The book is about a lot more than just the brilliant 1968 seasons of Bob Gibson and Denny McLain. The Year of the Pitcher—as the year with the high mound, low batting averages, and lower ERAs is known—gets into a lot of players, and not just the ballplaying kind. Jackie Robinson has a key role as a Civil Rights activist and firm supporter of the Republican Party, despite problems he had with them—and Richard Nixon. There is plenty about Robert F. Kennedy, Eugene McCarthy, Hubert Humphrey, Martin Luther King, and riots in Detroit and elsewhere.The two pitching protagonists couldn’t be further apart, except for the fact that the 1968 season is the touchstone for both. Though Gibson had already won two world championships, with him completing Game 7 in both 1964 and 1967, McLain was the big story in 1968. He is as much his own man as Gibson, though they couldn’t be more different in personality. Gibson is one of the all-time greats—even before his 1.12 ERA in ’68 assured his place—but McLain thinks he’s got it made. He wants more money, more fame, and is under the delusion that his ability to play the organ is something he can really cash in on. Maybe if he played the organ at Joe Louis Arena for Red Wings games!This book is different than most baseball books. It is told from an interior point of view as it is happening, rather than a man looking back. Johnny Sain, one of the game’s great pitching coaches and someone who was as much an individual as Gibson or McLain, has a lot to do with the development of the Tigers ace, who had a habit of rubbing everyone the wrong way. You get the feeling that without Sain you would only remember McLain for the racketeering and his other questionable decisions as opposed to being a pitching great who fell hard—and fast. McLain’s arm was already in extreme pain in 1968, but he kept pressing on. After two ugly starts in the 1968 World Series, he got the win in Game 6, the only Tigers win that did not go to Mickey Lolich. The big lefty, who also has a large role in this book, was the star of the Series as the Tigers rallied to take the final three games and the title.I remember seeing the highlight reel from this Series as a kid and being on the edge of my seat waiting to know what happened. Even knowing plenty about that team now and having read other accounts of that year, I feel like I now know what was going through the minds of the key participants, in a year where it was not easy to keep your mind on baseball.