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When selecting a historical figure to quote at the start of a book, very few people have selected Lefty Gomez for that honor. That’s likely because most people have never heard of Lefty Gomez. To be honest, if it wasn’t for Google, I would never have heard of him either. It turns out that Lefty Gomez was an all-star pitcher for the New York Yankees and Washington Senators, with a career that spanned 1930 to 1943. Once I discovered Lefty and his story, I came to appreciate what an interesting individual he was, both on and off the field. Born and raised in California, he signed with the Yankees in 1930 (after a short stint with the San Francisco Seals), playing throughout the difficult years of the Great Depression. It wasn’t an easy path at first. In 1931, the Yankees were concerned about Lefty’s pitching velocity and his overall size – Lefty was a slender 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighed 155 pounds – so the team physicians followed the standard medical strategy at the time and extracted most of his teeth – this was often the first step doctors would take to cure general ailments, a practice that was abandoned a few years later – while asking him to drink three quarts of milk a day.1 If you’ve ever needed a reason to appreciate the advancements of modern medicine, consider Lefty and his relatively toothless life. Interestingly, the strategy worked, and through these early years of his career, Lefty established himself as an elite player on the team. In fact, he was selected to pitch in the All-Star game each year from 1933 to 1939. As the new decade began, Lefty began struggling with injuries, and, just as the United States was preparing to join World War II, Lefty bounced between the Boston Braves and the Washington Senators, while working for the General Electric River Works in the offseason, which, equally interestingly, was the first plant to produce a jet engine.2 It’s not clear if Lefty actually put his hands on the first jet engines being produced, but it’s distinctly possible. Beyond baseball, Lefty became a popular speaker, sharing stories of his time on the field with legends including Babe Ruth, Joe DiMaggio, Goose Goslin, Lou Gehrig, and Dizzy Dean. Known for his comedic wit, he would regale audiences with stories from on and off the field, and Lefty was honored in 1983 as the last surviving player from the 1933 All-Star Game. There are plaques commemorating his career in Memorial Park at Yankee Stadium and at Lefty Gomez Field in Rodeo, CA. In full disclosure, I’m not a passionate baseball fan. I never actively played the game and never found myself invested as a fan in the sport, at a professional, collegiate, or prep sport level. I freely admit that I’d struggle to name the starting lineup of my hometown Colorado Rockies, let alone identify the best historical players from the 1930s. That said, it seems that Lefty Gomez should be a name that I know, given his fascinating story and history of proven successes. He’s held as a peer to many of the greats of the game, and is a proud member of the esteemed Baseball Hall of Fame. So, unfortunately, I don’t know him, but interestingly, it turns out, I do know of him. Most likely, you do too. I, like most people, know Lefty Gomez for the quote attributed to him. What is that quote? Lefty Gomez is known for coining the phrase “It’s better to be lucky than good.”