I'm not sure why David Wells was slapped with a six-figure fine over this book. Most of the "controversy" appears to be caused by out-of-context quotes randomly selected by the press. The supposed negative statements about teammates Mike Mussina and Roger Clemens are spoken in the larger context of praising their baseball skills. The much-criticized "25 to 40 percent" statistic of ballplayers who use illegal steroids and performance-enhancing drugs ("10 to 25%" is the number in the edited book) is part of an enlightening discussion of how Jose Canseco went from being a minor-league toothpick, to a tree trunk with 462 career home runs (and a book deal of his own).
Anyway, this book is just plain funny. Most sports biographies are written by sportswriters: half of them by Dick Schaap, half by Peter Golenbock, and Catfish Hunter for some reason chose Armen Keteyian. Wells goes with comedy writer Chris Kreski, best known for William Shatner's non-fiction epics, and "Growing Up Brady". Kreski's also a lifelong Mets fan, which makes the book easier for me to read, certainly. His ability to recap baseball games is only adequate -- he makes some minor factual errors, misspells some of the player names Wells dictated into the tape recorder, and gives Wells an impossibly specific memory about old games ("Two hours and forty-eight minutes later, 49,328 screaming fans watched me ...") -- but gives Boomer plenty of jokes and cutting insights into the many peaks and valleys of his career.
Wells decries the corporate naming of Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, saying that to him, it'll always be the Jack Murphy Stadium of his youth. Which is a wonderful sentiment... and wrong, since it was actually called San Diego Stadium until Wells was 17.
Boomer doesn't use the space to get on a soapbox and preach about baseball. No diatribes about interleague play, or the wild card. Wells is more interested in topless girls in the stands during spring training. He's clearly having too much fun in the major leagues to worry about salary caps and the fate of small market teams. Who would you rather read, Wells meeting Metallica's Lars Ulrich and describing Joe Torre's shock at AC/DC lyrics, or Whitey Herzog's whining about salary arbitration.
For a quick spring-training read, it's hard to get more entertaining than "Perfect I'm Not". If nothing else, hopefully Boomer will get his penalty money back in additional sales. And then lose twice to the Mets this summer.