Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty

The conventional wisdom about Ty Cobb is that he was a vicious baseball player who spiked infielders on purpose, a vicious racist who couldn't be in the same room with a black person, and an all-around vicious human being who died friendless and hated. While never sugarcoating Cobb's enormous temper and willingness to brawl—facts Cobb himself never disputed—Leerhsen's remarkable new biography reaches back to primary documents that stand this wisdom on its head. The grandson of one of the few courageous abolitionist politicians in Georgia, Cobb was among the first to applaud the breaking of the color barrier, and there seems to be no evidence of his racism. The myth of Cobb's supposedly violent play was largely based on a handful of very minor affairs, which all the principals agreed were overblown, coupled with his psychological style, which tended to scare opponents but not hurt them physically. And his legend as a hated man is belied by the fact that he was truly baseball's first superstar, beloved by the nation, and only eclipsed when the lively ball (a style of baseball with an emphasis on home runs) and Babe Ruth supplanted his version of the game. Leerhsen finds that the myth of Cobb was perpetuated almost entirely by a single man, Al Stump, the ghostwriter of an autobiography commissioned by Cobb but never approved by him, as he was too sick to review it. No prior knowledge of Cobb or his myth is necessary to enjoy this book, although it will help.