It's obvious the author looks at the 1972 Tigers team with fond memories. I can't recall exactly how old he said he was when the season played out, but I remember it being during one of those "glory kid years" when baseball seemed to capture many of our imaginations (at least for those of us 30 and older).
By all accounts, 1972 was one of the strangest years ever; marred by a brief but acrimonious strike in major league baseball, which produced a somewhat uneven and unbalanced schedule, which in turn produced a strange half game AL Eastern Division championship for the subject of this book - the aging Detroit Tigers and their wild and crazy manager, Billy Martin.Of course, this was also the year the Nixon administration decided breaking into the Democratic National headquarters was a great idea, and after getting caught red-handed, chose to lie about it for as long as possible.
Long-time Tiger fans will enjoy this book, but I doubt that it will appeal to broader baseball fans. The main problem with the book is that it focuses too much on the day-to-day games, often resorting to one paragraph descriptions of each game.
For anyone growing up in the Detroit area and as a fan of the Tigers this is a must buy.The author takes you from the history of the 1968 team and details the challenges this team faced to overcome many injuries and advanced age to win an improbable eastern division crown.
The 1972 Detroit Tigers: Billy Martin and the Half-Game Champs is a detailed and finely-chronicled account of an underappreciated team and pennant race - the Detroit Tigers and their eventual capture of the 1972 American League East championship. The author does an excellent job interweaving the pennant race and events beyond baseball, lending a nostalgic atmosphere to the story.
