* Yogi Berra: a man for all Times

The Sunday book section also featured this review of Allan Barra’s Berra book (I never get tired of writing that), by Jonathan Mahler, author of Ladies and Gentleman, The Bronx is Burning.

Barra has assumed a different task from that of the average biographer, who is concerned, foremost, with tracing the arc of a life. He is out to prove that Yogi Berra is underappreciated as a ballplayer and misunderstood as a human being, that Yogi’s image as an “amiable clown” created “a pseudo-Yogi that took on a life of its own, a caricature of the real man.”

While Mahler certainly appreciates the subject of the book, his is less enthralled with the author, it seems

Barra’s recaps of those seasons and postseasons, in particular his chronicle of Don Larsen’s perfect game in the 1956 World Series, make for some of the book’s best reading. Unfortunately, Barra can’t resist a good debate. He intrudes frequently into the story to tussle with Yogi’s detractors — managers like Leo Durocher, who derided his lack of discipline at the plate, and sportswriters who lambasted his erratic arm. Each time, the author’s evaluation of the facts leads him to the conclusion that Yogi’s critics were wrong. No doubt, Barra felt an obligation to set the record straight — and he may well be performing an overdue service to obsessive Yogi fans — but these pedantic digressions can make it difficult to get absorbed in the narrative.

And

Barra’s love for Yogi also seems to work against him. There is nothing inherently wrong with writers becoming enthralled with their subjects: Look no further than Jane Leavy’s “Sandy Koufax: A Lefty’s Legacy,” one of the finest baseball books of the last decade and a loving portrait if ever there was one. Barra doesn’t manage to achieve the same level of intimacy in “Yogi Berra.” It’s almost as if his admiration for his subject caused Barra to keep him at arm’s length. Barra covers all the key events, dwelling in detail on the baseball accomplishments, but never really peers into Yogi’s inner life and offers only a superficial portrait of his subject off the field.

I’ll have my own review for the book in a few weeks.