A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO COOPERSTOWN

A memoir earns its merits thanks to great writing or memorable stories, and McDermott's success largely lies with the latter—a gift of storytelling surely inherited from his Irish forefathers. A late 1940s pitching phenom turned drunk, McDermott has the uncanny habit of being able to entertain by tooting his own horn and being self-deprecating in the same breath. It also helps that McDermott, who went 69-69 in his 12-year big league career, played during baseball's Golden Age, the '40s to the early '60s, and that he tells his teammates' stories along with his own. Playing for 13 teams in four countries (including Cuba during Castro's revolution), McDermott not only played with everybody, he drank with everyone from Mickey Mantle to Jack Kerouac, and his countless tales of alcoholic excess are both humorous and sad. While his drunken debacles dominate the book, it is McDermott's presentation of his friendships with stars like Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio and characters like Jimmy Piersall and Billy Martin that are the cornerstones of his trip down memory lane. McDermott's memories are certain to touch a nerve with fans who remember baseball's "good old days" and will be an eye-opener for younger fans who never knew baseball when the game was not referred to as a business but as the national pastime, and highballs and beer, not ephedra and steroids, were the drugs of choice. Illus. (Apr.)