Back in the summer of 2012, when I'd first started to interview players, I had no real plan. I'd first tried to explore other avenues that I thought would get me to speak with some folks with great insight into the game of baseball. Someone I knew had a son who was "Mr. Met" and another person I knew had a son who was the PA announcer for the Mets.
In both cases, I struck out. Neither was allowed to give interviews. I had a friend with some contacts, through a venture capital business, with some big names in baseball. I approached him and explained my cause. Strike three! The couple of players with whom he inquired were used to getting big bucks, and the concept of doing something for free was kind of alien (and perhaps amusing) to them.
My observation has been that the *more* money players made in their careers, the *less* likely they are to do anything for free, even if only to spend a few minutes to answer questions for a book.
So, at this point, I felt pretty low. What I thought, when writing my book proposal, would be a few sure-fire ways to get interviews, had not panned out...
That's when I started making calls. And then, at a local barbeque, I happened to get to talking to the host, and the subject of the previous owners of the house came up. It turned out that a guy who lived a few blocks from me had been a big league catcher on the same team as Nolan Ryan. This man, Tom Donohue, ran the local funeral home. I called and made an appointment to come speak to him.
Once again, at this point I had no theme. He was a former player, and he was local. As it turned out, the interview was great. But soon after, I came to a realization that I had to have some kind of plan going forward. Some method, some reasoning.
And it came to me the day I happened to come across a list of the 100 oldest living baseball players...
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