Rating: 
Summary: A Long Game, but Not That Long
Review: I was privileged to watch Koufax's last game in Atlanta Stadium. It was, as Leavy depicts, a long, rain-delayed game, played before a standing room only audience, but it was not over at 2 AM! My mom would have tarred and feathered my dad if he'd kept his two sons out that late. I was 13 at the time, and midnight is closer to the truth. But it was a marvelous experience that I will never forget!
Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic "sociological" biography...
Review: Jane Leavy has really transcended sports biography with this outstanding account of baseball great Sandy Koufax. Framed in a "between innings" format, the reader gets Koufax's career discussed in parallel with his monumental September, 1965 perfect game against the Chicago Cubs. At the same time, we get a sort of "social" history of the times (mid 1960's) that adds depth and immediacy to this story thats lacking in other more celebrated biographies. From early childhood to his still current adulation, Leavy attempts to myth-alize and at the same time de-myth the Koufax icon...all the time with minimal cooperation from the subject. And even with this roadblock, she has achieved a major success! With the advantage of hundreds of interviews of Koufax intimates, she has managed to succeed in portraying the "real" Koufax where many before her have failed. His legendary career is celebrated at the same time his legendary "aloofness" is picked apart, showing that Koufax ultimately achieves what he always wanted to be be: a regular guy. There is no shortage of baseball talk here though...we hear Koufax explaining the mechanics of pitching in almost doctoral detail; why these mechanics ruined his pitching elbow and ultimately led to his early retirement. We get numerous funny and informative anecdotes from the afore-mentioned interviews, as well as some darned good game coverage...Leavy obviously was (is) an excellent sports writer and her passion for the game and the subject are obvious. The undeniable thread throughout this work, however, is the decency and "down to Earth" manner in which Koufax carried himself throughout his career. Whether it was his practice of hanging out with his "lesser" teammates (as opposed to Don Drysdale, who comes across as sort of "star-seeking") or refusing to pitch on the opening game of the 1965 World Series (which occured on Yom Kippur), Koufax's humility and class are ever-present in the narrative and gives the reader that fleeting "personal" side that has been missing from many other descriptions of Koufax's career. The social climate of the mid-to-late 1960's is interspersed with the games and gives a perspective and context that's not normally found in most sports biographies...it's this feature of the book and Koufax's personal makeup that make this book so appealing. Whether looking for a sports biography or a discussion of how sports fit into the late 60's culture, "Sandy Koufax: A Lefty's Legacy" is an excellent source. Extremely readable and highly entertaining, this book should be considered a watershed in these subjects as well as a definitive account of Sandy Koufax's career and I recommend it very highly.
Rating:
Summary: Wrong Title
Review: ...I love baseball and enjoyed this book but it was way too ethnic. Jane Leavy depicts Bensonhurst, Brooklyn as Tel Aviv and Lafayette high school as a Yeshiva. A reader who was not familiar with that area in the 50's and 60's would get a very wrong impression. For every bagel place there were two pizza joints. Jewish culture was very much a part of Bensonhurst but the mafia ruled it..."Koufax" is structured around being Jewish first and being a pitcher second. After reading this book I now know how many Jewish baseball cards there are. Sandy Koufax was a great pitcher and a good man but I didn't need to know if he ate pork. Aside from refusing to pitch on Yom Kippur, Sandy Koufax didn't seem to be all that religious. Good book but too ethnic.
Rating:
Summary: Good, but too preachy
Review: I enjoyed this book mainly for its insight into the baseball events that made Sandy Koufax famous. The author deserves much credit for the many interviews she conducted to bring us this insight. Unfortunately, the author also twists everything sociological to a far left wing point of view. Jew, blacks, and players are always the good guys. Non-Jews, whites, and management are always the bad guys. I can appreciate thoughtful sociological insight, but not the same points over and over, always from the same angle. There was also way too much swearing. Much of it didn't add anything to the point being made. Maybe Jane Leavy felt she had to include it to be "one of the boys". Too much hero-worshiping too. Interesting, Leavy criticizes autograph seeking as "the sycophantic elevation of one human being over another and the exploitation of that difference for material gain." But isn't that the perfect description of her book? Oh well, I still enjoyed the book. I would recommend it highly to baseball enthusiasts.
Rating:
Summary: In a word: Perfect.
Review: Like Koufax's 1965 perfect game, this biography achieves something close to perfection. Not a typical sports bio in any sense, Leavy constructs a beautiful story. It is one that weaves fans, stories, stats, and Koufax himself. It treats him with tremendous respect--something many biographies never do. It does not gossip or speculate. It enlightens. It tells of time a I never got to see (and one none of us shall ever see again). It makes Koufax real and, in a sense, that makes him even more of hero. Koufax was perhaps the best who ever pitched. This is certainly the best sports biography I have ever read.
Rating: 
Summary: Meet Sandy Koufax
Review: This book is a well done effort to give its reader's a good idea of the kind of person that Sandy Koufax was as well as detailing the accomplishments of one of the greatest pitchers of all time. Koufax is Jewish and a large part of the book is dedicated to racial prejudice, not only against Jews but all racial prejudice. Koufax is shown to be a kind and friendly person who also likes his privacy and doesn't want a lot of fuss made over him. He was extremely popular with his teammates and even players from other teams. His partnership holdout along with Don Drysdale was the start of better bargaining power for ballplayers and eventually was a stepping stone for other people to develop the free agency policy. The book details some theories about how Koufax was able to pitch the way he did, how he studied pitching motion, and improved to be the premier pitcher that he was. He was not used much during his first 6 years of his 12 years with the Dodgers and also was not quite the pitcher he became in his last six years. The last six years he broke nearly all records and did things no one else had ever done. After retiring from baseball, Koufax has continued his individualism and has helped many pitchers to develop their skills. Some examples are Tom Seaver and Nolan Ryan.
Rating:
Summary: The REAL Joe DiMaggio
Review: It's been said that Ted Williams was the "real John Wayne." Through Jane Leavy's excellent book, it could be argued that we meet the "real Joe DiMaggio." Sandy Koufax was and is everything DiMaggio's apologists wanted him to be - superior athlete who performed with grace, iconic ethnic hero, dignified, private - but with far, far more elegance and class and substance than Joltin' Joe when examined close up. "Lefty's Legacy" demolishes some of the most common myths about Koufax - that he was "perfect," that he was indifferent about baseball, that he went to the temple instead of pitch the 1965 World Series opener - while reinforcing how determinedly private a man he is. Although he wouldn't sit for an interview with her, he made himself readily available to her, encouraged his friends and former teammates to meet with her (contrast this with DiMaggio cutting off anyone who would ever talk about him), and checked the final draft for factual errors. Other reviewers have criticized the flow of the book, but I didn't find it disjointed. A mostly-chronological review of his life alternates chapters with an inning-by-inning review of his 1965 perfect game. Someone who picks this book up hoping to know Everything that Can Be Known About Sandy Koufax will be disappointed (hence four stars rather than five). Koufax, a proper and private man living his life with propriety and discretion, doesn't yield mounds of juicy material to write about. But anyone else who would like to learn a few new things about Koufax, or reinforce their already-held view that the man is someone special, as an athlete and as a person, will come away pleased. A suitably worthy treatment of a far-more-than worthy subject.
Rating:
Summary: A True Professional
Review: Jane Leavy's chronicle of Koufax's career was a fantastic read. A must read for baseball fans. She goes into great detail the struggles of a young left hander with no control, to the evolution of the greates pitcher of the 1960's, if not the greatest pitcher in Major League history. Every major league player should be made to read this to learn how to handle themselves not only professionally, but with class.
Ms. Leavy did a great service for us baseball fans who enjoy reading of an era gone by.
Rating:
Summary: The Koufax Story
Review: This is a fine book, and an unusual biography given that, although Koufax is alive and well, and Ms. Leavy had no intention of writing negatively about him, he provided her virtually no opportunity to interview him. So we are not privy to his thoughts about most of the events that are described. The book paints an excellent portrait of Koufax - the pitcher - who, for 5 years was, arguably, the finest ever. A fierce competitor and at his best when the stakes were highest and the drama greatest. On the other hand, without being judgemental, Ms. Leavy portrays him as being generally uninteresting outside of his baseball life, as probably most athletes are. Perhaps because his outside life has been ordinary, she dwells on his Jewishness which, apart from his declining to pitch several times on Yom Kippur, seems to have been relatively unimportant to him (although important to many of his fans). The book has a fine balance between the athletic accomplishments (without too much adulation) and a description of the times in which they took place, although as with many modern biographers, Ms. Leavy often creates a revisionist history regarding the contemporary significance of selected events of the 60's. She slips over the political edge occasionally, most memorably with her absurd point that Koufax starred in some kind of utopian era "when presidents were believed". C'mon- Lyndon Johnson?
Rating:
Summary: Uncovering the Mystery
Review: I was only 7 years old when Sandy Koufax retired, so I don't remember him first-hand. He has always been a fascinating sports character, though, and I hear my Brooklyn friends talk about him as if he were a god. Koufax and his career has always been shrouded in questions and conjecture. Why did he really retire ? Why didn't he have fun when he pitched ? Was he really a recluse ? Why was he so unfriendly ? Leavy does a very good job of answering these questions to the best of her investigative abiltity, while remaining objective. The reason Koufax has transcended the role of sports hero and become a cultural hero are many. Leavy describes how being Jewish in Brooklyn in the early sixties with his talent made Sandy the obvious , if reluctant, role model for all jews.
Surprisingly we find that baseball was not Koufax's best sport initially, even through college. And finally we find out why Koufax earned his reputation as a loner and an anti-athlete. As you read this book, be prepared to discard all the preconceived notions and age old rumours that we heard or read somewhere in the past about Sandy Koufax. There was nothing simple or easy about any part of Koufax's life. The physical and mental pain that he endured up until his retirement are absolutely shocking. While the content of Leavy's book is fascinating and informative, her style is clever as well. Chapters explaining the complete Koufax life story alternate with chapters that describe in detail the one defining achievement in Koufax's pitching career. After reading this book, I have a much better understanding of who Sandy Koufax was. Koufax the pitcher, the cultural icon, the deep thinker. the loyal friend, and perhaps more than anything, the man of principle. The sports stories are exciting, many of the anecdotes revealing and funny. And in this day and age, the concept of an athlete who cared for much more than just himself is quite inspiring.
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