A simple choice

In a similar vein as Mark Harris' Henry Wiggen with a touch of Ring Lardner's Jack Keefe, Rick Norman presents Andrew Jackson Fielder. Fielder's Choice (August House: 1991) is a baseball memoir with "Jax" Fielder recalling his life as a small-town Arkansas pitcher and war veteran. Narrating his life to an unnamed Army officer after the war, Jax paints a roller coaster of a story. As a high school pitcher, Fielder invents the "gooseball", a sidearm throw that seemed to rise as it closed on the plate. Fielder's success with the gooseball eventually earns him a spot on the St. Louis Browns. Like Wiggen and Keefe, Fielder is a rather simple soul who innocently moves about in a complicated world.

Fielder's career with the Browns in short. He signs in 1940, spends much of the 1941 season with the minor league Toledo Mudhens, and then is called up in August to try and help the Browns secure a pennant. Unfortunately, Fielder's ultimate claim to fame in baseball is not his pitching (despite his brilliance on the mound), but his error in the final game of the season that would have brought the Brownies the pennant. Of course, this being the fall of 1941, any hope for a lengthy career (and restoring his reputation) are cut short when America is drawn into the War.

Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Jax immediately volunteers. He is eventually sent into combat in the spring of 1945 as a gunner on a B-29. In Norman's continuing tale of lucky ups and downs, Fielder is "ejected" over Japan after his plane is attacked. He is captured and sent to a POW camp. At the camp, however, his identity as a Major League pitcher is discovered by a Japanese admiral who has Fielder transferred to his personal care. The admiral's wish is for Jax to teach the admiral's son, Yoshi, to pitch. And Fielder obliges.

While Fielder is a rather simple individual, but his life is full of complications. Because of his trusting personality, though, he doesn't fully realize just how convoluted his life really becomes until much later. Jax blindly accepts the role of pitching coach, but in seemingly innocent conversations with the admiral blurts out possibly damaging intelligence because he feels he's no longer serving in the Army. And his encounters with his sister-in-law, Dixie, gradually cause discord between himself and his brothers. Overall, Fielder's boat of life appears to follow a downward spiral solely due to Jax's innocence. But like Henry Wiggen, in the end he bobs to the surface without any serious damage.

Fielder's Choice is a charming tale of decency and honor amidst darkness and obstacles. The comparisons with The Southpaw and You Know Me Al are unavoidable, but Fielder's Choice is wonderful in its own terms. The character of Jax Fielder is certainly not Jack Keefe - while he is a simpleton, his naivete does not stretch as far as that of Lardner's character. And while the similarities between Fielder and Wiggen are closer, Fielder actually handles his situations in a much more mature manner. His displays of bravery and principle, I think, are much deeper than found in Henry Wiggen. This is a highly enjoyable story and one to be added to any collection.