The spirit of baseball novelist Mark Harris illuminates “The 33-Year-Old Rookie,” Bison alumnus Chris Coste’s autobiography.
From 1953 to 1979, Harris wrote four of baseball’s most enduring fictions, voiced by syntax-challenged “Southpaw” Henry Wiggen. His creed: “If you can not spell a word, make your very best guess at it.”
“Rookie” actualizes the brash, young Wiggen, along with the backup catcher of “Bang the Drum Slowly,” the “Ticket for a Seamstitch” pilgrimage and the aging stopper of “It Looked Like For Ever.” While closer to the grammatical strike zone than Wiggen, it has just enough hitches in its gitalong to affirm that there’s no ghost, just Coste.
His marathon apprenticeship began in a ramshackle independent league (think Niagara Falls’ wobbly Mallards). In 2006, he reached “The Show” as a Phillies catcher, embraced in a city where “Brotherly Love” is closely rationed. .
Coste’s chronicle unrolls without a hint of bitterness or entitlement.
“I felt I had finally earned the respect I deserved,” he wrote, circling success like a wind-blown pop-up.
He criticized only junior-college tyrant “Coach Smith” and Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein, whom Coste believes betrayed him.
In 2000, the road from bushes to bigs came through Buffalo.
“When I walked through the centerfield fence, I was in awe ... standing there was like stepping into a whole different realm of baseball,” he wrote.
Six years later, his daughter saw his first big-league homer as an ESPN highlight. “Daddy, that’s our name right there,” she will say. “Are we rich now?”
“Rookie” resonates with this innocence. Coste keeps locker-room language under wraps, as did the first three Harris novels. Although his quotes sound more written than spoken, he deadpans how “Eric wedged me into the lineup.” Of his early days in Fargo, N.D.: “It was a small pond, but I loved this pond.”
Coste heard rejections familiar to every job-seeker. Helping the team by playing several positions, he was belittled as “a utility.” Epstein feared fan reaction to Coste’s “indie ball” resume. Yet on page 186, Coste himself disses a Phillies trade for “Three minor-leaguers and a pitcher with 12 innings of major-league experience.”
Like “Untouchable” Eliot Ness, Coste has “become what he beheld” — the establishment. He’s entitled.
Reviewer Doug “Base Paths” Smith of Grand Island spoke at Mark Harris’ funeral last summer.
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