He wanted to count for something, but his impact as a player was already gone. The Red Sox won a couple of Series without him, after not winning any with him. His few “hits and games for a catcher” records were in reach for several active guys. So, what was immortal? What could he do that nobody else had done? He’d have the bronze plaque, like the other 302 guys. But what else?
Maybe the speech. He could tell the truth. Most of it. Something changed him in Syracuse, he knew that now. Made him more . . . detached.
The old guy had said, “Color your life.”
What life? Outside baseball, he was a guy wandering sideways, with no real attachments except to his fame. The words Connecting Generations ate at him.
For Grudeck, there were no daughters or sons, nieces or nephews, to tell stories of the real Grudeck. Who knew him, anyway? Really knew him. Since the phone call from Cooperstown, Grudeck thought about this constantly. His baseball “immortality” told him just how mortal he was. Who would outlive him to tell his stories? Articles, and highlights, and taped interviews didn’t explain what Grudeck was really like. Or what he believed in. Not like a family would. Connecting generations? Not Grudeck.
But maybe the speech . . .
He brought it up to Sal that day, leaving the studio, as he stretched out in Sal’s Buick LeSabre.
“Sallie, I’m thinking . . .”
Sal knew what it meant when Grudeck called him “Sallie,” like Chuck Grudeck used to. It meant he needed a friend.
“What?”
“I don’t know, the speech. I think I want to make a good speech.”
Sal looked at him over his half-glasses.
“What, kid? What’s bothering you, kid?” Sal said again, now stuck in traffic on West Sixty-seventh. “It’s just a speech. You’ve done a thousand. You get up there, thank everybody. Say you couldn’t have done it without them. Talk about your dad, all your good memories, how blessed you are. Maybe you get a little choked up, and sit down. That’s that.”
“I don’t know, Sallie. I want this one to be different.”
Grudeck looked out the window of the Buick, at hundreds of people hurrying down the city street. All the anonymous nobodies. Grudeck was a somebody; he could jump out of the car and be recognized.
And yet . . . all those nobodies probably had somebody. Husbands, wives, kids, parents, siblings. Grudeck had his mom, and Sal . . . and fans.
“I don’t know, Sal. Lately, I’ve been thinking,” he said, not turning. “You know something? I’ve never been anybody’s best man. I’ve never been a godfather. Not even a fucking Confirmation sponsor. How’s that possible, all the guys I know?”
“What’s bothering you, Joe?” Sal said, more serious this time.
He didn’t say it out loud, but a sentence formed in his head: I love nobody and nobody loves me. Just thinking it embarrassed him. What was he, a fifteen-year-old girl? Chrissakes. But Jesus, he felt lonely, right now, in midtown Manhattan, being driven by a seventy-something-year-old man, Sal, who was his best, maybe only, true friend. Maybe. Grudeck had made him rich. What if he hadn’t? What if he’d sucked? Then what?
Sal looked at him with a frown of concern.
“Nothing. I’m all right, Sal,” Grudeck said.
“It’s just a fucking speech, kid. You’ve done a million of them.”
* * *
GRUDECK WAS NO GREAT SPEAKER. He didn’t like it; it was just another way for people to get a piece of you.
Early in his big league days he did a bunch of off-season Meet Joe Grudeck dinners for Little Leagues, Babe Ruths, Legion ball, just to add to his income.
“If they pay a grand, give ’em a five-minute speech,” Sal used to say. “For two grand, give ’em the same speech twice. Just make sure it’s cash, otherwise you have to file a 1099, and the IRS gets a third.”
And that’s how it was. Grudeck, the guest of honor, hulking out of a business suit and choked by a buttoned collar, would tower over the dais in front of a banquet room at some Moose or Elks lodge, or VFW or Legion Hall in Braintree, Needham, or Walpole or back home in Jersey. He’d sit through iceberg salad and chicken something-or-other, then listen while the Whatever League president gave the audience the usual bullshit: How great it was for a great guy like Joe Grudeck to come speak to a great bunch of kids and their parents. As if Grudeck were there for free. As if there weren’t a brown bag of twenties and fifties at the end of the night.
Grudeck would rise to big applause and the guy who introduced him would shake his hand, pull close, and whisper something like “You have no idea how thrilled our kids are!”
This was done so kids and dads alike would think the league president somehow knew Grudeck well enough to invade his space, like they were personal friends.
When the applause died down, Grudeck would start with the same joke, fed to him by Sal.
“Thank you, thank you very much. I guess there aren’t many Yankee fans here tonight.”
He then launched into the stock speech: play hard, stay in school, be a good sport, stay away from drugs, and if you tried your very, very best it made you a winner, no matter what. Next to each boy was a dad, nodding in agreement, happy to have Joe Grudeck up there reinforcing the same b.s. they gave their sons at home. When he was done, the president would come back up—another handshake and intimate whisper—and tell everybody Grudeck had agreed to hang around for autographs. At a side banquet table Grudeck would sign balls, baseball cards, and event posters, and shake the moist, grubby hands of boys and fathers. The men would always squeeze harder than necessary. Even in those days, Grudeck felt the wear and tear on his hands. He would then go into the bathroom and scrub his hands under hot water to rinse off the germs, get his bag of cash from the club treasurer, and climb into a waiting Town Car, provided by the group, to go home.
Later, when he was making big money, he only did charity work. The Red Sox offered him for the $10,000-a-table fund-raisers for Children’s Hospital and the Greater Pilgrim Fund, where the silent-auction tables were filled with Grudeck-autographed bats and balls, signed and framed photos and jerseys. He posed for pictures, scrawled his name on programs. Joe Glad-hand. In the end, there was no brown bag. Just his hand-scrubbing ritual, then home with some wealthy divorcée or old-enough daughter.
Sal, too, asked him to do a few gratis fund-raising events. Sal’s wife was Jewish and on the fund-raising board of MetroWest.
“All the Jews in the world who make money, and I marry the one who only knows how to give it away,” Sal used to say.
So Grudeck did the circuit: the Maplewood Country Club for Beth Israel Hospital in Newark, Temple B’nai this or that for United Jewish Charities. He knew it was important to Sal. Delivering Joe Grudeck made Sal feel like a big shot, accepted by his wife’s crowd. And that crowd—doctors, lawyers, real estate developers, and their thin, ageless blond wives—never seemed to get tired of Grudeck, who always opened with the same line.
“It’s a great honor for me to be here, to be among people who consider me the second-greatest catcher ever to come out of Jersey—after Moe Berg!”
No matter how many times he used it, he always got a big laugh. Berg was a legend among this crowd. He was little more than a bit player for the White Sox, Indians, and Red Sox in the ’30s, but did spy work during World War II, which made him a Nazi slayer. Hell, he was bigger than Sandy Koufax with old Jews.
Truth was, Grudeck had never even heard of Moe Berg. Sal told him the story and fed him the line. “All the old Yids from Weequahic High say they remember him, but the truth is he played at Barringer with the paisans. One of my uncles from down there knew him pretty good.”
But all those gigs didn’t require a real speech, a keeper. The Hall of Fame induction did.
* * *
A FEW DAYS AFTER THE call from Strothford, Grudeck got a certified letter from the director of the Hall’s library, talking about its “vast amount of material.”
“Your speech will become a perm
anent part of our archives, available for future scholars to read and study, for insight into the culture of baseball in your times. Please view your speech as an opportunity to reveal not only your personality but also your thoughts, in your words, on the game we all cherish. While your plaque gives a brief biography and the statistics that made you induction-worthy, your speech can present your human side: the man behind the ballplayer.”
The letter was so . . . somber, like he had to deliver the Gettysburg Address or something.
Again, the language haunted him. “Your thoughts, in your words” meant words no longer filtered through sportswriters, or twisted by a sports talk host, or edited for television. No misquoting here.
And the “man behind the ballplayer” sounded as if the people at the Hall knew there was a real person lost inside Joe Grrreww.
That morning in Syracuse, after the girls staggered out, he got up and looked at himself in the mirror and saw something different. The kid in him was gone. He was twenty, already a sports mercenary, hardened by his small fame. Those girls . . . he took what he wanted, what he deserved. He was Joe Grudeck. Fuck everybody else. He changed.
Now was his chance to tell the truth—mostly—about how fucked up things were. And maybe figure out how fucked up he got.
* * *
“I’M NOT SURE WHAT I want to say, Sal,” Grudeck said on the drive home from the TV show. “I want it to be right. You know, maybe even important.”
“So, say what you feel,” Sal said.
“I’m not sure anybody wants to hear that.”
“Tell you what. I’ll pull some old speeches. Might give you some guidance.”
A few days later, Sal dropped off two 11-by-15 envelopes for him at the club, stuffed with induction speeches from the last few years.
“Where’d you get these?” Grudeck asked, as they ate breakfast in the club dining room.
“Online. Jesus, join the century. The Hall has their archives on the Internet.”
“For what?”
“For what . . . for when guys like you want to see other guys’ speeches. For research. For guys who write books about baseball. For professors who teach courses about baseball.”
Grudeck called the busboy over and asked him to get the girl from the club office. When she came to the table, Grudeck asked for a stack of club letterhead and a few pens.
“I have to write a speech,” he said.
“Does it have to be on club stationery? It’s more expensive than plain paper,” she asked.
“Whatever.”
When she returned with three legal pads and a fistful of Bics, Grudeck tipped her fifty dollars to bring it all to his condo. Sal went home, and Grudeck played eighteen holes, filling out an arranged foursome with three vice presidents from Lucent Technologies.
After a nap, dinner, and a couple of beers at the club, Grudeck opened the envelopes where the girl had left them. The names, all familiar, spread out before him, two dozen in all. Sal had gone back and got some of the greats. Hard to believe he was going to be one now.
Grudeck began to read, holding papers at almost arm’s length until his eyes could focus. For the first time, he realized he might need glasses.
Sal was right. Most of the speeches blurred with sameness. First, like Sal said, everybody thanked everybody, family, coaches, teammates, fans, then talked about playing catch with their dads and their love of the game. Next was how this moment exceeded all their dreams, and about the humility of being surrounded by the all-time greats. One after another, Grudeck thought how hollow it sounded. Humility? All those thanks were sent out to those who supported him, who coached him, the fans who loved him. Every speech. His family, his teammates, his experiences, his playing days, his highlights, his accomplishments. In naming everyone, they spoke only of themselves.
Grudeck saw it clearly now. His life, too, became all about him, the ballplayer. He let it happen. Prisoner in his own castle. Slave to fame. Fuck, he hated himself. But that was the truth. A star first, a person second. Check that: a star first, nothing second. It was that way right from the start, back to his first year in Little League, when he played for Ficchini Stationery.
Mr. Fich came to see his boys play on Opening Day, and Joey hit two home runs and pitched a shutout. Later that day, Joey and his friends were in town, up on Stuyvesant Avenue, and stopped into Ficchini’s for some candy and soda. They picked out stuff and pooled their money at the counter. No one ever stole from Isadore Ficchini. Not with those grappling-hook hands and long, sloped shoulders. He looked more like a retired heavyweight than a candy-store owner. Plus, there were those rumors . . . Isadore the Stevedore, they called him. Mr. Fich did some job rigging down in Port Newark.
As Mr. Fich began counting the kids’ money, he looked down at Joey Grudeck, still wearing his uniform.
“Hey, you play for me?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re the kid who hit the home runs today, right?”
“Yeah.”
“The pitcher, right?”
“Yeah.”
Mr. Fich reached over the counter and slapped his shoulder with a heavy hand.
“Hey! Hey! Attaboy!” He pushed the money away. “Forget it, kid! Treat your friends. It’s on me today.”
His friends grubbed up some more candy. And from then on, everything changed.
Being with Joey got you free candy and soda. Being with Joey meant you were cool in high school. Being with Joey meant you got the girls that couldn’t get Joey. All through school Grudeck couldn’t ever remember being alone, except at home. He also couldn’t remember a conversation that didn’t revolve around him.
Just that day on the golf course with the Lucent guys, same thing. Grudeck hit first and moved on, leaving the three execs to talk about business strategies, corporate lineage, stock prices, and all the other bullshit they came to the club to pretend to escape. But when Grudeck was among them, it was all about him and his moments, or his take on sports these days.
Now, reading the speeches, Grudeck realized he had talked about almost nothing but himself for thirty-five, forty years now, maybe more. Even toward the end with his dad, Grudeck never had a heart-to-heart with him about the illness. Or death. Or life, as each came to know it. The talk was the same as always. Joe’s prospects. Joe’s games. Joe’s stats.
When his dad was first diagnosed, it was kept from his son, because Chuck Grudeck didn’t want Joe distracted during the season. As the cancer progressed, in the brushfire way pancreatic does, Grudeck was called home. He hopped back and forth as much as he could, sometimes overnight from Boston, New York, or Baltimore. The last time they spoke, Grudeck had a day off before a three-game series in Detroit.
In what both knew might be their final moment, Chuck Grudeck lay still with a gray ghost of unshaven stubble on his hollow face, his neck and shoulders withered, and pronounced violet surgery tracks on his colorless skin. Through labored, rattling breath, he spoke only of his son’s current season, and another pennant race both knew he wouldn’t live to see.
It felt like those community service trips Grudeck made to Children’s Hospital. After “Hiya, Jimmy, how ya feeling?” it was all about Grudeck. The season. The team. How great it was he’d come. The kids would perk up and yak, as long as their strength allowed. But the only thing they had in common with Grudeck was Grudeck. He remembered how it made him squirm. A kid was dying, and Grudeck was getting all the attention from the kid’s parents, the nurses, the kid himself. Grudeck, a stranger, an image, just a ballplayer. Not someone who loved the kid or even knew the kid, or the extent of his suffering.
The last visit with his father, there was no perk-up. Grudeck sat by his bed and held the hands that had held him as a baby, and taught him how to swing a bat and throw a football. Those hands were skeletal now, the veins hard over raised metacarpals, under papery skin.
“So, you going to Detroit?” his father managed.
“Dad, just rest.”
“How’
d you do in Cleveland? The regular nurse brings me a Star-Ledger, but she’s on vacation.”
“I did okay. Nothing spectacular. We took two of three. I had a three-run homer in the opener. But look, just be still. Close your eyes. I’m here.”
“Okay, but hit a homer for me, will ya, Mr. Grudeck? And I promise I’ll get better.”
Chuck tried to laugh, but was consumed by a dry coughing fit. His son lifted a cup of water to his lips, and then Chuck Grudeck drifted off, into a peaceful, predeath sleep. Morphine had finally blunted the pain, much like cancer had blunted his life.
Grudeck stayed through the night. His mother relieved him at dawn, so he could catch a flight to Detroit. Chuck Grudeck died at 8:49 that night, in the second inning of an 8:05 start. Grudeck wasn’t called until the game was over, as was his father’s wish.
* * *
GRUDECK KEPT READING, reading long after he got tired, longer still after he got bored. His hips were aflame and he rolled his head on his neck, trying to loosen the tightness. He wanted to come across just one speech, just one, that said something important, or at least insightful. Instead, he tumbled into his bed, and fell asleep with the packet on his chest.
In a dream, he was a boy, lost and alone in a museum hall of cathedral proportions and grandeur. Lining the halls were hundreds, maybe thousands of suits of medieval armor. One plaque said, “Richard the Lionhearted, the warrior of the Crusades.” Grudeck knew they were empty, but they scared him just the same. He was a lost boy, looking for someone he thought might be trapped inside. He stood on his toes, lifted the faceplate, and peered into the blackness of the hollow suits. “Hello . . . Are you there? . . . Are you in there?” He went from one to another, his fear and panic growing as each suit came up empty. All that gleaming steel, no man inside.
He woke, with sweat pooled at his sternum and his hair damp.
It was after two o’clock when he called Sal.
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