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Golden Arm by Carl Deuker
High school senior Lazarus Weathers wants out of the run-down trailer park where he lives with his mother and brother. When he receives an invitation to move in with a well-off family and pitch for a high-profile high school baseball team on the other side of town, it's his chance to impress major-league scouts and maybe become a professional baseball player. But it also means leaving his family behind. As his brother gets sucked into the trailer park's drug world, Laz has to choose between being a star pitcher and being there for his family.
Review from Booklist Starred Reviews:
Nineteen-year-old Lazarus (Laz) Weathers and his half brother, Antonio, live with their mother in Jet City, a dilapidated trailer park in Seattle. When the boys’ high school scraps its baseball program, the former coach convinces a few guys to play in the summer, among them Laz. The ragtag team goes up against other high schools in the area, and Laz’s incredible pitching catches the attention of Mr. Thurman, the father of a star player at affluent Laurelhurst High. Mr. Thurman offers Laz a room in their house so that he can attend Laurelhurst, play baseball, and help his son’s team win the state title (the main reason for his generosity). Itching to get out of Jet City, Laz knows this could be his chance at a better future and accepts. Just as everything seems to be going his way, including catching the eye of some major league scouts, Antonio gets into trouble, forcing Laz to weigh the value of family against getting an offer from the pros. With short, fast-paced chapters, Deuker’s realistic novel pits poverty, friendship, teamwork, self-reliance, and supportive adults against wealth, privilege, overambition, and overbearing helicopter parents. Even readers who don’t like baseball will be riveted to this human-interest, underdog story. Readers who still love Matt Christopher’s and John Feinstein’s books won’t want to put this down.
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