Calico Joe

Calico Joe: A Story of Reconciliation, by John Frye

My wife, Julie, and I are John Grisham fans. We’ve read and are collectors of all his novels (except for the youth-oriented ones). Known mostly for his legal thrillers, Grisham does a change up once in a while and writes about sports. Playing for Pizza: A Novel is a fast and fun read about Rick Dockery, a disgraced pro quarterback who is wanted by and goes to play for the Mighty Panthers of Parma, Italy. Grisham uses the captivating story-line to introduce the reader to the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of Italy. Do not read while you’re hungry.

I recently finished Calico Joe, a novel featuring pro baseball around a character named Joe Castle from Calico Rock, Arkansas. (Scot, it features the Cubs). Joe is called out of the minor leagues and becomes a “phenom” for the Chicago Cubs. Grisham presents the narrator of the story, Paul Tracey, as the son of Warren Tracey a pitcher for the New York Mets. The baseball games are set in the summer of 1973. Spoiler alert. Warren Tracey is an egotistical, angry, wife- and family-abusing, hard-drinking quasi-OK pitcher. While he can’t throw consistently, Warren could “throw a ball through a brick wall.” His son, Paul, can’t stand him as a father or a man. Warren is a sulking, mean brute. A young boy in 1973 obsessed with baseball, Paul Tracey, like millions of Americans, became dazzled by Joe Castle, the (almost) perfect baseball player. Can you sense it? Warren Tracey is incarnate evil on the mound and Joe Castle is the youthful, engaging, startling hero specimen of perfection. Is Joe Castle (JC) a symbol for Jesus Christ? I’m just asking? Something tragic happens when the Mets play the Cubs. Warren Tracey throws a fast ball that changes everyone’s lives.

The heart of the story of Calico Joe takes place some thirty years after that fateful pitch in the summer of 1973. Joe Castle dropped off the national screen not to be heard from again. Paul Tracey is on a very risky mission to track Joe down. Warren Tracey after battling cancer is now close to death from it. Paul (the apostle?) Tracey wants to have his father meet with and apologize to Joe Castle. Warren, the father, forever the liar and excuse-maker, is now staring death in the face. He has one chance to make at least one thing right in his life.

Imagine you’re sitting in the bleachers of the nicely-kept high school baseball field of Calico Rock. Joe Castle Field, kept groomed year round by Joe Castle. You see two men sitting in folding chairs next to home plate. One man sitting there, after only a few months in the pros, lost a fabulous career as a baseball player. The other man threw the bean ball that destroyed a man’s career and health. As we watch, we see them talking; soon we see them shaking hands; then we see them laughing.

Without saying it, Grisham lets us know that Paul was given the ministry of reconciliation.