Monday, June 6, 2005

one more cup of coffee

Between October 2001 and the summer of 2002 I travelled the country - Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, and Wisconsin - interviewing former pitchers whose entire major league career lasted less than 50 innings.
I doubt that any writing project will provide as much pleasure as visiting with these men and listening to their stories.

Eighteen of these interviews were collected in Cup of Coffee: The Very Short Careers of Eighteen Major League Pitchers

But over that period of time I interviewed over 30 short-term major leaguers.
The tales left out of Cup of Coffee were as compelling as those that were included, but eighteen was more than enough for a book, and I wanted to touch on as many generations, experiences, and teams as space would allow.
It is my intention to post many of the remaining unpublished Cup of Coffee interviews here.

First out of the chute will be James Atkins.
Mr Atkins pitched a total of 15 innings for the Boston Red Sox in 1950 and 1952 (for those wanting more specific statistical information on Mr Atkins' major league career, I'm including a link to his page at the wonderful website baseball-reference.com).

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