Dwight Gooden's early years with the New York Mets were golden: he was the youngest winner of the Cy Young Award in baseball history and led the New York Mets to one of the most dramatic World Series victories in 1986. Dwight Gooden, a.k.a. Doc or simply Dr. K, had a fastball that hitters just could not beat. But Gooden's fall was as quick and dramatic as his rise. By 1994 he had twice been suspended from the league for drug abuse, plunging him into a vicious cycle that threatened his career and, ultimately, his life.

Today, Dwight Gooden is back in the big leagues. Heat captures Gooden's poignant road to recovery, and how it culminated in his second World Series ring with the New York Yankees in 1996, and offers a behind-the-scenes look at the Yankees club. During his fourteen years in the big leagues, Dwight Gooden has seen plenty. Heat brings to life the glorious world championship baseball through the eyes of one of its most popular and talented stars.

To look back at the dawning of Dwight Gooden's career is to see not just potential but also brilliance. Gooden roared onto the scene, a quiet teenage marvel with a loud adult arm, stringing together a pair of seasons with the Mets - Rookie of the Year in 1984, Cy Young Award in 1985 - that burst at the seams of his unhitable heater. New pages were prepped for the record books. But those pages were never filled in.

That Gooden self-imploded on a volatile cocktail of drugs and alcohol certainly isn't news. What is news is that his smart memoir goes beyond some smart analysis of the pitcher's craft to candidly dive into the wreck Gooden created for himself. Instead of mining for excuses, Gooden resurfaces with the requisite self-awareness -"The worst part about being an addict," he admits, "is that you lie all the time" - to probe the great expectations placed on him, the early triumphs and the way success went to his head, the pressures of New York and its nightlife, his sometimes difficult relationships with teammates, his personal inferno and its repercussions, his suspensions, his humiliations, his addiction treatments, and his comeback. Gooden made a splendid name for himself throwing heat; here, he gracefully humbles himself in a cautionary tale that displays the perspective and maturity that's required to be able to take the heat. - Jeff Silverman of Amazon

A reader from Chicago, IL, April 13, 1999
"WOW!! A Non-Traditional Autobiography Of A Current Player"

Martin Blackman from Boston, MA, March 13, 1999
"Ride the roller coaster of fame with Dwight Gooden"

Rajeev Malhorta from Syosset, NY, February 12, 1999
"A compelling book that takes a reader inside the dugout"

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Heat

Author: Dwight 'Doc' Gooden
Published: November 1999.

Baseball Book Shelf: Heat : My Life On And Off The Diamond