FOR LOVE
OF THE GAME
by Michael Shaara, 1991

Billy Chapel is a great pitcher reaching the end of his long career. Loyal throughout the many years to one team, a rarity in the world of baseball, he learns from a reporter the night before the last game of the season that the team's new owners have decided to trade him. His team is not in contention, but their opponent is the dreaded Yankees, who are playing for their pennant victory. Chapel considers retiring then and there, but has such affection for the game that he cannot leave just yet. Despite bitter disappointment at what the game has become, he will go out and pitch...one more game.

He dreams of retiring to the serenity of the Colorado mountains with a woman he had grown close to over the past few years. But she has suddenly disappeared, at a time when he needs someone to ease the turmoil of the closing of his career. So as he pitches the final game, his mind closes down, and he focuses on each pitch, each man he faces, and drifts away between innings to his own deeply private world. As the game progresses, and his teammates know to leave him quietly alone, Chapel is only partially aware that what is happening on the field is extraordinary indeed. He is pitching a perfect game.

Now a major motion picture, starring Kevin Costner and Kelly Preston, For Love of the Game is a fitting capstone to Michael Shaara's legacy as an accomplished author — this is his final published work.