chunk: Sportswriter Al Stump is hired in 1960 as ghostwriter of an authorized autobiography of baseball player Tyrus Raymond "Ty" Cobb. Now 73 and in failing health, Cobb wants an official biography to "set the record straight" before he dies.
  Stump arrives at Cobb's Lake Tahoe estate to write the official life story of the first baseball player inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. He finds a continually-drunken, misanthropic, bitter racist who abuses his biographer as well as everyone else he comes in contact with. Although Cobb's home is luxurious, it is without heat, power and running water due to long-running violent disputes between Cobb and utility companies. Cobb also rapidly runs through domestic workers, hiring and firing them in quick succession.