The Boy Who Saved Baseball

Though I haven't been a kid for many years, I am such a huge baseball fan that I enjoy reading most kids' books that deal with baseball. Today I finished The Boy Who Saved Baseball. It is a fantasy about a small town of 559 people near San Diego that has a really old amateur baseball park that may soon fall to real estate developers. The esteemed town doctor owns the large portion of land to be used and he has trouble deciding if he should take the $6 million offered or not. The townsfolk are divided between wanting to preserve this small slice of history vs. wanting their poor community to again thrive with a huge development that will bring jobs and people to their town.Doc decides to let a kids' baseball game decide the matter. A couple he knows are just starting a one-week baseball camp--with all of 9 campers coming including their son, Tom. In one week they will meet a team of all stars from a nearby town and if the local nine loses, he will sell his property.Tom's dad is to coach these youngsters--politically correct with 3 girls and 6 boys--but many are now saying they need a better coach. With that issue not resolved, a tenth players rides into town--on horseback, named Cruz de la Cruz. If you like books with a religious theme, don't get excited, despite his name basically meaning "Cross of the Cross" there is no religious theme at all here.Cruz, like the others, is about 12 years old. He displays great skills as a pitcher and a hitter, and the players are delighted he has joined them. It is Cruz who pushes Tom to join him in a late night ride on his first night in town, to the fancy, walled-off home of Dante Del Gato, a recluse who we learn, in 1984 was a fantastic hitter for the San Diego Padres who got 19 hits in a row, then walked away from his team right before they met the Detroit Tigers in the World Series. He never returned to baseball and there are many rumors about why, but no answers. Cruz and Tom want to talk Del Gato into coaching their team for that week, so they can win the big game.Much of the action involves Cruz's self-made video game that is supposed to teach players to hit like Del Gato. Cruz keeps improving it, almost daily, throughout the book. The other players go to their town's library and set up a practice area where they swing real bats in reaction to the video depicting a pitch coming toward them. In the entire book, there is only one game of any type depicted.There is a big buildup for this game--TV coverage even by ESPN and others--and the whole town shows up because their future is on the line.I have many issues with this book: It does the stereotype of claiming that anything we've had for a long time is worth keeping, just because, while any new development that will bring jobs and people and prosperity to a town is said to be a bad thing. The description on the book speaks about Tom "saving his hometown." But in the story, it's population has dwindled from over 5,000 to 559. Sounds like it is in need of saving WITH some development. The old ballpark is literally falling down--at least one of the outfield walls, and is in otherwise great disrepair. How many towns of under 600 people need a huge ballpark that holds thousands?The notion that these kids who are not at all good athletes can practice mostly on a video game and become high quality hitters in less than a week is greatly misleading to any young mind who might feel like if these kids can do it, he must be dumb to practice for months and only improve a little.The idea on how the video game can help may be sound--though impractical--but it can't do it overnight.The campers spend the rest of their week doing regular baseball drills. With only 10 players, they can't play games. Whoever heard of someone going to a baseball camp for a week, with the promise of only playing one game? I understand why it was written that way, but the whole premise of this set-up is just too far from reality.I am leaving out all of the other unrealistic story line to avoid giving away too much of the story. Author Ritter even has the old stereotype from fight movies of the 1930s-80s, where one of the "Bad Guy" developers wanting the town to thrive again, along with himself, threatens our hero about what will happen if the team wins the game.I will mention that the title is totally misleading. A poor title, but a correct one, would have said, "The Boy Who Saved His Tiny Town's Decrepit Baseball Field from Destruction." At no time was the game in general threatened, nor was it somehow suggested that there would be no other place to play baseball in this town if not for the ballpark in question.I finish with another criticism: There are dozens of Spanish phrases and words mixed in with the English text. I did not count them, but it was far more than a couple of handfuls. Some were words most Americans who don't know Spanish do know. But there were many times when these phrases had no or little context and I did not know what they were saying. I have no desire to read a book while keeping a Spanish-English dictionary at my side. I do believe that had I read this as a boy I would have been frustrated because there were so many Spanish words in there I couldn't understand.There are many dozens of baseball books for kids that are far more interesting, more realistic, and more satisfying than this one. I will recommend Pitcher's Hands is Out by Dan Bylsma as one example.

Grandson would enjoy for baseball

My son loved it! Kept his interest throughout.

Perfect for baseball loving kiddos who need to get some reading done this summer! Story grabs you right from the start!

Amazing book for any 11-12 year old. Especially if you love baseball. Many lessons to be learned.

My 11 year old son and I read this together, one of Brave Writer's recommendations for homeschooling. Such a GREAT read. We both thoroughly enjoyed the story and and the authors writing style.

My son (10) who loves baseball, loved this book! He only gave it 4 stars because someone died and that was sad lol

I read this book to my sons (6&7 years old) before bed. They loved it, especially since they play baseball. I would imagine it being a good book for young readers too (about 8-11 years old). I liked how it referenced San Diego a lot since that is where we live; but I did not quite appreciate the use of slang terms in the Mexican dialect. Do boys that age of that culture really talk like that? Seemed a bit racist to me...

Purchased for grandson, who said he is enjoying it very much even though he doesn't play baseball.

Grandson (10) loved the book