The Bronx Zoo

The Bronx Zoo

Relief Pitcher Sparky Lyle was the 1977 American League Cy Young Award winner for his role in helping the New York Yankees to their first World Series championship since 1962. The following winter, the Yankees - who changed the face of baseball in those early years of free agency - went out and aquired Pittsburgh closer Goose Gossage, relegating Lyle to an observer's role for the 1978 season. As it turned out, Lyle proved to be a more astute observer than anyone could have predicted. And, as luck would have it, the Yankee's 1978 season turned out to be as sensational, controversial, and colorful a season as there have ever been - a real zoo, in fact. The Bronx Zoo is Lyle's best-selling, highly acclaimed collaboration with author Peter Golenbock that, when originially released in 1979, was favorably compared to Jim Bouton's groundbreaking Ball Four as a hillarious - but scathing - baseball tell-all. Lyle had an insider's view like no other in a season for the ages, and the 1978 Yankees remain the biggest sideshow the game of baseball has ever seen.