment of baseball infamy. Roseboro, an African American, had suffered
through racial indignities both privately and professionally. The same applied
to Marichal, a native of the Dominican Republic. In both instances, fierce
pride fueled how they carried themselves on a daily basis.
Rosengren also writes of how the role of wide-spread
violence and unrest from that summer can’t be ignored. The Watts riots took
place where Roseboro lived and had just started to subside at the time of the
fight. Additionally, The Dominican Republic was in the midst of a bloody revolution,
and Marichal was constantly worried about the safety of his many family members
who lived in the country. To say that both men may have possibly been on edge
on the day of the fateful game could be a major understatement.
After the detailed backgrounds of both men, The Fight of Our
Lives takes the reader through a minute-by-minute account of the fight and then
the fall out, which was severe, especially for Marichal, who was largely
defined by his role in the incident for many years.
Fortunately, like all good stories, this one has a happy
ending. As the years passed, both men, fierce rivals even before their violent
encounter, gradually reconciled and in the biggest of surprises became true
friends. This is where Rosengren truly shines, as such reconciliations are
often a trope used to tie up such stories with a neat little bow. To the
contrary, this story is one of actual redemption.
It would be an oversight to not mention how well sourced
this book is. The theme of baseball history, which can be so grounded in
anecdotes, demands such detail to cement its authenticity. The bibliography and
list of citations gives any reader interested in following up with more
research on this story a fantastic road map to start that journey.
Baseball legacies really are built brick by brick but as
Rosengren shows, sometimes damaged foundations can be repaired under proper
circumstances. There are two sides to every story and there is always a
possibility for redemption. The connection between Juan Marichal and John
Roseboro had an ugly beginning but a beautiful end—and instead of being
remembered for one of baseball’s ugliest incidents it can now be filed as one
of its best stories.
Disclaimer: I was provided with
a free copy of this book, but received no payment or other consideration for
this review.
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