Product Description
This book is Orlando Cepeda's story, told in his own words and with refreshing candor and great drama.Amazon.com Review
A compelling presence on the field, Orlando Cepeda is equallycompelling off of it. The only player to win unanimous Rookie of theYear and Most Valuable Player titles, the former slugging firstbaseman for the Giants and Cardinals was part of the first wave ofMajor League stars to come out of Puerto Rico in the 1950s, yet it'shis postcareer that supplies Baby Bull with its power. Afterthe fullness of a baseball life lived in the spotlight, Cepedaspiraled downward in the late '70s into shadows of his ownmaking. Tapped out financially, carousing in discos, and deep intodrugs, he served a prison sentence for smuggling marijuana beforefinally finding and righting himself through Buddhism: "All therecords and cheers and the celebrity do not, and did not, create innerpeace," Cepeda admits candidly. "Buddhism ... gave me the tools toturn my pain into medicine." Now back in baseball with the Giants as akind of goodwill ambassador, and content as a husband and father,Cepeda looks back on a life worthy of a novel. Mercifully, he relatesthe story of his life without defensiveness, self-pity, or second-guessing. If it is, in part, a cautionary tale, it's at least acautionary tale with a happy ending. --Jeff Silverman ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

BABY BULL TOOK IT BY THE HORNS
THIS IS THE STORY OF ORLANDO CEPEDA FORMER MLB PLAYER. ORLANDO TAKES US THRU HIS LIFE IN PUERTO RICO, BASEBALL CAREER, JAIL TIME AND HIS COMMITMENT TO BUDDAHISM. ALONG THE WAY, HE HAS MANY INTERESTING STORIES AND OPINIONS. AMONG HIS STORIES IS A THE FAMOUS BRAWL IN WHICH ORLANDO WAS ABOUT TO TAKE A BAT TO USE ON SOMEONE UNTIL WILLIE MAYS TACKLED HIM AND ENDED THAT THREAT. HE ALSO HAS SOME BAD OPINIONS OF ALVIN DARK, WILLIE MAYS, AND RUBEN GOMEZ. WHETHER ORLANDO IS TELLING THE TRUTH IN ALL OF THESE INSTANCES IS DEBATABLE. BUT HE IS HONEST ABOUT HIS ADULTERY AND DRUG USE. ORLANDO WAS A VERY TALENTED AND COLORFUL PLAYER. I FOUND HIS BOOK TO BE BOTH ENTERTAINING AND INTERESTING. I RECOMMEND IT FOR ALL BASEBALL FANS.

Try another book
I found the book very boring, as is typical of most books by former ballplayers.I should have known better.Orlando talks about his life growing up in PR, briefly about the minors, the majors, and his post-career life.He is very frank about his life.Orlando didn't care for Al Dark or Willie Mays.OC was the first SF Giants hero, as Willie was considered a NY guy.

Cepeda vs. Franks:He said/he said
I tend to prefer my baseball books pure, untainted by "larger" themes (as though there were any).

I knew that this book, billed as a frank autobiography of Orlando Cepeda, would deal with his conviction for smuggling marijuana.But I am interested purely in his baseball career and was planning not to take much interest in what happened afterwards.

And yet, it must be confessed that Orlando's story of the disgrace that he suffered among his fellow Puerto Ricans after his arrest and conviction and how Buddhism helped him to overcome his difficulties and make peace with the world and find his way back into major league baseball was a moving one.Especially touching is the story of his reunion with a son sired out of wedlock.

But the story of his personal experience with weed is uncomfortably vague.He acknowledges having smoked it as a youth in Puerto Rico and that he picked up the habit again in 1965, while still with the Giants, to relieve stress after a particularly bad run-in with The Evil One, Manager Herman Franks.

Yet Orlando appears to have become as happy as a clam after having been traded to the Cardinals in 1966, and this is certainly reflected in his performance while with the Cardinals and in the championship seasons that "El Birdos" compiled with him on the roster.

So with the stress gone, did he continue to smoke pot as a Cardinal?And with the teams that he played on afterwards?How did this affect his performance at game time?Orlando simply does not tell us.

Still, it's "Baseball Forever", and baseball purists will be glad to know that most of this book is set in between the foul lines.This is a familiar-sounding story of a youngster who grew up in poverty, despite having been born the son of Puerto Rico's most celebrated ballplayer, the great Perucho Cepeda.Perucho was known as "The Bull", and Orlando's nickname, which is the title of this book, was naturally passed onto him.

He used his natural ability (presumably also inherited from his father) and effort to overcome prejudice in the United States and build a storybook career.

The year-by-year recapitulation of his performance and that of the teams he played on is interesting but unremarkable and gives the reader a chance to reacquaint himself with the players from that era.What I primarily wanted to hear was Orlando's version of his alleged refusal to move from first base to left field in order to enable the Giants to get both his big bat and that of Willie McCovey into the lineup in a way which would not sacrifice too much defense (McCovey was not mobile enough to play left field effectively).

It is remarkable that a team laden with as much talent as the San Francisco Giants of the 1950's and 1960's won only one National League pennant, and many blame this on Cha-Cha's alleged refusal to make the switch to left.

In interviews conducted by Steve Bitker for his book, "The Giants of `58", Herman Franks repeats this charge, and Orlando sidesteps it.But even Bill Rigney, revered by Orlando as a father figure, states that he thinks that the Giants would have won the pennant in 1959 (McCovey's Rookie of the Year season) if Orlando would have been more cooperative.

Again, Orlando is uncomfortably vague in dealing with this issue, stating only that by 1966, he was ready to try to become the best left-fielder in baseball but that Herman Franks was already set on getting rid of him.But McCovey and Cepeda had played together for six years before 1966 (Cepeda was hurt for virtually all of 1965).What of those years?

The statistical comparisons from those years of how often Orlando played the outfield and of McCovey's at-bats and Orlando's might provide a slightly better defense of Orlando than he does of himself.

After 1959, 1962 seems to be the only year in which McCovey, while healthy, might have been deprived of at-bats because of Orlando's possible resistance to playing left field.Yet the Giants won the pennant that year and so this resistance appears not to have cost them.

But while McCovey does not appear to have been deprived of at-bats during those other years, he mostly played left field in 1963 and 1964, and played it poorly, while Cepeda was anchoring first.Would a switch have made enough of a difference to mean a Giants pennant?The statistics show that Orlando played creditably in left field in 1960 and 1961.

Cepeda also responds to Herman Franks's charge that he was a poor clutch hitter by pointing to his 553 RBI's garnered over his first five seasons.It's an astounding number, but it includes a monstrous 1961 season in which Orlando produced 142 "ribbies", which staggers the five-year total somewhat.From 1958 to 1960, he averaged slightly under 100 RBI's a season.

100 RBI's is usually a sterling number, but RBI's, by themselves, do not a clutch hitter make.Runs batted in during the early stages of a close game might make a difference later but are not the stuff that heroes are made of.

And runs produced when one's team is hopelessly ahead or behind are meaningless.But situational statistics weren't kept in Orlando's day so the case for him having been a good or a bad "clutch" hitter can only be made through anecdotal evidence, which is lacking in both the Cepeda and Franks accounts.

So to this day, it remains unresolved whether Orlando's complaints about being under-appreciated are valid - or just a lot of Baby Bull.

Amazing story
Orlando Cepeda is one of the greatest baseball players of our time.His personal life story is even more inspiring than any of his professional achievements.I was so moved by his accounts of overcoming drug addiction and other tribulations.I was also inspired by his encounter with Soka Gakkai and Buddhism.I recommend another book filled with wise quotes from the Buddhism Orlando Cepeda practices titled "Open Your Mind, Open Your Life: A Book of Eastern Wisdom." by Taro Gold.Wonderful.

Nice re-read the day that Cepeda went into the BBHoF
I saw Orlando Cepeda play throught his career (mostly in person during the time he was with St. Louis).He was my hero then, he is a hero now.The book captures it all.I just wished that its publication could have waitedto include a chapter on his 1999 induction into the National Baseball Hallof Fame (maybe the paperback will). But with all the times he just missedout on the honor, who can blame the man for writing his story now. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

New appreciation for Cepeda
Orlando Cepeda was a revolutionary player. He was San Francisco's first homegrown star after the Giants arrived in California in 1958--the great Willie Mays was considered a holdover from the franchise's days in New York. "The Baby Bull," so nicknamed because he was the son of great Puerto Rican slugger Pedro "The Bull" Cepeda, was a tremendous run producer in a time when those players were rare. And in Mays and Willie McCovey the Giants had three of the National League's best. With Juan Marichal as the team's ace, it's amazing that San Francisco won only one pennant. Their inability to win wasn't Cepeda's fault--after leaving the Giants he helped the Cardinals and Braves reach the postseason three straight years--but Cepeda's biggest mistakes happened away from the field.

Beloved by his teammates, Cepeda had problems with his knees and his managers, which together led to five uniform changes in his final eight years in the major leagues. He also had difficulties with his marriage and the IRS, but his lowest point came after his career ended when he served time in prison for trafficking marijuana. In a book aimed at young adults these things are not simple to address or explain, but Bruce Markusen does both very well. It's not just a book about a baseball player, it's a story about a man of flawedcharacter who swallows his sizeable pride and proves to be greater in defeat than he was in victory.

Disgraced in his home country and not entirely welcomed in America, Cepeda started his life anew in plain sight of those who thought of him as a criminal who had thrown away fame, wealth, and respect. He made it back to the major leagues as a coach, but didn't last long in any place. Fittingly, the turnaround came in San Francisco, and the author does a wonderful job of recreating the scene. You can almost see a packed Candlestick Park and hear the roar of the crowd when he throws out the first pitch during the 1987 playoffs. He admits that it was not until that moment that he realized that people cared and accepted him, flaws and all. That is perhaps the book's most valuable lesson--Cepeda paid for his mistakes, admitted he was wrong, and worked to get back the people's trust. While the ultimate reward for most people won't be the Hall of Fame or the cheers of thousands, it is a fitting prize for someone who has fallen on his face while the world watched and judged.

Cepeda has been covered in at least four other biographies--including three autobiographies--but Markusen's version is a no nonsense approach that tells a story well for a young audience that can benefit from the lessons Cepeda learned the hard way. I have read Markusen's other two books on this era of baseball history--The Great One and Baseball's Last Dynasty, which deal with Roberto Celente and the 1970s Oakland A's, respectively--and I would safely call this another success. ... Read more

Product Description
Chapters: Roberto Clemente, Benito Santiago, Orlando Cepeda, Juan González, Iván Rodríguez, Carlos Delgado, Bernie Williams, Carlos Beltrán, Roberto Alomar, Jaime Navarro, Mike Lowell, Jorge Posada, Victor Pellot, Raul Casanova, Javier Vázquez, Ramón Castro, Geovany Soto, Bengie Molina, Sandy Alomar, Jr., Willie Montañez, José Oquendo, Carlos Baerga, Joel Piñeiro, Alex Cintrón, Roberto Hernández, Felipe López, Alex Ríos, Ed Figueroa, Javier López, Jonathan Sánchez, Yadier Molina, Melvin Nieves, Rubén Sierra, Tony Bernazard, José Molina, Alex Cora, Luis Alicea, Javy López, Joey Cora, Wil Cordero, Sixto Lezcano, Leo Gómez, Sandy Alomar, Sr., José Cruz, Jr., José Valentín, Kiko Calero, José Lind, J. C. Romero, Bombo Rivera, Félix Torres, Jerry Morales, Jaime Cocanower, Omir Santos, Ramón Vázquez, José Alberro, José Hernández, Ellie Rodríguez, Hiram Bithorn, Nino Escalera, Danny Tartabull, Jonathan Albaladejo, Ángel Pagán, Ricky Ledée, Héctor Mercado, Willie Hernández, Rubén Gotay, Luis Olmo, Pedro Valdes, Hiram Bocachica, Andy González, José Vidro, Giancarlo Alvarado, Luis Arroyo, Félix Mantilla, Pedro Feliciano, José Morales, Ángel Sánchez, Félix Millán, Candy Maldonado, Javier Valentín, Wil Nieves, Rey Sánchez, Iván Dejesús, José Santiago, Luis Figueroa, Ricky Bones, Orlando Merced, Fernando Cabrera, Carmelo Martínez, Iván Calderón, Edwin Rodríguez, Luis Matos, Luis Alvarado, Juan Beníquez, Benny Ayala, Juan Pizarro, Ramón Hernández, Felipe Crespo, Luis López, José Guzmán, Lou Montañez, Tommy Cruz, Héctor Cruz, Luis Quiñones, Luis Aquino, Saúl Rivera, Omar Olivares, Germán Rivera, Orlando Mercado, Ed Romero, Carlos Corporan, Carlos Rivera, Juan Padilla, Raúl González, René Rivera, Luis Alcaraz, Mike Rivera, Roger Moret, Edwin Núñez, César Crespo, Luis Aguayo, Eduardo Rodríguez, Luis Márquez, Pedro García, José León, Willis Otáñez, Rafael Montalvo, José Rodríguez, Dicky Gonzalez, Robinson Cancel, Ozzie Virgil, Jr., Juan Agosto,...More: http://booksllc.net/?id=25901 ... Read more