By Ed Piper
Two days after the release of Dan Good's new book on Padre third baseman Ken Caminiti, I've plowed my way through the first seventh of the book. It seems well-written; the book (I got the e-version) is written by a veteran writer; Good is knowledgeable on baseball and shows it.
These are all good things. The author has already laid out the teary-eyed and treacherous terrain we're going to cover: Caminiti, a good athlete as a youth in San Jose who began using alcohol in middle school to loosen up socially, was driven by a dad who loved him but who also attended every youth baseball practice and game, standing behind the backstop, critiquing his son's performance.
With an impossible burden--his older brother Glen already hadn't measured up--to carry on the athletic field, Caminiti, an MVP for the Padres in 1998, began using steroids. He got strength and recovery from the steroids, but his body also began to break down.
My wife and I have often discussed how Ken left a wife and two young children when he died of an overdose in squalid conditions. The author, Dan Good, said in a promotional interview with the San Diego Union-Tribune that he conducted over 400 interviews in preparation for writing his book, and "there was constant crying"--a difficult path to fill out the mostly-unknown background of the baseball player's pitiful death.
"Not everyone" will choose to read his book, said Good. But a positive can be if understanding and more of the truth can come out to combat abuse of performance-enhancing drugs by other young athletes.
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