But before he dies he wants to win the pennant that eluded him during his career as a third-string catcher and suddenly stops trading away the organization’s top prospects, signs an expensive free-agent pitcher, and makes a blockbuster trade during spring training. No one, especially the notoriously cynical members of the press corps who have covered the Clippers for years and have a few black sheep in their own ranks, takes Honk’s moves seriously. The writers dismiss them as empty hype designed to sell a few more tickets and put the profits into the greedy owner’s pockets, especially when the Clippers get off to another typically rotten start. And then, in spite of all their flaws and foibles, the oft-maligned “Boys of Somerville” begin winning … and winning a lot. Do their long-suffering fans dare to believe baseball’s longest-running joke might actually be good enough to win the pennant?
Goofball
$5.00
The Boston Clippers have been the laughingstock of the National League for years, a patchwork club of rejects, misfits, and oddballs operating in the shadow of the immensely popular and American League powerhouse Red Sox and playing in a mausoleum of a ballpark in nearby Somerville built from the ruins of an old prison. Honk Cassidy, their tight-fisted owner, learns he has terminal cancer and chooses to keep it a secret.
