A wonderful baseball book whether you are a Dodger fan or not. His story was very interesting from college through his time in the minors and then finally making it to the majors. He speaks of the different players on the teams he was with and also the wins and losses. Especially losing the World Series to the Yankees in 77 and 78 and how getting back to the Series winning not just for him, but for the Dodgers and for the infield of Garvey, Lopes, Russell, and Cey. For not to have won a World Series would have been disappointing just for the amount of time that they were together. A really good book and he really speaks about his wife in one chapter as well which was nice also. Very much worth the read.

Thank you to Triumph Books and NetGalley for the ARC.

This one was all over the place. Some decent stories but overall this is the standard format of telling the career in chronological order with chapters on other topics, people and events thrown in.

I did not see any rhyme or reason behind the flow of the book. I am also not very smart and could have easily missed it.

Mostly for people like me who need to read every baseball memoir ever published.

I greatly enjoyed this biography by Ron Cey. It had all the insight you would want on the period - both what was going on behind the scenes as well as Cey's perspective on the Dodgers/baseball,teammates/games all these years later. In addition, Cey makes some interesting comments about how different MLB was at the time compared to what is happening with players today. He is very straightforward, gives honest opinions but doesn't spend time on the sensational recollections (such as pitcher Howe's substance abuse).

The book is fairly chronological but for the most part sticks with themes during the time. You won't have to skip through his family history or growing up in Washington - he begins the book with getting into the minors and ends it with his work with the Oakland A's. The lionshare of the book is spent during that golden era of the Dodgers: the infield that included Garvey, Russell, Lopes, and Cey in the 1970s. He goes into some interesting discussions about those players but you'll learn a lot less about others such as catcher Yeager or outfielder Guerrero. But he gives very honest opinions and thoughts and this feels like a book that is straight home truths rather than fanciful remembrances.

I was pleased to see some information about Vin Skully in there and certainly there is a lot about Lasorda and O'Malley - and how they ran the club like a family business. Cey did not always get along with e.g., O'Malley but he is very fair in what other players/owners/staff brought to the club and game in addition to their shortcomings. He is very fair and evenhanded in what is here, even about himself.

It was a great read: I was never bored and Cey has a great tone of voice throughout. You can hear his straightforward personality and it was fascinating to see names again that I had not heard since the late 1970s, when I attended/watched games as a 12 year old girl with my family (I can remember amusing my teacher on a class trip to a Dodger game by describing Steve Sax as "virile").

This is well worth the read. Fans and non fans alike, it really sets the stage and tells a tale about life in the 1970s, a second golden age of baseball (especially for the Dodgers) and about a team that took chances and ended up with quite a few accolades when those decisions paid off. Reviewed from an advance reader copy provided by the publisher.

Ron Cey was part of the infield combination that played the most number of games together for one team. With Cey at third base, Bill Russel at shortstop, Davey Lopes at second base and Steve Garvey at first base, this foursome played together nearly nine complete seasons for the Los Angeles Dodgers. Each one of them was an all-star and Cey talks about his journey to the big leagues in this memoir.

The best part of this book was Cey’s candor. He wasn’t afraid to drop some criticism or share bad experiences with teammates, especially the other three infielders mentioned above. This is also true of his coaches, managers and front office personnel. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a book where he harps on the negatives – indeed, most of the stories are positive and at times funny. It just was refreshing to see that when he sensed something wasn’t right, he wasn’t afraid to call it like he saw it. The best example of this was his experience with former Dodger GM Al Campanis, whom Cey felt never was totally sold that Cey would be a key part of a winning Dodgers club, which he certainly became.

There are also times where Cey shows that he played in a different era than today as there is more analytical data in the decisions made by on-field managers as well as general managers. I’ll stop short of calling it sounding like he is yelling at people to get off his lawn, but he clearly doesn’t agree with some of this process today. To his credit, he gives counterarguments to what was done when he was a player. For example, when he mentioned that today, players are shuffled in and out of a lineup because of data showing strengths and weaknesses, that was done by communication between players and managers during the 1970’s and 1980’s when Cey played.

Overall, the book does read like a typical memoir with some extra name dropping since after all, this was Los Angeles and Cey was able to rub elbows with many celebrities. He also talks about his time with the Chicago Cubs, including their memorable 1984 season, but for the most part, both during and after his playing career, he certainly bleeds Dodger blue. Any Los Angeles fan will enjoy reading this book.

I wish to thank Triumph Books for providing a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

I want to thank NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC, and here is my honest review.

It was difficult for me to be unbiased in reviewing this book, but I will try. I have been a Dodger fan in the Midwest since I knew what baseball was. It was a joy to read the life story of one of my childhood heroes, the Penguin, Ron Cey. Penguin Power helped me relive those cherished childhood memories, and I thank Ron Cey and his co-writer Ken Gurnick for providing this.

I devoured this book in a few days as I was thoroughly entertained as I had the opportunity for a few hours to get a true feel of what it was like being on those memorable and historic Dodgers’ teams with Ron Cey and the help of his co-writer Ken Gurnick.

Being young while I idolized the Dodgers’ players in the seventies and early eighties and before social media, it was great to get the “tea” if you will of what was happening behind the scenes. There were some very funny anecdotes with Tommy Lasorda and other Dodgers told from the perspective of someone that was there.
My father would love this book. He retired to Florida from the Midwest so he could be near Vero Beach, just so he could be close to the Dodgers during spring training. He was heartbroken when the team moved their spring training to Arizona. I do remember about Holman Stadium there wasn’t an outfield fence. Also, how open to fans spring training was, where fans had almost unlimited access to the players of today and yesterday.

I loved the stories that Ron Cey shared of his time in baseball from college, the minors and his time with the Dodgers and the Cubs. You have here his recollections of his defeats and triumphs. No spoilers here, but I can still see my father screaming at the television when Reggie Jackson broke up a huge double play with his butt in the World Series.

Ron Cey was very candid and open at times with his relationship with his former teammates and where baseball was in the seventies and eighties compared to today, like the fight between players and owners.
The book excels when Ron is sharing little vignettes with us of his playing days in the MLB and those he played the game with. There is a terrific tribute to Bill Buckner that fans of the Cubs and the Dodgers will enjoy. Also, what I learned about one of my favorite players as a child, Steve Garvey, was honest and eye-opening, reminding us that baseball players as with the game itself is a game full of imperfection where the individual fails more than succeeds.

My one flaw was that at times, maybe this is true of baseball books in general, some of the prose became too stat driven. But this is only because I wanted to hear more human stories about the players and those that were a part of the Dodgers and Cubs franchises than cold statistics that could be found in any baseball almanac, or today probably googled.

In these pages, one thing became clear, Ron Cey was not just someone that played the game, but also was a fan of the game. He was a baseball player who had the opportunity to meet his own childhood heroes from the diamond. And with this book, we get to share this joy with him that he was able to live out his childhood dream of becoming a professional Major League ballplayer, a world that few of us will ever get to experience, except for the players, like the Penguin, that played the game.

I so enjoyed this book and wallowing in nostalgia about life with the Dodgers in their pomp in the 80s.

I was a massive Mets fan living in NYCat the time but I so respected the Dodgers and their all star infield and I learned so much from this book about the Dodgers's way of doing tings and why they were so successful.

The book is packed full of great insights and anecdotes from those glorious days when the Dodgers reigned supreme and Cey, aided and abetted by an excellent ghost writer has a keen eye for detail and a good story. This book is highly recommended for all baseball fans of a certain age who want to understand how and why the Dodgers were so successful.