I remember seeing Dale Berra play for the Pittsburgh Pirates in the early 1980s. Back then, a friend and I attended occasional baseball games at Three Rivers Stadium. Considering all of the other great athletes who were also playing for the Pirates at the time, Dale Berra wasn't exactly the person you specifically came to the field to see. It was the fact that he represented a continuing legacy that made us appreciate his presence there. Of course, everybody knew he was Yogi's son.

Here Dale tells the story of his family, centering naturally around his father, Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra (1925-2015). We follow Yogi from his origins (as Lorenzo Pietro Berra) in an Italian neighborhood of St. Louis, to his service in the U.S. Navy during World War II, to his lengthy career in the world of baseball. He got his unusual nickname from a friend who thought he sat in the dugout like a yogi from India. A group of cartoon creators would later hijack the moniker to introduce their own necktied bear character. Rest assured, the real-life man came first.

This book is a tale of two Berras and a tale of two eras, with a certain amount of overlap. We first learn about Yogi's times with the New York Yankees and the New York Mets: as a player (from the mid-1940s to mid-1960s), then as a manager, then as a coach. A few years with the Houston Astros are thrown in for good measure.

Eventually, Dale, the youngest of the three Berra sons, starts making his own way into the field in 1977. Literally. And lands with the Pittsburgh Pirates in time to be part of the "We Are Family" team when it wins the World Series in 1979. Sections of this story tend to turn into a "best fest." Dale tells of baseball records that his dad held, and then seasonal records that he himself held. Yes, yes, you guys were good players, in different decades. Boasting is warranted and should probably be expected here.

The book's apt subtitle points to the fact that baseball is firmly attached to the Berra family. The work is never far away from the home. Dale tells what it was like to grow up under the watchful eyes of Carmen and Yogi Berra in Montclair, New Jersey. In fact, even this book is in part a family affair. The narrative includes sidebars and asides written by Dale's two older brothers, Larry and Tim, and by Dale's oldest daughter, Whitney. With the clear focus on baseball and family -- meaning, the original Berra family -- Dale barely mentions his own early marriage, his first wife and Whitney's birth. When he gets closer to the conclusion, he pays a bit more attention to his second wife and his two younger daughters. Maybe he thought to protect his own private life as much as he could. Or maybe he thought that his own details were not as interesting or as relevant to the reader as the ones surrounding the 1950s-1970s household featuring Yogi, Carmen, Larry, Tim and Dale.

What Dale IS honest about is his past use of cocaine. He dabbled, then convinced himself that he could handle it and, obviously, discovered that he couldn't. It took a few arrests and the pride of the Berra family to eventually turn him around.

As usual, I listened to this book on CDs during my commute. Dale reads the book and tells the story himself in a loud, sports commentator-like voice. Curiously, the sidebars by the other family members are read by narrators Joe Barrett, Robert Fass and Sarah Mollo-Christensen. I wonder: Why did the other Berras contribute to the print version and not to the audio one? Doing so would have further bumped up their authenticity for the listeners. Oh well. At least we still hear the multiple viewpoints from multiple voices.

This dual Berra memoir should be of high reading interest for many baseball fans, and specifically for those fans of the Yankees, Mets and Pirates. They will hear player names and stories from the past that they may not have thought about in a good, long while. A collateral audience may be those folks who want to hear how cocaine addicts have overcome their addictions. In this regard, the book is not without its teachable moments. We get to hear of the challenges firsthand, from someone who endured them himself.

Kudos to Dale Berra for not only bringing us good stories about his famous family, but for also revealing his own personal demons in this public forum.