Those who remember how Paul O'Neill patrolled right field when he played for the Cincinnati Reds won't be surprised to hear he's an impassioned author.
The same fire he brought to each at-bat is on display in the pages of Me and My Dad, his first published book and in many ways the first soul-baring O'Neill has done since he broke into the big leagues in 1985. Whereas O'Neill the player wore his heart on his sleeve -- during his run with the Reds, 1985-1992 and his storied tenure with the New York Yankees -- he was never one to open up much in the public eye.
In a recent interview with CityBeat, O'Neill acknowledges that he tended to let his numbers and all-out playing style speak for him when he played. But Me and My Dad was a chance not only to explore his career in retrospect, but to immortalize his father, Charles "Chick" O'Neill, who died in 1999 while Paul was still playing for the Yankees.
"I had been asked to write books before, but I just liked to play baseball then go home, and that's it," he says. "When this was brought up and the outside thing about writing about my father, I thought what a great chance to have something for my kids to remember down the road."
Me and My Dad chronicles O'Neill's life in baseball, which pretty much started at age 4 when his older brothers finally let him take batting practice in the backyard with them. The book dips back in time a bit to establish the history of baseball in the O'Neill family and sets up Paul's early desire to play well to please his dad. But the bulk of the tome focuses on his professional career, starting when he was called up from the minors to play for the Reds in 1985. The baseball gods smiled on him: O'Neill started his career with a hit for his first at-bat. But that was only the beginning of his great baseball karma.
He spends a chapter detailing the 1990 season when the Reds stayed in first place "wire to wire" and then, in David and Goliath fashion, upset the Oakland A's in the World Series.
The honeymoon was somewhat short-lived, however, as O'Neill was traded to the Yankees after the 1992 season -- a trade that many Reds fans call one of the franchise's worst. O'Neill doesn't write much about the episode except to describe how he found out (an answering machine message) and how his father told him it was for the best.
"Especially when you finish playing, you look back and remember the better times a lot more than the ups and downs of the game," he says. "The memories you want to take are the good things. I was fortunate enough to win five world championships and one of them in Cincinnati. Those are definitely the memories you take away from the game. Those are the things you work for, and those are the things you were able to accomplish with teamwork."
As O'Neill admits throughout the book, his father was right about everything. The trade that sent him to New York in many ways vaulted O'Neill from a great right fielder in the National League to one of baseball's elite. He was called the heart and soul of the Yankees team that went on to win four World Series in his tenure.
"Looking back, I played on good teams at the right time in good cities," he says. "I walked away from the game healthy. That's all you can do. I lived out a dream that I had since I was 5 years old. Not everyone gets a chance to do that. You have to remind yourself of that."
And O'Neill got to do it in front of his father.
"Let's face it: Every kid on the baseball field basically has their father in the back of their mind," he says. "Because their father is usually the one who taught them the game."
PAUL O'NEILL will sign and discuss Me and My Dad at 7 p.m. Monday at Joseph-Beth Booksellers.
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