Mets’ R.A. Dickey Working On Memoir

A passionate and critical reader, Dickey is writing a book scheduled to be published by Penguin a year from now.

Dickey, 36, is far more literary than most pro athletes, and more than even most of the college-educated reporters who write about him. So he will be writing virtually all of the book himself, with some assistance from Wayne Coffey, a sportswriter with The Daily News.

But wait, there’s lots more ...

“I’m definitely throwing myself under the bus, that’s for darn sure,” Dickey said. “That doesn’t feel great all the time, but it’s inevitable in any good narrative that there’s conflict. That’s the way life is, and to be honest about that conflict, you’re going to have a response.”

Dickey said the book would include many accounts of which he is not necessarily proud, as in how as an adult with two children he almost drowned in the Missouri River over a foolish wager. He will chronicle how, while pitching in the minor leagues, he missed the birth of his third child, who arrived early. Dickey listened on the phone as his wife described the Caesarean section birth, then took the mound minutes later and threw a complete-game victory.

“My past is littered with such narratives,” he said. “I started to unpack some things from the past that made me who I was, both good and bad.”

If nothing else, this is definitely going to be the best book ever written by a knuckleball pitcher. Well, since Jim Bouton’s Ball Four, anyway. But after reading this whole piece, I get the idea it might be one of the better books ever written by a baseball player, period.