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Odd Man Out: A Year on the Mound with a Minor League Misfit
A Season on the Mound with Minor League Baseball's Most Unlikely Pitcher
Matt McCarthy never expected to get drafted by a Major League Baseball team. A molecular biophysics major at Yale, he was a decent left-handed starter for a dismal college team. But good southpaws are hard to find, and when the Anaheim Angels selected him in the twenty-first round of the 2002 draft, Mc...more
Matt McCarthy never expected to get drafted by a Major League Baseball team. A molecular biophysics major at Yale, he was a decent left-handed starter for a dismal college team. But good southpaws are hard to find, and when the Anaheim Angels selected him in the twenty-first round of the 2002 draft, Mc...more
Hardcover, 295 pages
Published
February 19th 2009
by Viking Adult
(first published 2009)
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Nancy Kennedy
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Yale graduate Matt McCarthy is your guide to the minor leagues in this book that chronicles his year as a pitcher with the Angels organization, playing in Provo, Utah.
The schedule is alternately grueling and mind-numbingly boring. Coaching styles careen between gentle paternalism and obscenity-spewing mania. Players are foul-mouthed, hormonally overcharged and undereducated teenagers, and a racial divide splits the team down the middle. Camaraderie and professionalism are in short su...more
The schedule is alternately grueling and mind-numbingly boring. Coaching styles careen between gentle paternalism and obscenity-spewing mania. Players are foul-mouthed, hormonally overcharged and undereducated teenagers, and a racial divide splits the team down the middle. Camaraderie and professionalism are in short su...more
I really enjoyed reading this book; it was well paced and the writing was very accessible, making it a quick and entertaining look at the entry point for aspiring MLB players. Picked it up on a whim and read it quickly, only to now learn that there's controversy over factual errors. Well, that dampens my enthusiasm somewhat, but doesn't surprise me, as some of McCarthy's stories and comments seem a bit over the top or inflamatory. Makes me want to ask Callaspo what he thinks of the book next tim...more
Found this on the new books shelf at the public library and decided it looked interesting without have heard anything about it. Since I "really like it" while I was reading it, I give it four stars. Now I read that there are many complaints from fellow players who alleged inaccuracies - enough so that an article appeared in the New York Times describing them (and the author's defense). If I had known about that before I read it, it would have been more difficult to enjoy. So I don'...more
Like most of Matt McCarthy's teammates on the Provo Angels minor league team where he spent one season, I'm sick and tired of Ivy League bullshit.
A dude pitches on a losing team at Yale, gets drafted in like the 25th round and then writes a book about his one season playing minor league ball. What's remarkable about McCarthy's book is not the casual entrenched racism and homophobia that is middle America's stock in trade - because who is shocked that every asshole in this country ha...more
A dude pitches on a losing team at Yale, gets drafted in like the 25th round and then writes a book about his one season playing minor league ball. What's remarkable about McCarthy's book is not the casual entrenched racism and homophobia that is middle America's stock in trade - because who is shocked that every asshole in this country ha...more
(how often do you really use the "it was amazing!" rating?)
Baseball time so a baseball book and as far as baseball books go, this was a very good one. Matt McCarthy gives a very honest and transparent memoir of the life of a major league baseball player that we don't get to see. For all the glamor and glitz of the big leagues here is what goes on for years sometimes for those who have the dream of making it to the big club. McCarthy does an excellent job of retelling a year...more
Baseball time so a baseball book and as far as baseball books go, this was a very good one. Matt McCarthy gives a very honest and transparent memoir of the life of a major league baseball player that we don't get to see. For all the glamor and glitz of the big leagues here is what goes on for years sometimes for those who have the dream of making it to the big club. McCarthy does an excellent job of retelling a year...more
"Odd Man Out" makes clear the virtues associated with being good at two things.
Matt McCarthy's is an autobiographical account of a Yale grad with a scientific bent and the good fortune of being a southpaw.
The fact of his left-handed birth limited the competition for pitching slots nationwide. It paved the way for McCarthy to play at Yale and later be drafted by the Los Angeles Angels Baseball Club.
The dynamic here is simple and effective. A young ...more
Matt McCarthy's is an autobiographical account of a Yale grad with a scientific bent and the good fortune of being a southpaw.
The fact of his left-handed birth limited the competition for pitching slots nationwide. It paved the way for McCarthy to play at Yale and later be drafted by the Los Angeles Angels Baseball Club.
The dynamic here is simple and effective. A young ...more
Didn't like this book that much basically because except for maybe one character, who the reader doesn't meet until the end, you hate everyone. All the athletes are racist, homophopic and just plain dumb. This includes the writer. Well, maybe he's not dumb since he went to Yale, but you end up not liking him at all. For one, all the facts are wrong I guess, since there has been a lot of controversy around it. Also, he calls someone else a mole in the book, although HE'S DOING THE SAME EXACT THIN...more
This is an entertaining book that documents a year on the road with the Provo Angels minor league baseball team. It was written by Matt McCarthy who pitched for and graduated from Yale before he was drafted by the Angels in the 26th round, and then he spent one year playing for Provo before being cut the following year in spring training. McCarthy is a gifted writer which is not always the case for the pro athlete turned author.
Despite my compliments and high rating, I often felt...more
Despite my compliments and high rating, I often felt...more
I don't usually have three books on the go at once. But, I picked this up off a bargain book rack, started to read it in the doctor's waiting room, and can't seem to put it down.
An inside look at the life of a minor league baseball season, the author's one and only. Matt McCarthy was drafted in the 21st round by the Angels and assigned to their rookie league affiliate in Provo, Utah. Baseball is a tough business, ruled by the numbers, from your draft position, to your batting average...more
An inside look at the life of a minor league baseball season, the author's one and only. Matt McCarthy was drafted in the 21st round by the Angels and assigned to their rookie league affiliate in Provo, Utah. Baseball is a tough business, ruled by the numbers, from your draft position, to your batting average...more
I kind of loved this, really. It's close to a five star book, but for a bit of nagging distraction.
I am a fan of baseball, especially the local minor league team, the Durham Bulls. So I loved getting the perspective of a player going through a farm system. It's also well-written and perfectly paced. I was invested in the successes and failures of McCarthy and his team, the Provo Angels. Surprised at how grueling that schedule is and the toll it takes on a struggling player.
...more
I am a fan of baseball, especially the local minor league team, the Durham Bulls. So I loved getting the perspective of a player going through a farm system. It's also well-written and perfectly paced. I was invested in the successes and failures of McCarthy and his team, the Provo Angels. Surprised at how grueling that schedule is and the toll it takes on a struggling player.
...more
Entertaining very quick read (1 business trip). The book is about a guy who barely makes it into the minors, and spends one season with the single A team. It's reasonably well-written, and while the characters are not particularly well-developed, a couple of them are memorable. The interesting thing about the story is not the characters, or even the story itself (the team is reasonably successful, but there's hardly a climax), but the little observations, quirks, and light analysis of life as ...more
*sigh* Another mediocre minor league baseball memoir. I've gotta learn to stop reading these. The idea is fascinating — a Ball Four-style account of a year in the low minors from a Yale grad who, after he left baseball, ultimately went on to Harvard Medical School and a career as a physician (thereby validating the "misfit" claim of the title, given the anti-intellectual culture that seems largely endemic to a career in the game). But the execution is fairly flat... while McCarthy is a...more
An interesting, but ultimately unsatisfying read. It is the story of a minor league pitcher who lasts just over one year in the minors. There are a lot of behind the scenes stories about the lives (on field and off) of the players on his minor league team. There was some controversy when then book came out about some of the stories in the book, but I don't know how anyone could be that shocked about the antics of young, uneducated, sexed- up young men living thousands of miles away from home in ...more
There's a lot of criticism of this book for time/place/statistical mistakes -- most of which read something like "McCarthy describes this happening on July 15 but so-and-so didn't join the team until July 30." To place this criticism in the context of the book, first of all, I don't think the author makes a single reference to a specific date of a game in the whole book -- so fact checkers FIRST have to figure out what date McCarthy is IMPLYING something occurred and THEN they can tel...more
An interesting account of a year in the life of a minor league baseball player, Matt McCarthy, who is currently a medical student. Interesting because McCarthy writes about stuff that we fans probably have always suspected but never get proof of. Such as the fact that players almost never venture out of groups of their own racial background, and that there is almost zero communication between Americans and so-called "Dominicans" (a catch-all term for Latino ballplayers).
However,...more
However,...more
Nice insight into what it was like in minor league ball during the steroid era. McCarthy hasn't written a masterpiece, but it is rife with memorable characters and funny situations...especially given that it basically follows a bunch of hard-charging ballplayers in Provo, Utah (of all places). Hilarity ensues.
As with any memoir or autobiography, I always find it a little more truthful if the author makes him or herself seem like a jerk or at least a real person. And McCarthy does ...more
As with any memoir or autobiography, I always find it a little more truthful if the author makes him or herself seem like a jerk or at least a real person. And McCarthy does ...more
I poured through it in two nights. It was a little slow at the end, but overall, a good read.
You can't help but walk away from this book without some kind of opinion of the author and the behind-the-scenes antics of minor/major league baseball. My opinion... The author flaked out too often when conflict was presented and tried too hard to blend-in instead of being a leader in the clubhouse. Despite his shortcomings on and off the field, I can believe every incident (despite the de...more
You can't help but walk away from this book without some kind of opinion of the author and the behind-the-scenes antics of minor/major league baseball. My opinion... The author flaked out too often when conflict was presented and tried too hard to blend-in instead of being a leader in the clubhouse. Despite his shortcomings on and off the field, I can believe every incident (despite the de...more
This is one of the best baseball books I have read in some time. An irreverant, unromantic, and--I believe--realistic account of experience at the low minor league, it is throughly enjoyable. The author, now a physician, tells about an eclectic collection of characters largely interested in chasing girls and drinking beer but, as memebers of the Provo Angels, isolated deep in Mormon country, much to their frustration. The pressures of daily baseball, long bus rides, often poor facilities, and...more
I enjoyed this vignette of the minor league experiences of a Yale graduate. McCarthy's style is pedestrian (not meant as a cut) and allows the casual reader to get sucked into the life of an aspiring major league baseball player. At first, I had a difficult time "reading" into the author's descriptions of his own actions and dialogue with others...was he playing with others, keeping his own views private while secretly expressing amusement at others' naivete or different world views ...more
This one leapt out at me...but didn't really deliver. It's an entertaining read, and it was perfect for the bout of insomnia that struck me last night, but to compare it to Ball Four, as did a couple of blurbs that sold me, is not doing a justice to Ball Four.
It's less like a book and more like a funny magazine article...I like the processes and idiosyncracies described, but at the end of of the day there's not a lot of heart to the whole work. Which is maybe indicative of the mino...more
It's less like a book and more like a funny magazine article...I like the processes and idiosyncracies described, but at the end of of the day there's not a lot of heart to the whole work. Which is maybe indicative of the mino...more
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Interesting story. Molecular biophysics major and decent left-handed pitcher from Yale, Matt McCarthy was drafted by the Anaheim Angels in the 26th round. He played with Anaheim's minor league affiliate in Provo, Utah. A satisfying telling of his year on the road with an assortment of both kind and cruel and misunderstood players and a coach who could be your best friend or just plain crazy. I have not read "Ball Four" but have heard it is another baseball book worth reading, and that ...more
I was going to give this four stars as I enjoyed it quite a bit but then I looked up and read some stuff online about fabrications and falsehoods--kind of put a damper on the book. McCarthy writes about some wild antics in the locker room and based around his one year as a pitcher in a rookie league in Provo. Seems a lot of people claim things didn't happen the way McCarthy writes they did. It's his book, his memories but you expect to have a majority of truth in a memoir setting. Kind of puts a...more
Humorous at times, pompous at others. The know-it-all author narrates his way perfectly through every tough situation. There seemed to be a disconnect between the author and everyone else he encountered during his minor league baseball time. I guess this is because of the constant promoting, retiring and cutting of the players. It seems like he was as lackadaisical on the field as he was in the locker room, and it comes across in his writing, too.
I'd say the book is worth the read ...more
I'd say the book is worth the read ...more
Autobiographical account of Yale graduate and baseball player, Matt McCarthy, and his year in minor league baseball with the Angels organization. There are a lot of good things to be in this world, but a left-handed pitcher who can throw in the 90s is one of the best. Some dispute about the accuracy of this memoir, but I thoroughly enjoyed the stories of the life of a minor leaguer, especially in fish-out-of-water Utah. Interesting take on some of the natural divisions in baseball clubhouses,...more
Matt McCarthy reminds me of Paul Shirley. Neither seems to realize how cocky they come off, and neither can write nearly as well as they think they can. The problem with being a semi-literate pro-athlete is that, relative to your peers, you seem like Shakespeare, but to the rest of us, you write as well as the average blogger.
Other notes:
Probably the only baseball book to begin a chapter with a "The Waste Land" reference.
The Bobby Jenks anecdotes are entertaining but...more
Other notes:
Probably the only baseball book to begin a chapter with a "The Waste Land" reference.
The Bobby Jenks anecdotes are entertaining but...more
Matt McCarthy was an Ivy League pitcher on a losing Yale baseball team and a biophysics major (and probably the only minor leaguer doing genetic research during the off season) drafted in the 26th round by the Angels only because he was a left-handed pitcher (fastest way to the Show, as they say). The book chronicles his brief and harldly brilliant baseball career in the minors with the Provo Angels.
Growing up in a town with a minor league team (the Dunedin Blue Jays - who ate at ...more
Growing up in a town with a minor league team (the Dunedin Blue Jays - who ate at ...more
One of the better baseball books I've ever read. Matt McCarthy, the author, was a graduate of Yale in biophysics, who also happened to be a left-handed pitcher of modest talent on some bad Yale baseball teams. After graduation he was improbably drafted (albeit in the 21st round) by the then Anaheim Angels, and eventually assigned to their rookie league team in Provo,Utah.
His stint with the Provo Angels brought him into close proximity with people, culture, and practices with which he w...more
His stint with the Provo Angels brought him into close proximity with people, culture, and practices with which he w...more
I'm a baseball nut and have covered minor league baseball in the past, so this one was of extra special interest. I love these first-person stories about life in the low minors and what people did to get through it. Long bus rides, crappy food, low pay and not knowing what their lives will be like in the future.
The life of a minor leaguer isn't easy. Matt McCarthy takes us through one year in the minors -- his lone year in professional baseball -- in Provo, Utah. From getting drafted,...more
The life of a minor leaguer isn't easy. Matt McCarthy takes us through one year in the minors -- his lone year in professional baseball -- in Provo, Utah. From getting drafted,...more
I picked this up last night and finished it this morning. It was a entertaining and quick look into a season of minor league baseball through the eyes of a Yale educated pitcher from being drafted to cut the following year. Some of the players mentioned are currently in the MLB making thus giving a peak into their careers right at the beginning through the eyes of someone not counting on making a living through baseball. Any sports fan and/or ex/current athlete will appreciate this book.
A starkly real memior of a Yale graduate's year in minor league baseball. As a baseball fan, I guess I was hoping for more heart, but at least he was honest; I've seen many of these stories played out in real life. I wish many of Matt's teammates had been fleshed out better, it would have made caring about them easier. I know he was trying to cover 3 months plus spring training, but I finished the book knowing more aobut his teammates and less about him. I wish McCarthy had had more fun.
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