How a contract breach led Catfish Hunter to become baseball's first real free agent

The following is excerpted from Dynastic, Bombastic, Fantastic: Reggie, Rollie, Catfish, and Charlie Finley’s Swingin’ A’s. Copyright © 2017 by Jason Turbow. Used by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

In January 1970 Oakland A’s owner Charlie Finley loaned 23-year-old pitcher Jim “Catfish” Hunter $150,000 to buy a 485-acre farm adjacent to his existing property in North Carolina. Hunter was to repay the money at a minimum of $20,000 per year, plus 6 percent interest, for as long as it took to get square. At Hunter’s salary—$21,500 in 1969, $33,200 in ’70—it was a stretch, but worth it. The pact was consummated with a handshake, no contract necessary.

Just a few months later, however,…