Another fascinating Josh Hamilton story.

With just over two hours to go, the two prevailing bids for the autographed copies of Josh Hamilton's autobiography, "Beyond Belief," are each for $600. If you are still interested in bidding more, please respond to this email before 5:00 (on Thursday, Oct. 23, 2008). I also want to direct your attention to a really well-done account of Hamilton's fascinating pre-addiction life. Parts of it are especially chilling, given what we know now about what he went through not long after the four-part St. Petersburg Times series (three written by Anne Hull during and following his 1999 rookie season and one – eerily – written by Marc Topkin as an epilogue of sorts – but a prologue in another way of looking at it – three days before the infamous truck accident in which he and his parents were involved during spring training 2001), and all of it, I suspect, will give you a greater appreciation for the life that Michael Main and Manuel Pina and Justin Smoak and Shane Funk and Bill Richardson and dozens of others like them live, and have lived. Think what you want about life in the lower minor leagues – I bet this series will change your perspective. It's really, really well crafted, and the fact that it happens to have been written about Josh Hamilton before he'd faced any real adversity in his life obviously gives it another couple layers of wow. You can find all four parts (which happen to also have a ton of childhood and teenaged photos of Hamilton) at this link: http://www.sptimes.com/News/webspecials/abaseballstory/ But beware: It's going to command a good half-hour of your time, if not more. Well worth it, in my opinion.