Michael Lewis' Tribute to Coach Fitz

There was a turning point in Michael Lewis's life, in a baseball game when he was fourteen years old. The irascible and often terrifying Coach Fitz put the ball in his hand with the game on the line and managed to convey such confident trust in Lewis's ability that the boy had no choice but to live up to it. "I didn't have words for it then, but I do now: I am about to show the world, and myself, what I can do."

The coach's message was not simply about winning, but about self-respect, sacrifice, courage, and endurance. In some ways, and even now, years later, Lewis still finds himself trying to measure up to what Coach Fitz expected of him.

--Teaser copy from the Amazon page

Having just finished Moneyball for the second or third time I decided to take out a couple more books by Michael Lewis. I'd enjoyed Flash Boys, The Big Short and Liars Poker, so I was going to keep following the the stream and see where it led. The Undoing Project and Coach were both in our library and I requested them.

I found myself surprised at my disappointment in The Undoing Project. When I picked up Coach: Lessons on the Game of Life, I was immediately drawn in. 

First off, the book design is elegant. It's a small--5"x 7"--and only 90 or so pages, one-third of which are black and white photos of junior high kids playing baseball, or swimming or just being kids. It didn't take long for me to realize where Mr. Lewis' Moneyball came from. He himself had once dreamed of being a big league ballplayer, as did I when I was his age. 

The story itself is a tribute to a coach who made an impact on his life, Coach Fitz. It is also something of a morality tale, revealing how times have changed over the past three or four decades. 

Lewis, born in 1960, play ball in the 70's under a coach who had had experience in both basketball and baseball, including a two-hit fight during a basketball game with Pistol Pete Maravich. (He hit Maravich and Maravich hit the floor.) He'd played in the Oakland A's minor league farm system, a 6'4" 220 lb. catcher.  He'd caught Catfish Hunter and Rollie Fingers, among others.

I so relate to this book because I, too, played ball in high school and had a JV coach who made an impact on my life. Mr Dennison. who was also my Physics teacher junior year, had spent seven years in the Boston Red Sox farm system as a pitcher. He, too, was probably 6'3 or 4 inches and at the end of that last year he was brought up for the last couple games of the season to be in the bullpen for the Red Sox. This is the famous stadium with the Green Monster in left field, which is featured in Field of Dreams.

Mr Dennison sometimes used to take me and Skip Hoy out of last period study hall and pitch to us Sophomore year. Junior year it was Joe Sweeney and I. That first year Skip Hoy batter .500 and I was the second best hitter on the team at .387. The following year Joe Sweeney batter .500 so I was second best again.  

Becoming a better player was not the point of Michael Lewis' story of Coach Fitz, nor was it the big takeaway for my story of Mr. Dennison. Since this is a review of Coach, I only share this above to say that I related to this book on many levels.

Mr. Lewis does an interesting thing is this book, though. He returns to his high school at a time when the kids who had him in the past came back to honor him. There is simultaneously a new generation of students whose parents want to censure him. His intensity unwelcome, his honesty unwelcome, his passion perceived as destructive. 

Example. One kid doesn't show up for practices, has even appeared to have lost interest in trying to win, and Fitz benches him. The parents rake him over the coals, try to get him fired, because if he doesn't play it may hinder his ability to get a scholarship. 

There are more examples and I witnessed this myself in our local high school on parent/teach conference night. While we met with our daughter's teach, across the hall a parent was hollering at a teacher there, not interested in advice on help the student but insisting that her daughter get a better grade. 

When the police came to our house when my brother was caught shoplifting football cards (he was 9 or 10) not parents did not defend him. My parents didn't insist that there must have been a misunderstanding.

Coach tries to modify his behavior, but in an era of increased coddling of egos, there's a real problem here.

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I once pitched a book idea about someone whom I thought worthy of a tribute. I went to the library and looked at a hundred biographies to get an image of what I was thinking would be the right concept. It turns out that what I envisioned was something not too different from Coach. Short, with photos and substance, inspirational but real. 

Did you have a teacher or coach that took in interest in your development, who believed in you or inspired you? Feel free to share in the comments.

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Related Links

Moneyball: Worth More than the Price of Admission

Major League Baseball: Some Things Have Changed and Some Haven’t in the Umpire Business

Play Ball!

Coach: Lessons on the Game of Life