Mike Shannon

Review: Hutch by Shannon and Hannig

http://andalittlewine.blogspot.com/2013/10/review-hutch-by-shannon-and-hannig.ht...

While the Pirates rolled over the Reds on Tuesday night, I read Mike Shannon and Scott Hannig's graphic novel biography of Fred Hutchinson, Hutch.

An under-appreciated pitcher in his era, Hutch boasted great command but never racked up enough wins to garner more than a single All-Star appearance. His Tigers teams of baseball's golden age were overshadowed in the American show more League by the Yankees, who would take the pennant in seven of Hutch's ten seasons. In the only World Series appearance of his career, at age 20, he pitched one inning, gave up a homerun and walked a batter.

Clearly, this is the story of a good man who never stood at the peak of his craft, but who loved the game and worked hard anyway. He'd become a player-manager with the Tigers, and then win Manager of the Year for the Cardinals. Then, he'd lead the Cincinnati Reds to the 1961 pennant. But the Yankees in '61 where the Yankees of Mantle and Maris, and the Reds would lose in five games. That was Hutch's last pennant; in the spring of 1964, he'd share with the world that he was battling lung cancer, and 3 weeks after the end of the season, he died. Baseball would create the Hutch Award in his memory.

Shannon and Hannig have set themself a difficult but admirable task: to bring a second-tier hero of the 50s and 60s to life. They do this in part by establishing (dubiously) Hutches' place in the history of the game: he's born the year of the Black Sox scandal; he makes his MLB debut May 2, 1939 against the Yankees, on the day Lou Gehrig removes himself from the lineup; his managerial career sees the arrival of Frank Robinson and Pete Rose. They try to position him as a bridge across distinct eras of baseball.

The book's big flaw is that neither the writing nor the artwork takes the lead at any point in the story. Rather than a series of scenes, rather than capturing voices and characters, the narrative is expository occasionally punctuated by a press quote. This "reading the box score" approach might be alright with visionary art to accompany it, but the books' 2x3 frames creep along page after page. Individually, Hannig's watercolor inspired frames are lovely, clearly the product of Hannig's search for the "specific, historical detail" Shannon references in the preface.

But because there is so little dialogue and so much of the action occurs on the field, Hannig's art feels like snapshots of ballplayers too cartoonish to be photo-realism, but not childish enough to capture the innocence of cartoons. I compare Hannig's work with the vibrant and evocative watercolor art of a book like Kate Williamson's in At a Crossroads: Caught Between a Rock and My Parents' Place, and I can't help seeing how a more dreamlike quality could have deepened the book's impact. If we're not old enough to remember these players, to bring with us our connections to them, Hutch doesn't bring them to life compellingly enough to make us cheer in the dramatic and heartbreaking moments.

And there are heartrending moments in Hutch; this is a story worth telling. The book is meticulously endnoted, with 20 pages of additional material, a bibliography and a detailed index of its 184 page story. This is a book of research meant for a classroom or for a museum. show less

I won this book in the March ER but it never showed up. Even so, I still wanted to read it so I tracked down a copy.

First off, I thought it'd be a regular biography of a ballplayer/manager with whom I was not that familiar. It turned out to be a graphic bio. That itself is not bad, just not at all what I expected. I went back and looked at the ER description and, sure enough, it says it's a graphic bio.

It was OK. I certainly learned quite a bit about Hutch and his playing days as a pitcher show more for the Detroit Tigers in the 1940s/early 1950s and his managing career with Detroit, St Louis, and, most notably, the Cincinnati Reds. By its nature, however, it just touched the surface. I'd like to know more.

These days, Hutch is remembered for his courage. While he was the Reds manager, during the off-season (on Christmas Eve, in fact), it was discovered that he had cancer. The book called it chest cancer. He didn't live that long after his diagnosis and passed away at a relatively young age.

Since then, baseball has annually given out the Hutch award to a player who shows courage, dedication, and competitiveness, like Fred showed. Interestingly, one player who was once treated at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center has won it in recent years, so the award has come full circle.

Overall, I'd call it OK. Not a bad read certainly but skimpy in details. I wanted more so, for me, this book was a bit of a disappointment. show less

According to Shannon, one of the major purposes of Diamond Classics is to "function as a sort of "Reader's Digest" of baseball books" (introduction, p xiii) and he is right. It is jam packed with information about all kinds of books about baseball. I think he covers every type of book from every perspective. The information is extensive. For starters there is the mandatory title, author, publisher, page numbers information (in other words the perfect citation). But it goes further than that. show more This is a great book for research purposes. Let's say I wanted to write an essay on the great Jackie Robinson (since there is a new movie coming out about the legend). I could use Shannon's Diamond Classics to compile all the relevant and useful baseball books that feature Jackie. But, wait! there's more. Shannon reviews each book for writing style as well as content. He includes the critical reception to the book (if there was one). Shannon is careful to add other baseball books written by the same author. Even his reviews of photography books are descriptive and analytical. He includes books by seasoned sports writers, former athletes and even fans. And, and! And, everything is in alphabetical order...but of course. show less

Who knew that a "graphic" book could be so informative? Apparently not me, so "Hutch" has been a wonderful and entertaining surprise. While I remmebr Frank Hutchinson as a manager (and being well-known for his temper and -- what would be refrred to these days -- his "old school" approach to this great game), this biography, while perhaps a trifle superficial due to its genre, does a good baseball man well. While written in broad strokes, the reader will come away from this book with a solid show more overview of Mr Hutchinson's life, character, and times. Admiring without being sanitized, with superb illustrations from beginning to end,"Hutch" will make a very fine addition to any baseball aficinado's library. show less