Mickey Mantle Is Going to Heaven

FRITZ PETERSON WAS A NEW YORK YANKEE WHO NEVER STOPPED SEARCHING FOR GOD.

In the 1960s in New York City, every young boy dreamed of playing for the Yankees. The difference was that Fritz Peterson was born with a pitcher's arm that would take him to "the Show." In his rookie year, in 1966, Peterson had the opportunity to play with Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris. Then he made a name for himself-both on the field and off.

Like so many of his colleagues, Peterson was a prankster; and as his story unfolds, we are given a home plate look into the quirks and foibles of his time with such baseball greats as Whitey Ford, Thurman Munson, Jim Bouton, Bobby Murcer, Joe Pepitone, and Mel Stottlemyre. In 1973, Peterson was involved in what Sports Illustrated called the most highly publicized trade in all of sports history -when he and a teammate traded wives. The storm of negative publicity and disapproval damaged his career. But whether in his very public years as a baseball player or in his later, private struggle with prostate cancer, Fritz Peterson continued to seek "salvation" and ultimately came to understand the truth of God's Grace.