Reviews for Big Hair and Plastic Grass: A Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging '70s

The average rating for Big Hair and Plastic Grass: A Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging '70s based on 2 reviews is 2.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2010-08-03 00:00:00 Emi States I don't know what happened during the 1980s that ruined the two great passions of my childhood life'major league baseball and classic rock'but somehow shortly after I blossomed into a teenager my passion for each of them slowly and sorrowfully fizzled. I had just turned 13 years old when the Major League's players went on strike'1981'and I immediately had this very raw "screw them" epiphany. By 1984 I had no real interest in major league baseball what so ever. I had stopped collecting baseball cards and obsessing over the league leaders and box scores in the Sunday paper, I couldn't sit through an inning of watching a ball game on TV anymore and I soon found myself just channel surfing right past the highlight reels on ESPN. And on the rare occasion that I actually found myself at a major league ball game, I'd sit there interested in anything but the actual game; the guy selling peanuts, some large breasted woman three rows up, a cloud… Even when I consciously tried to focus on the game, after two or three pitches, I'd just think to myself, "What's the frickin point?" Not just the point of watching the game, but what's the frickin point of major league baseball in general? The broadcasters regurgitated one cliché after another, the players seemed like robots. The fans seemed ridiculous, with their puppet-like reactions of anger and/or rehearsed celebrations. Maybe I should have just blamed it all on Reagan and let it go at that. Fast forward 20 some odd years to the summer of 2010 when one day, having taken a strange and mysterious journey to my local suburaban library, I came me upon Dan Epstein's book Big Hair And Plastic Grass: A Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging '70s - The cover of which promised a treasures trove of interesting anecdotes, funny details and witty insight. Besides great images of Oscar Gamble and Mark "the bird" Fydrich, the cover also sported a retro design that instantly conjures up the distinct 1970s vibe. But even as the title and sub-title promised a funky ride through the baseball landscape of the swingingest decade, I proceeded with caution for as I've been burned before by cover promises and stylized illustrations. Then, as always, I look to the book's back jacket to get an image of author. There I see Epstein - dressed as hipster wannabe, complete with 70s side burns, a height-ashbury jean jacket, and a coolier-than-tho smirk. Then taking a bite out of his introduction, at first it seems as though Epstein might actually delivery on his big promises when he acknowledges the disparity between Major League baseball in the 1970s and Major League baseball post-70s when he writes: "In recent years, for example, the Atlanta Braves have held a 'Faith Day' promotion, featuring performances by Christian rock bands and testimonials from Braves players about how Jesus turned their lives around. This is same team that, back in 1977, drew more than 27,000 fans for a 'Wet T-Shirt Night' competition." Well shit, this might just be the book I've been hoing for. Unfortuneately as I read on, it didnt take long to realize that this book was more style than substance. The large part of Epstein's text is year by year summaries of how teams won their divisions, who the stat leaders on the teams were, with a few seasonal and individual game high lights mixed in, which all goes to read like a 3rd year college journalism student covering the local college team. At the begining of each chapter Epstein tried very hard to shoe horn pop culture into the baseball landscape. I'm not sure what the point of that was other than try to add some kind of context but it came off as Epstein wanting to be considered an expert on 70s culture so that he might be asked by the producers of VH1's "I heart the 70s" so that he could contribute witty comments about slinkys or moon boots. About halfway through, I began skipping around a bit. Then a bit more. There were some interesting narrative possibilities, but Epstein only touched the surface and gave the cliche wikipedia-ish treatment to them, and not much else. By the time I got to 1978 I was looking at maybe two words per paragraph until I finally just gave up. The most disappointing thing here, is that I DO believe that the subject matter is worthy of a book. A good book even. Possibly something in the tradition of an oral telling along the lines of Loose Balls (about the American Basketball Association) where we have the stories told directly to us from the mouths of the players, owners, coaches, managers, umps, anouncers, etc themselves. Overall I give it 3 out of 5 WagemannHeads. I think Epstein could have done more with the wealth of material than what is here.

Review # 2 was written on 2011-08-23 00:00:00 Kenneth Poirot This book reads like Epstein's research notes. Rather than do the author's task of finding an interesting STORY to tell and being selective about what he includes, he just dumps everything he can find in a big pile for you in chronological order. He doesn't identify a lot of themes, he doesn't focus too closely on any characters, he really doesn't cause you to care about anyone in the book, and at times you're just reading a list of stats and award winners and game results. This book drove me nuts, because the source material is great, full of colorful characters and events, but Epstein couldn't seem to edit it down in the slightest.