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‘The Wax Pack’ dives into post-glory days of ’80s baseball stars
Brad Balukjian was sprawled out in the upper deck of the Oakland Coliseum six years ago when the idea crystallized: What if he could open up an old pack of baseball cards just one more time?
The Duke-educated college biology professor turned his thought into “The Wax Pack,” a colorful piece of narrative non-fiction about what becomes of players when the spotlight fades.
Balukjian embarked on a self-funded, cross-country summer road trip in 2015 to parachute into the lives of former stars and journeymen from a random 1986 Topps pack bought on eBay. He pulled back the curtain on his childhood heroes and himself, sharing heartwarming and heart-wrenching tales about unconditional love, lost love and the search for clarity.
Balukjian paints a vivid portrait of 14 former players, opening up old wounds with a delicate touch. He writes about the complexity of former Dodgers catcher — and drinker — Steve Yeager, who “poured out all his bottles in February 1987 and hasn’t had a drop since. Like his failed marriages, he faced the problem, accepted it and moved on.”
The author retraces former Cardinals shortstop Garry Templeton’s dugout exchange with manager Whitey Herzog in 1981 after the player was ejected for making obscene gestures at racist hecklers. “Whitey stabbed me in the f—-ing back,” Templeton says four decades later.
“I wasn’t a militant,” Templeton tells Balukjian. “I just said what was on my mind. I didn’t hold back. I wasn’t that black guy that just kept his mouth shut.”
Balukjian chronicles journeyman Randy Ready’s pain after his first wife was left in a vegetative state after a heart attack. He shares former Brewers pitcher Jaime Cocanower’s unyielding love for his wife, Gini, who remains the rock of the family after undergoing a mastectomy.
Every chapter brings a unique energy. Balukjian deftly weaves in his own struggles, drawing parallels with some of his cardboard heroes. The author tells of his obsessive-compulsive disorder diagnosis in college and infidelity that ended the most meaningful relationship of his life.
When former Phillies pitcher Don Carman, who was Balukjian’s favorite player growing up in Rhode Island, reveals his insecurities as a kid, the author writes: “It’s surreal to realize that my hero could just as easily be talking about me. I think back to being bullied in junior high, ostracized to the nerd table in the lunch room wearing head gear and praying my allergies wouldn’t flare up.”
Balukjian, who teaches at Merritt College in Oakland and is the director of the school’s Natural History & Sustainability program, sprinkles in anecdotal humor, too. He admits that his attempt to write a biography of infamous 1980s pro wrestler The Iron Sheik was “a failed experiment that ended with a drug-addled Sheik threatening to kill me in his living room.”
Former Cy Young award winner Rick Sutcliffe’s re-telling of a clubhouse altercation with Tommy Lasorda in 1981 is pure comedy.
“He had all these Frank Sinatra albums and pictures on his office wall,” Sutcliffe tells Balukjian. “Everything signed ‘To Tommy, Love Frank.’ I snapped and said, I’m gonna throw that chair right through that f—-king wall.’ I’m about to throw it and standing in the door is Dusty Baker. He grabs the chair and says something like, ‘Kid, you’re in enough trouble. You don’t need Frank pissed off, too.’ ”
Balukjian writes with vulnerability when threading the book together with the most powerful theme: Fatherhood.
He re-traces the lives of loving and absentee fathers, what-ifs and mea culpas.
Yeager: “It was a very dysfunctional family. I was close to him. When he wasn’t drinking, he was the greatest guy in the world. But he’d show up at a baseball game and be half in the bag, yelling and screaming. It was embarrassing.”
Ready: “I remember the last time I saw him was one of those moments where he wanted to give me a hug, and I said, ‘Hey, we’re in public. We should probably just shake hands.’ It wasn’t cool hugging your dad in public at that time. So, I backed off and shook his hand, and I never forgot that. Later I said if I have children, I’m gonna do it different.”
Sutcliffe: “My dad was my idol to begin with. But I never looked up to anybody after what my dad did to me. I know what a piece of s—- he is. I know
what not to be.”
Even when some of the “wax packers” like Dwight Gooden and Vince Coleman proved to be elusive, Balukjian weaved magic through his reporting and writing.
Gooden’s relationship with his oldest son, Doc Jr., who lived with and took care of his troubled father at the time, is sobering.
“I don’t even know if he knows how intelligent I am about real life,” the son tells Balukjian. “I’m big on facts, big on statistics. I’m a completer, a seeker. I love research. I don’t know if he knows I have that type of passion and ambition about life.”
“I want to do something good enough to where I get recognized and then I give my story,” the son continues. “I want to speak for kids who had successful parents. I’d like to talk to them. I know there’s a ton of them going through what I went through. All of them just want to feel normal. I don’t want to be caught in what my dad did or didn’t do. I’m me.”
Balukjian ends his fascinating trip by recounting the haunting final days of former big leaguer Al Cowens’ life through the eyes of his son.
“He was angry with the game, with the struggles to find life and meaning after his career ended,” the author writes. “He encouraged people to always make God and family priorities in their lives.”
Balukjian’s 30-state, 11,000-mile journey is a compelling, story-telling triumph.