Baseball Joe at Yale; or, Pitching for the College Championship

"Baseball Joe at Yale; or, Pitching for the College Championship" by Lester Chadwick is an early 20th-century sports story about Joe Matson, a young pitcher, stepping up to the challenge of juggling college life at Yale University with his burning desire to play professional baseball. The book begins with him wrestling with his feelings about attending Yale, as he feels the pull of his family's expectations versus the strong pull of his own dreams. Things start happening as a friend reminds him of his responsibilities to his mother and he reluctantly accepts his path, and then he encounters a stranger that he helps out, which teases that Joe will face similar challenges with the same urgency. The story hints that following your dreams is a tough call, a push and pull with growing up and doing what is expected, and Joe has to figure it all out.