Clubbie: A Minor League Baseball Memoir by Greg Larson

Abstract

Reviewed by: Clubbie: A Minor League Baseball Memoir by Greg Larson Roberta J. Newman Greg Larson. Clubbie: A Minor League Baseball Memoir. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2021. 247 pp. Cloth, $27.95. Clubbie: A Minor League Memoir is Greg Larson's breezy account of his two-season tenure as clubhouse manager for the Aberdeen IronBirds, the shortseason A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles in the now-defunct New York Penn League. Self-admittedly not talented enough to play professional baseball at any level, Larson chronicles his attempts to keep the team's players fed and equipped, coaches happy, all the while trying to convince himself that he is a participant in the game. At times, he succeeds, though his attitude toward his job and his performance varies. Larson enters the clubhouse with more than a soupcon of fanboy naivete. His lack of sophistication is apparent in his choice to bring a Minnesota Twins blanket with him to his new job, expressing his concern that he will not be accepted by members of an Orioles' farm team. The players do not care. More striking is his lack of knowledge about the conditions under which the players he serves labor. One look at the Orioles' development guide disabuses him of the notion that A level baseball is a lucrative undertaking. Of his reaction to discovering that none of Aberdeen's players are paid more than $1,300 per month during the season, he writes, "Look, I didn't think Minor leaguers made Alex Rodriguez money (30 million a year), but I had no understanding of the astronomical difference between Major League and Minor League salaries," (30). Once they have paid him their seven-dollar dues and remitted rent to their landlords, if they have them, he realizes that IronBird players barely earn enough to survive. In return for their seven dollars—one more than they pay other single-A equipment managers—Larson does their laundry, dispenses balls, bats, and uniforms, and provides meals, often amounting to little more than peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and leftovers from the luxury suite spreads. In fact, he initially resists spending anything on food until he is admonished by a coach. But he learns, and serving enough food for [End Page 271] the least possible outlay becomes a source of personal pride. He leaves at the end of each of his two seasons with more money than the players. This is only a minor source of guilt. Throughout his memoir, Larson, who is a stand-up comedian, among other pursuits, attempts to tell his story with humor. He peppers the narrative with anecdotes from inside the clubhouse. One of his favorite sources and targets is pitching coach Alan Mills, whose self-professed claim to fame is his temper. Above all, Mills seems to be proudest of the fact that he once punched Daryl Strawberry during a 1998 benches-clearing brawl between the Orioles and the New York Yankees—a story Mills tells repeatedly whether or not anyone asks. Larson's fondness for Mills is apparent throughout, perhaps because, as the coach also never tires of reminding the author, he was also a clubbie before making it big. Larson is generally amused by Mills's explosive temper until he is the brunt of it halfway through the author's second season. Chastised by Mills for giving lousy tickets to the family of a pitching prospect, Larson describes the encounter in this way: "The whites of his eyes expanded and he leaned in toward me. 'You'll know when I'm in your face, meat, and this aint it.' He let his look linger for a second before walking out. In that moment I'd seen a single fierce glimpse—one movie frame—of the man who'd punched Darryl Strawberry, Brian Graham, and damn near half of the 1993 Seattle Mariners" (185). However, his opinion of Mills remains unchanged. While Larson's memoir is written with humor, it tends to trade in baseball cliches. Among the oldest of his chestnuts is "Baseball taught me how to love"(9), followed shortly thereafter by "Baseball taught me how to have my heart broken" (10) without as much as...