Jim Bouton

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James Alan Bouton (March 8, 1939-1939-July 10, 2019) was an American professional baseball player.

Bouton appeared in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a pitcher for the New York Yankees, Seattle Astros, Houston Astros, and Atlanta Braves between 1962 and 1978.

He was also a best-selling author, actor, campaigner, sportscaster, and one of the originals of Big League Chew. Bouton played college baseball at Western Michigan University before committing to the Yankees for the first time.

He was a member of the 1962 World Series champions and made his first appearance in the 1964 World Series.

He developed and threw a knuckleball later in his career. Bouton wrote Ball Four, a compilation of his 1969 season and memoir of his time with the Yankees, Pilots, and Astros.

Personal life

Bouton and his first wife Bobbie had two children together, Michael and Laurie, and they had adopted a Korean orphanage, Kyong Jo. Later, Kyong Jo changed his name to David. In 1981, Bobbie and Bouton separated. Bouton's ex-wife collaborated with Nancy Marshall, the former wife of pitcher Mike Marshall's, in 1983 to produce a tell-all book titled Home Games. Bouton wrote: "I'm afraid of the book's publication: I'm sure they did not know it was published."

Laurie was killed in a car crash at the age of 31 in 1997. Bouton married Paula Kurman later in life. They had six grandchildren.

Bouton had a stroke in 2012 that did not incarate him physically, but it did hurt his memory and speaking.

Bouton encouraged the Vintage Base Ball Federation to establish vintage clubs and leagues around the world to standardize the codes and equipment of its 19th-century roots, as well as the organization of tournaments.

Bouton was a delegate to George McGovern's 1972 Democratic National Convention.

Bouton died at home on July 10, 2019, after weeks of hospice care for cerebral amyloid angiopathy at the age of 80.

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Amateur and college career

Bouton was born in Newark, New Jersey, as the son of Gertrude (Vischer) and George Hempstead Bouton, an executive. He grew up in Rochelle Park, New Jersey, where he lived until the age of 13. He and his family lived in Ridgewood, New Jersey, until he was 15 years old when his family moved to Homewood, Illinois. Bouton began attending Bloom High School, where he competed for the school's baseball team. Bouton was nicknamed "Warm-Up Bouton" because he never got to play in a game and spent a majority of his time as a benchwarmer. Jerry Colangelo, who later became the owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks and Phoenix Suns, was bloom's star pitcher at that time. Bouton did not throw particularly hard in summer leagues, but he knocked batters out by mixing traditional pitches with the knuckleball technique, which he had been playing with since childhood.

Bouton played for the Western Michigan Broncos baseball team at Western Michigan University and pitched for the Western Michigan Broncos. For his second year, he was given a scholarship. He played amateur baseball in the summer, attracting the notice of scouts. Art Stewart, the Yankees' scout, acquired Bouton for $30,000.

Professional career

In 1959, Bouton signed with the Yankees as an amateur free agent. Bouton began his baseball career in 1962 with the Yankees, where his tenacity earned him the nickname "Bulldog" is used to describe him. He had a fastball by this time. He began to be known for his cap flying off his head at the end of his plate, as well as his uniform number 56, a number that is usually assigned in spring training to players designated for the minor leagues. (Bouton later revealed that he was given the number in 1962 when he was promoted to the Yankees and wanted to keep it as a reminder of how close he was to not making the team). (He wore number 56 for the majority of his major league career.)

Bouton appeared in 36 games during the 1962 season, including 16 starts, and had a record of 7–7. Although he was supposed to start Game 7 in the Yankees' 1962 World Series victory over the San Francisco Giants, he did not participate in the games. Ralph Terry pitched instead when the game was postponed due to rain. Bouton appeared in the 1963 All-Star Game, going 21-7 and 18-13 in the next two seasons.

In Game 3 of the 1963 World Series, Bouton and Don Drysdale of the Los Angeles Dodgers clashed for the first time in a memorable duel at Dodger Stadium. In a 1–0 victory, Drysdale pitched a three-hit shutout, with Bouton giving up only four hits for the Yankees. Tommy Davis, who bounced off the pitching mound, was the only one who scored in the first inning on a walk, wild pitch, and single.

Bouton made his debut in the 1964 World Series as a wrestler. On October 10, he defeated the St. Louis Cardinals 2–1 on a walk-off home run by Mickey Mantle, who then defeated them again at Busch Stadium, 8–3, backed by another Mantle homer and a Joe Pepitone grand slam. In World Series play, he was 2–1 with a 1.48 ERA.

Bouton's regular use by the Yankees during those years (he led the league with 37 starts in 1964 in comparison to pitching in the World Series that year) may have accounted for his subsequent arm injuries. An arm injury slowed his fastball and ended his career as a pitching phenomenon in 1965. Bouton began throwing the knuckleball again in an attempt to stretch his career after being relegated mainly to bullpen service. Bouton, a retired Seattle Angels minor league reliever, by 1968.

Bouton was part of a group of American sportsmen who watched the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, protesting apartheid South Africa's involvement.

In 1969, the Seattle Pilots signed Bouton and used him almost entirely out of the bullpen. At Fenway Park, he pitched three innings of hitless, scoreless relief on May 16. Even though other Seattle relievers gave five runs back in the 11th inning, the Pilots earned him the victory in the top of the 11th inning. Bouton won another game against the Red Sox in July, but not allowing a hit. He made a 2–1 record with a 3.91 ERA in 57 appearances with the Pilots.

In late August, the Pilots traded him to the Houston Astros, where Bouton had a 4.11 ERA in 16 appearances.

Leonard Shecter, a sportswriter who had befriended Bouton during his time with the Yankees, approached him in 1968 with the suggestion of a season-long diary. Bouton said he had taken some notes during the 1968 season with a similar aim.

Bouton's experiences with the Pilots in the next year were chronicled in the Ball Four's diary. Bouton was also followed during his two-week stint with the Vancouver Mounties in April, and later in late August, after his move to the Houston Astros. Ball Four was not the first baseball diary (Cincinnati Reds pitcher Jim Brosnan had written two such books), but it became more popular and discussed than its predecessors.

The book was a candid, insider's look at professional sports teams, covering the off-field aspects of baseball life, including petty jealousies, obscene jokes, alcoholic tomcatting of the players, and routine drug use, including Bouton himself. Ball Four's "detrimental to baseball" was the book's publisher, according to baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn, who attempted to convince Bouton to sign a statement stating that the book was entirely fictional. Bouton, on the other hand, refused to deny any of Ball Four's reports. Any teammates never blamed him for disclosing details given to him in confidence or naming names. Bouton was unpopular with many players, coaches, and officials on other teams as well; he was banned from baseball informally.

Bouton's articles about Mickey Mantle's life were among the most popular, though they were limited to only four pages and some of the material was free. For example, when Bouton won his first shutout victory as a Yankee, he recalls Mantle laying a "red carpet" of white towels leading directly to Bouton's locker in his honor.

Bouton wrote a sequel, I'm Glad You Didn't Take It Personally, in which he addressed both the controversy and reactions to Ball Four's cancellation, as well as his transition to become a New York sportscaster.

Bouton retired midway through the 1970 season, just after the Astros sent him down to the minor leagues. Bouton left baseball to become a local sports anchor for WABC-TV in New York City; as part of Eyewitness News, he later worked at WCBS-TV. Bouton published a collection of managerial tales in 1973, including one by Bouton himself about Joe Schultz, his Seattle Pilots manager. Bouton performed in Terry Lennox's The Long Goodbye (1973), as well as Jim Barton's lead role in the 1976 CBS television series Ball Four, which was loosely based on the book and was cancelled after five episodes. Bouton will also appear in the 2010 James L. Brooks film How Does Anyone Know?, a decade later.

A cult audience saw Ball Four as a candid and funny representation of baseball life's ups and downs. Bouton went on the college lecture circuit, giving amusing accounts of his experiences. He wrote a sequel, I'm Glad You Didn't Take It Personally, and later updated the original text with a new extended postscript that included a ten-year review, dubbed Ball Five.

Bouton made his comeback with the Portland Mavericks of the Class A Northwest League in 1975, compiling a 5–1 record. He missed the 1976 season to appear on the television show, but in 1977, Bill Veeck signed him to a minor league deal with the Chicago White Sox. Bouton was winless for a White Sox farm team, followed by a stint in the Mexican League and a return to Portland.

Ted Turner, a native of the Atlanta Braves, has been a member of Bouton from 1978-78. He was called up to Atlanta's rotation in September after a fruitful season with the Savannah Braves of the Class AA Southern League, and he had a 1–3 record in five starts. In a book by sportswriter Terry Pluto entitled The Greatest Summer, his winding return to the majors was chronicled. Bouton talked about his return to Ball Four Plus Ball Five in a tenth anniversary edition, as well as adding a Ball Six, updating the players' stories in Ball Four. All were included (in 2000) as Ball Four: The Final Pitch, as well as a new coda that detailed his daughter's burial and his union with the Yankees.

Bouton, a member of the Emerson-Westwood Merchants of Bergen County, New Jersey, also played in Teaneck, New Jersey, after returning to the major leagues.

Bouton became one of the creators of "Big League Chew," a shredded bubblegum that looks like chewing tobacco and sold in a tobacco-like pouch, after his baseball career came to an end. He co-authored Strike Zone (a baseball book) and edited an anthology about managers called I Managed Well, But Boy Did They Play Bad (published 1973). Foul Ball, his most recent book, is a non-fiction account of his bid to save Wahconah Park, a historic minor league baseball stadium in Pittsfield, Massachusetts.

Despite the fact that Bouton had never been officially identified as a non grata by the Yankees or any other club as a result of Ball Four's revelations, he was barred from most baseball-related activities, including Old Timers' Games. Mickey Mantle himself was reportedly told the Yankees that he would never attend an Old-Timers' Game to which Bouton was invited. Mantle denied the charge after a mantle's son Billy died of cancer in 1994 after Mantle's uncle Billy died of cancer, according to Mantle's uncle Billy, who was sending Bouton a condolence card.

Michael Bouton's oldest brother wrote an open letter to the Yankees in June 1998, in which Michael outlined his father's agony after Michael's sister Laurie's death at the age 31 in August 1997. Michael compared Yogi Berra's self-imposed exile with the de facto banishment of his father's de facto banishment, but it created a situation in which not only was the Yankees under intense public pressure to invite his father back but also the Berra's reconciliation was possible.

Bouton, wearing his familiar number 56, received a standing ovation when he took the field at Yankee Stadium in July 1998.

Bouton was inducted into the Shrine of the Eternals of the Baseball Reliquary in 2001.

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