1956 Yankee Prospect of the Past: Jim Finigan

"In 1954, Jim joined the A's. He hit .302 and made the rookie all-star team. The Yankees didn't know his value and traded him to the A's. Jim is a real hustler and a sure-handed fielder."

-1956 Topps No. 22

1956 Yankee Prospect of the Past: Jim Dyck

"After hitting .378 for the first half of the season at Indianapolis, Jim came up to Baltimore in 1955. He can hit a long ball and led the league in R.B.I.s in 1951. Jim's a fine fly-chaser and can also fill in at third base."

-1956 Topps No. 303

1956 Yankee of the Past: Jim Delsing

"Jim is a fine extra-base clutch hitter. In the minors, he was on the Pacific Coast, Northern and American Association all-star teams. Jim's best season was 1953 when he hit .288."

-1956 Topps No. 338

1956 Yankee of the Past: Clint Courtney

"Joining Washington in 1955, Clint enjoyed his best year at the plate. He's one of the best defensive catchers in baseball.

Between seasons, Clint is a cattle rancher in Louisiana."

-1956 Topps No. 159

1956 Yankee of the Past: Lew Burdette

"Lew pitched in more games than any other Brave in 1955. He's averaged over 14 wins in every year since 1953. After being a reliever in '52 and '53, Lew switched to starting in '55."

-1956 Topps No. 219

1956 Yankee of the Past: Lou Berberet

"Lou was in the Yankee chain for five years before he joined Washington. In 1954 he hit .317 with 118 R.B.I.s for Birmingham.

Lou is a fine defensive backstop."

-1956 Topps No. 329

1956 Yankee Prospect of the Past: El Tappe

"Catcher Elvin Tappe, always a notoriously poor hitter, likes to tell of the fellow from Quincy who had just returned from his first visit to Chicago. 'I liked Chicago, all right,' said his friend, 'but everybody's got his hand out up there.' Snapped Elvin: 'Yeah, I found that out too, except when I was there they all had baseball mitts on.' "

-Edgar Munzel, Chicago Sun-Times (Baseball Digest, May 1956)

1956 Yankee Prospect of the Past: Jerry Snyder

TRIUMPH OF THE UNWANTED

Ignored In Camp, Snyder Forces Senators To Recognize Him

"One of the more engaging developments on the Washington club is the Jerry Synder story, strictly gee-whiz and very refreshing, because it is the triumph of an unwanted ball player.

He was the low man in the Senators' infield plans last March at Orlando, tolerated but not much esteemed. The only role charted for him was a bench job, if, indeed, he could escape banishment to Chattanooga for the third time. With the Senators, he was beginning to take on the status of a career fifth wheel.

Jose Valdivielso, the nimble Cuban, was Manager Chuck Dressen's favorite, alloted the shortstop job as if the candidacy of any other player was unthinkable. Dressen talked excitedly of Valdy as the best shortstop in the league and one of the few players on the Washington club not for trading.

And then for the first time in the knowledge of his teammates, Jerry Snyder blew his top. 'This is too raw,' he said. 'I'm a better shortstop than Valdivielso. I'm a better second baseman than (Pete) Runnels. I can't hit with Runnels but I can outhit Valdivielso and outfield him, too, and if they give me a chance, I'll prove it.'

The chance came to Snyder three days after the season opened and he started proving it. With the season six days old, Valdivielso was gone. Snyder was Dressen's shortstop. It had been fortunate for the Senators.

If Dressen was slow to recognize Snyder's talents in Florida, he was quick to backtrack after a few facts became evident and when he chose to cast his lot with Snyder it was whole-hog.

One day in Boston the Senators were about to be engulfed by their worst disaster of the season. They blew a 5-0 lead to the Red Sox and lost the first game of a doubleheader. They blew a four-run lead and were losing the second game, 9-7, and now there were two out and two on base in the ninth inning.

It was at that point that Snyder saved the ball game for the Senators by hitting the second home run of his major league career. This one was very special, because for the first time in his life he was hitting a ball out of the park. The only other homer he had hit in the majors was an inside-the-park type that he legged out.

So, to emphasize it, Snyder in 444 previous times at bat in his big league career, had never hit the ball over anybody's fence. That was probably because he knows his limits, is a deliberate choke-hitter, doesn't try for the fences. He let his hands slide down to the knob this time, though, and among his teammates it was the most-cheered home run of the season.

Both Dressen and Calvin Griffith can take a bow for the emergence of Snyder as something of vital value to the club. Dressen has left him in there against all kinds of pitching, and Rookie President Griffith in 1953 landed Snyder for the Senators in the first deal he swung for the club on his own authority.

It is remembered that Snyder was a throw-in when the Yankees got Irv Noren from the Senators in the Jackie Jensen trade. The Yankees hadn't bothered to call him up from their Kansas City farm, in fact, had demoted him to Beaumont in 1951. When Griffith had asked for 'something more' from the Yanks for Noren, they tossed in Snyder with no great sense of loss to their farm system.

Snyder bounced on and off the Washington roster in 1953-54-55, never quite making good against big league pitching, and always belaboring Southern Association pitching when they sent him back to Chattanooga. He was valued chiefly for his steadiness in the infield and his versatility.

In Florida during the spring, Dressen had Snyder at second base briefly while Runnels was switched to the outfield. When Eddie Yost came up with a lame arm, Snyder was Dressen's third baseman. They were thinking of shortstop only in terms of Valdivielso.

Before he broke his wrist in June, Snyder was batting a competent .270. As a right-handed hitter, he gets none of the best of it, either. Opponents rarely feed the Senators left-handed pitching, the idea being to feed right-handers to the big bully-boys like Sievers, Lemon and Olson. During one period, in 17 consecutive games, the Senators never saw left-handed pitching start against them.

A fellow named Tom Greenwade could be feeling very good about Snyder's new importance to the Washington club. He is the Yankee scout who signed Snyder off the Oklahoma lots, obviously divining some special talent in him. Greenwade is the same chap who turned up Mickey Mantle for the Yankees. The Senators were blessed when  Snyder didn't make good quickly enough to please the Yanks.

Another gentleman who is feeling very good about Jerry Snyder's new eminence is his dad. Pere Snyder, Jerry says, always wanted a big leaguer in the family. He had ten children. He had to go to number ten to get his big leaguer. You see, Jerry is the youngest of the Snyder clan."

-Shirley Povich, Washington Post (Baseball Digest, August 1956)

1956 Yankee Prospect of the Past: Vic Power

"Vic learned to hit high fast balls and became the top Kansas City batter in 1955. He was switched to first base from the outfield and led the American League in double plays, putouts and assists. No sophomore jinx for Vic, he raised his batting average 64 points over his '54 mark."

-1956 Topps No. 67

KANSAS CITY SHOWBOAT

Vic Power May Ham It Up, But He's A Solid Performer

"Ask any player in the American League who's the biggest showboat and, chances are, you'll get the lightning answer: 'Vic Power.'

The rollicking Puerto Rican is upstage most of the time for the Kansas City Athletics, hamming up the most elementary situation at first base. He baits the crowds by making one-handed circus catches of easy bull's-eye pegs, and sometimes succeeds in nauseating his fellow athletes. But, along with all the histrionics, Vic manages to maintain his reputation as a pretty solid performer.

He led American League first basemen in assists last year, with 130, which was 46 more than his closest competitor, Boston's Norm Zauchin. He also hit .319, only 21 points below Al Kaline's championship average of .340, to which he was runner-up. Although injuries cramped his style this spring, Power was back knocking at the door of baseball's elite 'Club .300' as the season's halfway mark neared.

'Man, this here game is crazy,' grins the radiant Caribbean. 'And these fans out here are crazy, good and crazy, the way they cheer us on. I hope I don't hit too many of those crazy-bad slumps. I'm hoping I don't hit the skids like I did last July.'

Vic was a .425 slugger last year in May, but a .298 slumper in July. If he 'stays level,' he figures he could make a run for the top.

'I had three or four slumps last year,' he explains. 'One of them dropped me from .370 to .298 before I could pull out of it.'

Winter ball, Power feels, cuts down on his energy when major league weather gets hottest. Although he won't be 25 until November, the Little Latin says he is starting his eighteenth baseball campaign- nine summer and nine winter.

'I wouldn't mind giving it up in wintertime, but the folks back home want me to play- and there is always the money,' he says. 'So now I am working on a plan with the manager's (Lou Boudreau's) help to set up a baseball school in Puerto Rico, in addition to my playing during the winter.'

Power, like Clint Courtney and several other players, still holds a peeve against the New York Yankees, who once owned him but failed to bring him up.

'They didn't take me after I hit .349 for Kansas City (American Association, 1953), so I was glad to be traded.'

Vic was swapped, along with Jim Finigan and Bill Renna, to the Philadelphia A's, whence Kansas City's big league franchise sprang, in a multiple player deal involving Harry Byrd and Eddie Robinson, among others. Robinson, now 35, was brought to the A's in a recent deal with the Yankees.

Apparently trying to convince the Yanks how much of a mistake they made in letting him go, Power recalls that he 'tried to kill the ball all the time' that first year in Philadelphia. As a result, he hit a disappointing .255.

'I just swing now,' he says, 'and if the ball looks good, why I just go for it.'

Why do you make so many catches one-handed?

'To keep me loose,' beams the husky Athletic. 'When I grab 'em two-handed, I don't feel loose.' "

-James Ellis, Baltimore Sun (Baseball Digest, August 1956)

1956 Yankee Prospect of the Past: Dale Long

"Dale tried out as a left-handed catcher- it didn't work. He went to the minors and had three good seasons. With Pittsburgh in 1955, he tied for the most triples (13) in the National League."

-1956 Topps No. 56

THE LONG WAY HOME

Pirates' Record-Setter Finally Rewarded For 12 Years' Struggling

"You probably recall the old gag about the taxi driver's theme song being 'The Longest Way 'Round Is the Shortest Way Home.'

Well, for one fabulous stretch this season, the longest way 'round- the Dale Long-est way, that is- WAS the shortest way home.

The way to home runs. SHORT- and sweet. For in a run of eight consecutive games, the Pirates' big (six-four, 212), likeable lefty from the Northern Berkshires did what no other of the 9,000 big league players before him ever did- knocked a homer a game in each of the eight straight games.

Sure, there have been other tremendous displays of home run power compressed into small packages of time. An earlier Pittsburgh Pirates home run hero, Ralph Kiner, once (1947) sent eight big homers resounding in four consecutive games. Tony Lazzeri (1936) and Gus Zernial (1951) hit seven in four games. Babe Ruth, Vic Wertz and Jim Bottomley hit seven homers in five games. Only two years ago Stan Musial hit five in a double-header. But for sustained consistency, never before was there anything like Long's surge.

It extended over a period of ten days and was accomplished against eight different pitchers of five different teams and in Philadelphia as well as Pittsburgh. It started at Pittsburgh when Long sent one of Jim Davis' knucklers roaring high into the second deck of the right field stands in the eighth inning to help beat the Cubs, 7-4.

The next day, in a double-header with Milwaukee, Long hit another into the same upper stands off Ray Crone in the first game, and in the opening inning of the second game repeated off Spahn, again to the same deck. After an open date, the Cardinals showed up at Forbes Field. Once again the upper right field stands were dented, with Herman Wehmeier the victim.

The fifth homer in the skein was a low liner that said goodbye to Forbes Field just above the 436-foot sign on the right-center field wall. The Cards' Lindy McDaniel thus had the dubious distinction of throwing what was said to be the first home run ever hit over that distant spot in the nearly half a century of the park's existence.

Two nights later the scene transferred to Philadelphia's Connie Mack Stadium. Curt Simmons was the pitcher. The score was 3-2 against Pittsburgh when Simmons walked Frank Thomas. Though it was obvious he was fooled by the pitch- Long said later that he was looking for a fast ball when Simmons crossed him with a curve- Long hit the ball one-handed as he fell away from the plate and the surprising result was a homer- number six- over the 350-foot right field fence.

Next day Long broke the major league record for hitting homers in consecutive games with his number seven, also at Philadelphia. In the very first inning he knocked at the door of the record with a drive that came within a half foot of clearing the right field wall, rebounding for a double. After two more futile tries, he connected off Ben Flowers in the eighth frame, with the right field wall the departure point.

Fate took a hand in raining out the last game at Philadelphia, returning the Pirates to Pittsburgh to give the home fans- 32,000 of them were there and will be talking about if for years to come- a chance to see number eight. It came in the fourth inning off Brooklyn's Carl Erskine and tied the score.

The deserved ovation accorded Long was what many veteran observers believe to be the greatest ever given a player in the history of the game. The deafening cacophony of fans' huzzahing him until they were hoarse,  hand-clapping until their palms stung, didn't let up until Long emerged from the dugout and took a 'curtain call.'

That night, for 34 games, the big first baseman was hitting a stratospheric .414, with a total of 14 homers and 39 runs batted in.

Though stopped by the Dodgers' Don Newcombe the next day, he went on to 17 homers before pulling an ill-fated handicap. A pulled leg muscle, compounded by a badly bruised right shin, crippled him and while he gamely continued to play, his hitting was obviously affected.

Though it took him a little more than a week to capture the nation's headlines and the fans' imagination, it was, literally, a long way around for Dale. At 30 (he was born Feb.6, 1926, at Springfield, Mo.), he endured the despair of perennial frustration almost since he first started in pro ball with Milwaukee in 1944.

His itinerary in baseball sounds like something a beserk train caller would call out. Milwaukee, Middleton, Lima, Columbia, Ogden, Providence, Muncie, Oneonta, Lynn, Williamsport, Binghamton, Pittsburgh (for ten games in 1951), the St. Louis Browns (for 34 games in 1951), San Francisco, New Orleans and Hollywood before finally, at long last, becoming the Pirates' regular first baseman (.291 and 16 homers in 131 games) in 1955. That's at a total of 16 teams in 13 years.

But that's only part of the story. They tried him in the outfield, on the mound (one victory at Lima in 1945, a defeat for Ogden in 1946), at first- and Branch Rickey, in one of his wilder moments, even envisioned him as that rara avis, a left-handed catcher.

What sort of fellow is this Long? Well, let's look around the Northern Berkshires, where he is proudly claimed by three communities, North Adams, Mass., where he now makes his home with his attractive wife, Dorothy Robak Long, his high school sweetheart, and their two children, Dale, Jr., eight, and Johnny, one; Adams, where he gained his first athletic fame as an outstanding high school athlete climaxed by being named All-New England center in basketball in the 1944-45 season, and finally, Cheshire, where he spent his boyhood.

Determination, so often expressed by the slugging first baseman in the winter months where he worked first for a department store as a truck driver and then in the public relations department of the Sprague Electric Company, the world's largest manufacturer of electronics and North Adams' biggest industry, was foremost in his mind when he reported for spring training this year.

And through all his latest success, the TV and radio appearances, the unprecedented ovations at the Pittsburgh ball park, the interviews by top sports writers, Dale has remained the hometown guy everybody likes.

He is still the same chap who during the winter, at the end of the day's work, would dally over a cup of coffee at Liggett's drug store or Nassif's drug store and bat the breeze with the fellows.

The same fellow who, when he returned home at the end of the 1955 season would walk to the high school football practice field and show the kids how to boot the ball high and far down the field and who never tired of trying to help some youngster get more distance in his punts.

A typical example of Dale as a thoughtful neighbor is seen in the case of Mrs. Andrew Flagg, his next door neighbor on Blackinton Street before the Longs moved to their pleasant, modest dwelling on Corinth Street.

Mrs. Flagg met with a serious injury this past winter and for a long time was unable to walk and was alone during the daytime hours while her husband was at his teaching duties. Every morning, before going to work, Dale would go to the Flagg home next door and carry Mrs. Flagg to the Long home where she would spend the day visiting with Mrs. Long and the children.

Dale's wife did not see her husband break the homer record. Little Dale was making his first communion in St. Francis Church the day after Dale broke the record by hitting home run number seven.

Did Dorothy listen to the radio that night when Dale hit number seven? No, she was too busy getting Little Dale ready for his big event and putting Johnny to bed. She did not know about it until Bucky Bullett, North Adams sportscaster and a close family friend, called her.

'We have had our ups and downs,' Dorothy told this writer, who has known her since she was a little girl in Adams.

'But through it all,' she went on, 'Dale has never whimpered, never complained, never blamed any one person for the tough breaks he got, but always saying, 'Our day will come; don't worry, honey, we'll get there yet.'

'Naturally, I am thrilled and happy, not so much because Dale has broken the home run mark, but for Dale himself and the fact that he is finally being recognized for all that he is,' she asserted.

'The biggest thrill of all,' Dorothy declared, 'was the night in Pittsburgh when Dale was called from the dugout by the fans for that great big ovation. And when I look back on the days of the boos and the jeers, instead of the cheers, I am so thrilled I can hardly think. Yes, he has been booed, not cheered. And believe me, it is hard, real hard, to sit in the stands and hear your husband get the catcalls when you know deep in your heart that he is giving everything he has.

'The darkest days in Dale's baseball life,' Mrs. Long said, 'came when he was with Hollywood and couldn't get out of a slump. He knew that he had to make good or go back to a lower league. He wasn't hitting, wasn't eating and was just plain discouraged. I suggested that he have a talk with Bobby Bragan, who was manager of Hollywood at the time. Dale did and started off by saying, 'What's going to happen to me, Bobby?' 'What do you mean, Dale?' Bobby replied. 'You're staying with Hollywood. Now go out and hit a few.'

'His confidence restored, his mind resting better, Dale did go out and hit a few. It changed his whole career. I believe that was the turning point. Do you wonder why Dale has such confidence in and such respect for Bragan, now his manager with the Pirates?'

Long was voted the Most Valuable Player in the Pacific Coast League that year.

A little know trait concerning Long and which really brings out 'the boy in him' is the desire to be on hand when news stories are breaking, especially accidents and fires, and he has a standing order with Randy Trabold, staff photographer for the North Adams Transcript, to 'call me when you're going out to take a picture, no matter what the hour.' "

-Tommy McShane (Baseball Digest, August 1956)

1956 Yankee Prospect of the Past: Dave Jolly

JOLLY GOOD RELIEVER

Braves' Bullpen Ace Recaptures 1954 Form

Back in the Fall of 1952, the Braves picked up a relief pitcher named Dave Jolly in the annual draft. This hardly was cause for excitement and for a couple of reasons. For one, the draft was a dubious medium at best, and for another, Jolly was strictly an unknown.

'Who's Jolly?' was the first question directed at Braves' management after the selection was announced. And 'Who's Jolly?' was the stock question in the pressbox every time the newcomer took the mound in the ensuing season.

Well, they don't ask 'Who's Jolly?' any more. The unknown draftee of 1952 has become one of baseball's outstanding relief pitchers, a man who conceivably could mean a pennant for the baseball burghers of Milwaukee.

This is not to say, of course, that Jolly is likely to bring Milwaukee a pennant singlehandedly. It is not even to say that he will lead the Braves home in front. But relief pitchers being as valuable as they are these days, with the complete game almost a thing of the past, it is safe to say that the Braves won't make it without him.

Who is this relief pitcher extraordinary? He is a solemn looking, slimly built right-hander who admits that his next birthday (Oct. 14) will be his 32nd. He is a native of Stony Point, N.C., with an easy going disposition and a pleasant 'backwoods' type of drawl. And he is a guy who talks so seldom and at such short length that his teammates have come to call him 'Gabby.'

'Ernie Johnson (a fellow pitcher) gave me that nickname in '53,' Jolly recalls, 'but I don't think I live up to it any more. Shucks, I talk a lot more than I did when I first came up.'

Despite Jolly's contention that he has developed into a veritable chatterbox, the 'Gabby' monicker has stuck. And if he does talk more these days, his loquacity hasn't become more evident to those around him.

The little Jolly does say, though, is worth remembering. He has a dry sort of humor which brings laughs with the minimum of effort. A particular forte of his is the art of composing puns.

Perhaps the best compliment one could pay to Jolly's sense of humor is that he didn't lose it during the 1955 season. Rarely has a pitcher had a more trying time, what with a sore arm and attendant inability to retire opposing batters; yet Jolly, outwardly at least, was as cheerful as ever.

'It just seemed that way, though,' Jolly explains. 'Actually, I was down on myself and my confidence was gone. My arm hurt every time I threw a ball. I was happy to see the season end.'

Jolly's ailment of last season is generally referred to as 'tennis elbow,' a strained tendon in the elbow, the currently popular ailment called tendonitis.

Tennis elbow, strained tendon, tendonitis- whatever you want to call it, the poor guy couldn't throw much harder than if his arm had been broken. And to make matters worse, he couldn't throw accurately, either. His base on balls total of 51 in just 58 innings illustrates that more graphically than words.

'I was just pushin' the ball up to the plate,' he recalls. 'Sometimes it didn't even get there without bouncin'. I was aimin' the ball, too, and when you do that your control is sure to suffer.

'There was only one time all year when I really threw a fast ball. That was in St. Louis, around the middle of May, I think. The rest of the time I couldn't have hurt anybody if I'd hit him in the head.'

While perhaps an extreme case, Jolly's major league career to date provides a good example of the ups and downs of a relief pitcher.

In 1953, apparently as little known to Manager Charlie Grimm as to others in the baseball world, he seldom got into a game. When he did, it usually was because the game already was hopelessly lost and Grimm wanted to reserve his more highly regarded pitchers for more important situations. The result was that he won no games at all and lost one- in only 38 innings.

Nobody thought much of Jolly when the 1954 campaign began, except perhaps to point out that, no longer being a newly drafted player, he could finally be sent to a farm club. But the silent Southerner was thrown into a tight spot one day, and did such an outstanding job that Grimm made a habit of throwing him into tight spots. He emerged as a relief pitching sensation, as proved by his 11-6 record and 2.43 earned run average.

Then came 1955 and the sudden attack of tennis elbow.

'It started bothering me in my first game in spring training,' Jolly says. 'After that I felt it every time I pitched.'

Instead of winning 11 games, Jolly won only two, while losing three. And instead of a 2.43 earned run average, he finished with the whopping figure of 5.74.

After that came a winter of rest, and when Jolly reported this spring his arm was as good as new.

'I was still a little leery for the first two weeks,' he says, 'but even the first time out I was throwin' harder than I did last year. I gradually got my confidence back, and I haven't felt a bit of pain this season.'

Although Jolly has pitched only for the Braves since reaching the majors, he has been in four big league organizations all told. He signed originally with the late lamented St. Louis Browns, then was drafted by the Cincinnati Redlegs' farm system and traded into the New York Yankees' chain. It was from the Yankee farm in Kansas City, then in the American Association, that the Braves drafted him.

Why did Jolly sign with the Browns? The answer is simple. As he puts it, 'Nobody else was interested in me. I didn't get a dime for signin', either. I was lucky to get a job.'

Neal Millard, then a scout for the Browns and now handling the same duties for the Redlegs, signed Jolly in 1946 after watching him pitch in semipro ball following his discharge from the Army.

Jolly's first stop on the professional baseball ladder was at Mooresville, N.C., in the Class D North Carolina State League. Also a member of that club, coincidentally, was Hoyt Wilhelm, now a relief ace for the New York Giants.

'We were both starters in those days,' Jolly recalls.'Who'd've of thought we'd both wind up in the bullpen.'

He was not complaining, though, and neither would Wilhelm. From their humble beginnings as $150 a month starters in Class D, Jolly and Wilhelm have blossomed into two of the best relief pitchers in the business.

Like any pitcher, Jolly likes to boast of his feats as a hitter.

'Hittin' is old stuff with me,' he relates. 'When I was with Mooresville I used to play first base and outfield when I wasn't pitchin'. I remember back in 1947 when I hit .375 and hit two home runs. I haven't hit a homer since, except in battin' practice.

'Of course, I didn't play first base very long- just one game, as a matter of fact. My first base career ended when I ruined a no-hitter for Wilhelm. Somebody hit a slow bounder to me, and it took a while to figure out what to do with it. The first thing I knew, the runner was past first and I still had the ball.

'You know, we had quite a club at Mooresville that year. One time we even had two men on third base at the same time and both of 'em scored.'

Asked how this unlikely event occurred, Jolly replied, 'Well, we tried a squeeze bunt with men on second and third. The batter missed the pitch and the man on third slid back to the bag. Wilhelm was the guy on second and he kept coming toward and slid in, too. Then the catcher threw the ball away and they both got home.

'Everything happened that year. I even broke my jaw. I was on second base, goin' toward third, and the ball was hit toward short. Well, we met, and for the next month I ate nothin' but soup and milk shakes.'

Jolly always had been a starter before George Selkirk, now managing the Braves' Wichita farm club, converted him to a relief specialist at Kansas City in 1952. He has started only once as a Brave, and in that game he held the Dodgers to one run in ten innings before being taken out for a pinch hitter with the score tied.

'Who cares whether you start or relieve?' Jolly says. 'Just so you get to play- and eat that big league food.'

Jolly claims the distinction of being one of the few pitchers who never turned in a no-hit game, not even in high school.

'The closest I ever came,' he recalls, 'when I was with Tulsa (Texas League). I pitched a two-hitter against Beaumont, I think.

'Wait a minute, I take that back. I had a no-hitter for eight and two-thirds innings of relief this year before Temple (Johnny Temple of the Redlegs) spoiled it.'

Jolly referred here to the fact that he had pitched hitless ball through his first five relief appearances and for part of his sixth before losing his 'no-hitter.'

'Funny thing, too,' he adds. 'I wasn't a bit nervous.'

Jolly chuckles at the common misconception that he used to be a knuckleball specialist.

'I don't know how that idea got started,' he says, 'but I kept readin' about bein' a knuckleballer when I was goin' good in '54. Sure, I used it once in a while, but the only reason I ever did was to show 'em another pitch.

'The fast ball and slider have always have been my best pitches- except last year, of course. I didn't have any good ones then.'

Asked to name the toughest hitters he has to face in the National League, Jolly replies, 'A lotta hitters give me trouble. I'd say Dark, Reese and Moon give me the most.'

Jolly spent two seasons at Mooresville, posting records of 5-3 in 1946 and 14-7 in 1947. It was then that the Redlegs drafted him for their Tulsa affiliate, for which he had a 3-5 mark in 1948 besides putting in enough time with Columbia (South Atlantic League) to win four and lose two. After that he was 12-7 at Tulsa, 5-11 at Syracuse (International League) and 9-13 at Tulsa before being traded to Kansas City. After he won six and lost one for the Blues in relief, the Braves took their profitable gamble on his services.

'One thing I oughta mention,' Jolly says, 'is the first game I pitched for Tulsa in '48. I beat Dallas, 31-1, and gave up four hits and got four myself. That was the biggest day I ever had at the plate.'

Another big event in Jolly's minor league days came on November 3, 1950, when he married pretty Doris Hunter of Stony Point. The Jollys have two sons now, one three and the other born April 21.

Does he want the kids to follow in their dad's footsteps as a ball player?

'I dunno,' he says. 'We'll see. Maybe they'd be better off going to work!' "

-Bob Wolf, Baseball Digest, July 1956

1956 Yankee of the Past: Bobo Newsom

THE SHOWBOAT THAT REFUSED TO SINK

Bobo Newsom Pitched - And Won - With Broken Jaw, Broken Leg

"Lewis Norman Newsom, the Great Showboat, moved majestically across the room on the eve of the All-Star Game and swiftly buttonholed his victim. Bobo's eyes were sad, his expression pained.

'Bobo wants to talk to you,' Bobo' he said, a sob in his voice. The words had a familiar ring because the massive Mr. Newsom always has had a quaint manner of speaking, addressing everyone as Bobo and using the third approach for himself. But the heavy Carolina drawl has flattened out since he retired after 20 years of top-flight pitching in the big leagues to become a Baltimore broadcaster. However, he's still as big a ham as ever and it was instantly evident that he was playing this role for tragedy.

'You once wrote that Bobo horsed around with a five-run lead against the Yankees,' said Bobo earnestly. 'I admit I was a showboat and hammed it up good but Bobo liked to win too much. You know that, Bobo, don't you?'

Sure do. The large Mr. Newsom may not have been quite as good as he thought he was but he certainly was a magnificent competitor. As the admiring boys in the trade used to say of him, 'He had the gall of a burglar.'

The prize example, of course, was in 1936 when he was pitching for the Senators against the Indians. Earl Averill, a vicious hitter, swung violently and the ball went back as if shot from a cannon. It struck Bobo on the knee. Bobo hobbled after the ball and threw out the runner. Oblivious to pain, the indomitable Newsom finished the game to score a 5-4 victory. Then he limped to the clubhouse.

'Mike,' Bobo drawled to the trainer, 'Bobo thinks his laig is broke.' It was, too. He was in a cast for five weeks.

On Opening Day in 1936 Bobo was matched against Lefty Gomez and the Yankees. At one point in the fray, the mercury-footed Ben Chapman dropped down a bunt. In swooped Ossie Bluege from third. He made a hasty throw. Bobo was merely standing there, admiring himself, when the bullet peg crashed with sickening force against his jaw.

Bobo staggered from the mound like a wounded water buffalo crazed with pain. He ran in circles. They tried to lead him to the bench. He refused.

'Whenever President Roosevelt comes to see Bobo pitch,' said Bobo with great dignity, 'Bobo ain't gonna disappoint him.'

This was in the third inning, mind you. Bobo won the game, 1-0. Oh, yes. His jaw was broken.

Oscar Judd once caromed a line drive off Bobo's forehead, the ball rolling all the way to center field. Bobo rolled with the punch but didn't go down.

'But Bobo didn't remember nuthin' for a few innings afterwards, though,' he later confessed.

He broke a finger in Detroit and the doctors said he'd be out for three weeks. The huge Mr. Newsom disagreed.

'When Bobo wants a fracture to heal,' he said, 'it's gonna heal in a hurry.' Eleven days later he was pitching. The Athletics beat him, 1-0, but they had to go 11 innings to do it.

There was one season when Bobo had won 18 games for the Tigers as the final double-header of the year approached. Bobo had been promised a bonus if he won 20. Late in the first game Del Baker, the Detroit manager, signaled the bullpen for help, and out strode Bobo, who was scheduled to pitch the second game. Baker gasped and protested.

'If Bobo ain't worried none,' imperiously announced Bobo, 'you shouldn't worry neither.' So he won the first game- and the second game, too.

It was in 1940 when Bobo won the opening game of the World Series and then was called home by the sudden death of his father. Bravely he returned in time for the fourth game. The story was a tear-jerker, Bobo winning for his father. He did, of course. But Paul Derringer of the Reds edged him in the seventh game, 2-1.

'Bobo shore woulda liked to win that one,' said Bobo afterward.

'For your father?' asked a reporter, scenting a story.

'No, for Bobo,' said Bobo.

Bobo once took Bob Considine to task for writing that he'd won 31 games one Pacific Coast League season. Bobo said that it was 33, although the record book insisted on 31.

'Who you gonna believe?' said Bobo with an air of finality.

The tale of Bobo showboating with a five-run against the Yankees had been supplied by Birdie Tebbets, who had caught him that day.

'I may have erred on the size of the lead,' admitted Birdie, 'but the story is essentially correct.' His eyes twinkled. 'Bobo just wants you to write about him again. He loves to see his name in the paper.' "

-Arthur Daley, New York Times (Baseball Digest, September 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Lefty O'Doul

FATE TURNS BACK ON O'DOUL, ONCE TOP MINOR PILOT

"So you're having troubles? Consider for a moment the plight of Frank Joseph O'Doul, the former ex-Mayor of Powell Street, San Francisco, U.S.A.

Here's a guy with a full mess kit full of sour K-rations.

Heading into August he was eighth, a poor eighth, in the Pacific Coast League. There are only eight clubs in the Pacific Coast League. How low can you get?

Well, F. Joseph is there, along with his Vancouver club, and it was only a comparatively few years ago that he was the highest paid, highest rolling, highest reaching minor league manager in baseball. During the campaigns of 1946-47-48 he won a pennant, tied for a pennant, and finished third.

The major leagues beckoned. But F. Lefty Joseph, the former big league batting champion, was going good, as they say in the confines of the clubhouse. He turned a high salaried and contented back upon the East, where the money was, but the security wasn't, and marched confidently towards what he thought would be an everlasting alliance with the old home town.

How wrong can you be? 

In 1949 he finished seventh, unfortunate victim of maneuverings in the front office. In 1950 much money was spent to recoup,  and the club missed fourth place by a single game.

The year 1951 was shattering to the man who three years before had been the most desired manager in the minors. He finished eighth with a club even the cat wouldn't drag in. That winter he was fired.

Then he went, on a sort of jilted romantic rebound, to San Diego in 1952. There he fashioned a fifth-place finish, a sixth in 1953, and a pennant, with a playoff with Hollywood, in 1954. It was the first full, clean, non-split season flag the San Diego baseball club had ever won.

He walked away from it last year, went to Oakland, wound up seventh and now he's with Vancouver- floundering.

Too bad, too, because the Pacific Coast League has never had a better manager, or a better man. The ball just bounced wrong too many times."

-Bob Stevens, San Francisco Chronicle (Baseball Digest, September 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Ernie Shore

"TRY TO GET THROUGH ONE INNING"

Ernie Shore Got Through- To A Perfect Game!

"It was a hot, dry day in June, 1917, June 23 to be exact, when a tall, raw-boned North Carolinian unsuspectedly was tapped for a niche in baseball's Hall of Fame. It was the day that Babe Ruth, then pitching for the Boston Red Sox, was thumbed to the showers for speaking somewhat bluntly to Umpire Brick Owens, who had just given Ray Morgan of the Washington Senators a base on balls.

Manager Jack Barry looked down the Red Sox bench, spotted six-foot-four Ernie Shore, and motioned him to the pitcher's mound.

'Try to get through this inning,' Barry said, 'and we'll get someone warmed up to take over.'

What followed is one of the more illustrious chapters in diamond history. Morgan, trying to take advantage of the rattled Red Sox, broke for second base on the first pitch and was thrown out by Catcher Sam Agnew, and Shore went on to mow down the next 26 batters for one of baseball's rare perfectly pitched games as Boston won, 4-0.

It's Sheriff Ernie Shore now, picture-book guardian of the law in Forsyth County (Winston-Salem) and the memory of that day in Washington will always be with him.

'Someone said that Ruth took a swing at Owens,' Ernie remembered, 'but that isn't true. He just cussed him out. You know how the Babe was. I'd been with him in Baltimore, and we went up together when Jack Dunn sold us to the Red Sox.'

Shore went in cold, with only eight warm-up throws to the catcher before resuming the game, and retired the Senators so easily after Morgan was thrown out Barry kept him in. He didn't realize he had a no-hitter going until the ninth inning when someone on the bench mentioned it- strictly against baseball superstition- and the Senators tried it steal it away that inning.

'Jack Henry, their catcher, lined one to Duffy Lewis in left field in the ninth,' Ernie recalled, 'and then Clark Griffith ordered Mike Menosky to drag a bunt. Mike was pretty fast, but we got him.'

There was quite a debate whether Shore should be credited with a perfect no-hit, no-run game, since he came into the game as a relief pitcher, but it's in the record book and few people will say he doesn't deserve the honor.

A 200-pound right-hander, Shore- who only goes 220 now- had a fast ball sinker the Senators couldn't fathom that day, but they weren't the only club that had trouble with it. He pitched five one-hit games that season. Against the Athletics Shore went unscathed after Jimmy Walsh, the first batter up, singled. Later on, against the St. Louis Browns, he went seven innings before a pinch hitter spoiled his game.

Shore won a game for the Red Sox in the 1915 World Series, and lost one to Grover Cleveland Alexander of the Phillies. In the 1916 Series he beat Brooklyn twice.

Ruth was a real whiz, Shore said, at his pitching peak, as his World Series records bear out. But the Sheriff thinks Babe was beginning to have a little trouble with his arm when Ed Barrow shifted him to the outfield, where he became one of baseball's all-time greats.

Shore, who has been sheriff 19 years and has three more to go on his present term, would have been a corking good tackle in football, for size at least, but came along 30 years too soon for the pro game. As a matter of fact, nearby Guilford College, where he went to school, had no football team during his time, only a baseball team. It must have been a pretty good one, too, for Shore won 24 games and lost one in two years there, catching Owner Jack Dunn's eye in Baltimore."

-Lewis F. Atchison, Washington Star (Baseball Digest, November 1955)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Fred Merkle

MERKLE WAS STAR 16 YEARS AFTER IMMORTAL BONER

"Fred Merkle died because of trouble with his heart. The exact reason is easy:

It was broken.

Many years ago when the Minneapolis Millers trained at Daytona, Beach, Fla., Mike Kelley went to see him at his home in neighboring Ormond Beach.

Mike came upon a broken 'old' man, though Merkle then was just 50. He was plaintive, not bitter, about his misfortune.

'If they would only leave me alone,' he said. Everywhere I go, I'm pointed out as 'There's Fred Merkle, who failed to touch second.' Or, 'There's the guy that pulled the boner that cost the Giants the pennant.' ' (On first base at the time, Merkle failed to run out a 'winning single' in the ninth inning of a late-season game against the Cubs, leaving the game deadlocked 1-1 and forcing a playoff for the pennant which the Giants lost.) For many years, Fred was a virtual hermit.

And yet there is something glorious in Fred Merkle's history. I don't suppose 10 per cent of the fans realize Merkle committed that boner of failing to touch second base when he was only in his second year of big league ball. He had played just 33 games.

Know how many more seasons he had? Just SIXTEEN!

That was 1908 and Merkle finished in 1926 with some in between years out of the majors. He played with the Giants for 11 more years, had seasons with the Cubs, Dodgers and Yankees. Twice he hit over .300, usually was around .290. He was one of the great right-handed first basemen, being shadowed only by the splendid George Kelly.

He was an excellent base runner. He was adept at the bunt and hitting behind the runner and all the things John McGraw craved and ordered.

Yet he died, in his own mind, a social outcast. This was bitter and cruel. Wasn't it only last year that an American Leaguer, with the winning run going over the plate, was called out for not advancing from first to second? That name can't be remembered. And it has happened 50, 100 other times.

Yet Fred Merkle's failure cost a pennant. He is a truly hard luck legend."

-Halsey Hall, Minneapolis Star (Baseball Digest, May 1956)

1956 Yankee World Series of the Past: 1955 World Series

 PRAISE 'N' BRAYS FOR SERIES PLAYS

"The World Series of 1955:

Most Spectacular Play: Sandy Amoros' catch of Yogi Berra's high fly in the seventh game.

Best Fielding Play: A double play by the Yankees in the last game. Billy Martin made a great stop of Pee Wee Reese's bounding ball, got the ball to Phil Rizzuto at second and, while flying through the air, Rizzuto made the relay to first.

Biggest Mystery: Don Newcombe's arm, sore or not?

Sharpest Crack: Casey Stengel, when Martin was thrown out at the plate trying to steal in the first game, asked what he said to Martin, the Yankee manager replied, 'I congratulated him on being out.'

Second Sharpest Crack: Duke Snider's home run to right center in the fifth inning of the fifth game, a legitimate home run in any ball park in the world. No other Series homer could make this claim.

Worst Strategy: Walt Alston's failure to yank Billy Loes in the fourth inning of the second game when the Yankees were combing his hair with line drives. Even after a walk and four sharp singles, Alston permitted Loes, a right-hander, to pitch to Eddie Robinson, a left-handed pinch hitter. He promptly hit Robinson. Then with Tommy Byrne, a good left-handed hitter, up, Alston still left Loes in, though Spooner was ready to relieve. Byrne's drive past Loes' ear cracked the game wide open.

Best Manager: In the long one, Alston, despite a wobbly beginning. He refused to be stampeded by his own men, some of whom (notably Zimmer and Newcombe) groused openly. Finally, in the clutch game, Alston and Johnny Podres settled on the type of pitching best suited to Yankee Stadium as contrasted to Ebbets Field.

Best Pitcher: Podres, perod. He had everything a winning pitcher needed, including guts.

Best Game: The seventh, when the only tension and stress of the entire series became manifest in the late innings. As Podres continued to be the master of the Yankees, the regard and affection of the customers for him grew to mammoth proportions.

Biggest Winners: The club owners, who got rich from the fifth, sixth and seventh games.

Best All-Around Fielder: Phil Rizzuto again. The Yankee shortstop handled all chances, several of them requiring agility and speed you wouldn't expect from a 37-year-old shortstop. He ranged the infield, from deep in the hole to back of second. He pivoted, at the risk of limb, on double plays. And he rushed in to make great underhand throws on balls hit slowly past the mound.

Best Second Guess: The Yankees would have won with Mantle able to play all of each game.

Second Best Second Guess: On Stengel in the fifth game. With the Yankees behind, 4-2, in the eighth inning, and with a man and Martin representing the tying run, he didn't pinch-hit Mantle in that spot. A long ball was the Yankees' only hope and in Ebbets Field any kind of a fly ball Mantle might hit might be a home run.

Unluckiest Player: Irv Noren. Handicapped by a leg injury, he grounded into five double plays.

Luckiest Player: Roy Campanella because he has to play in Yankee Stadium only at World Series time.

Luckiest Non-Players: Silvera, Wiesler, Leja, Walker, Howell and Koufax. All got full shares without appearing in a single game.

Cheapest Home Runs: Furillo in the first game in Yankee Stadium, Amoros in the fifth game in Ebbets Field. Furillo's was a slicer that went only about 310 feet, Amoros' was a lazy fly that fell just over the right field fence.

Best Inning: The ninth of the seventh game. You could hear the heartbeats of 62,465 tightened-up fans as Podres retired Skowron, Cerv and Howard in order."

-Franklin Lewis, condensed from the Cleveland Press (Baseball Digest, November 1955)

WHY CASEY DIDN'T BUNT WITH BERRA

Here's Stengel's Playback Of Key World Series Play

"When the Yankees' daily chores are done, Casey Stengel and his coaches gather with the newspapermen and William, maitre de press room in Yankee Stadium, serves refreshments. If a visitor minds his manners and is pure of heart and does good deeds, he may be rewarded with a dissertation on baseball by the incomparable, the imitable, the unmitigated Mr. Stengel.

This was such a day. Talk meandered aimlessly for a while, touching on Mr. Stengel's threat to play nine shortstops occasionally this year just because he had nine shortstops in camp, moving on to the six-man and seven-man infields which Branch Rickey experimented with a few springs ago, and all of sudden the meeting was hips-deep in a discussion of offensive tactics with special reference to the final game of the last World Series.

That was the game of the Wonderful Double Play which Brooklyn won, 2-0, behind Johnny Podres. The Yankees couldn't score on Podres but they were about to score when Yogi Berra sliced a fly to left field with one out and runners on first and second. Sandy Amoros, going faster and farther than Wes Santee, rushed from left-center field to the foul line, caught the ball and fired it to Pee Wee Reese, whose relay doubled Gil McDougald off first base, ending the inning and saving the world's championship. It was a game whose details remain vivid in Casey's memory and probably always will because he's never lost a World Series before.

Now he replayed it.

'I didn't make too many excuses because how can you get mad at that fella for pitching so good and everybody keeps talking all winter about the seventh game but where I lost the Series was in the third, fourth and fifth games because all I got to do is win one of them and there ain't no seventh game. I win the first two games and if you win the first two games of a short series like that you figure to take the series and all I wanted was one of those three games in Brooklyn but I lost three there and after being ahead in one, 6-1.

'Now, they ask me would I bunt with Berra in that situation with two men on base and I say, yes, I would bunt with Berra but let me remind you of Charlie Dressen a couple years before. He bunted with Campanella but I got a man there behind the plate built like a wrestler, you'd say, because he ain't got legs that would look good on a woman.

'Dressen bunted twice with Campanella and the next fella, a pretty good hitter too, and that fella looks like a wrestler, he jumped out there in front of the plate and got the bunts and th'owed men out at third. All the writers said wow, it was close, did the umpire blow the play maybe, but Mr. Berra made the play and the umpire said out.

'Now, you compare catchers, if you can compare American and National League, and I don't think Campanella, the great catcher that he is, could get out there for that ball quite as fast as the wrestler. Ask me a catcher that can th'ow a little better than Berra sometimes and I have to give you Mr. Campanella. Or you want a fella can do a job for you with that stick on a ball up here, Mr. Campanella is a batsman that gets better with age. He will hit that ball for you and Berra will hit some of them, too.

'All right, maybe I could bunt with Berra but baseball today is the greatest act I ever saw in the seventh, eighth and ninth innings. The first baseman charges you and the third baseman charges you and when you got runners on first and second base they can make a force-out at third.

'Suppose Berra does bunt and they move those runners over, are they going to bring the infield in now and give the next batter a chance to get a base hit on a ground ball? With the score 2-0, they are not. That fella over there who I think did an amazing job because he kept his mouth shut and handled some men that were maybe a little tough to handle, he will have his infield back for the double play and concede me that run on third base.

'Maybe I could get that run home but the way that fella was pitching we didn't look like we were gonna score because we had other chances and didn't score. Do you know how many innings I went without scoring? The day before I won, but didn't score after the first inning so it was 17 innings I didn't get a run in those two games and then I went to Honolulu and I didn't score in my first three innings there. That's 20 innings and I'm not used to going that long.

'No, I figure I got a man up there at bat built like a wrestler that can pull a ball into the right field seats pretty good and if we're going to score at all again against that pitcher this might be the time. Remember, I need two runs to tie and if I give up Berra on a bunt then it's two out and the sacrifice fly is no good to me to get any runs home.

'I figure Berra might pull the ball to right field and so do they, because if they were pitching outside to make him hit to left, why was their outfield playing all the way over in right field? Because it's a right field hitter that's up.

'But Berra hits to the foul line in left and with the left fielder way towards center field that's going to be a two-base hit nine times out of ten. McDougald runs past second and I don't blame McDougald because he's looking to tie the score from first base the way our club can do some times. McDougald ain't dumb and he runs the bases pretty good.

'If I was the runner on first base I would do the same thing as McDougald because he is the tying run. If that ball drops in there, they wouldn't have had a chance in the world to get McDougald at the plate, I don't care how good the relay is.

'But the ball don't drop in, and I'm ruined.' "

-Red Smith, New York Herald-Tribune (Baseball Digest, May 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Bucky Harris

OH COME NOW, BUCKY!

Better-Than-Ever Stuff Just Plain Spinach

"Featured in a recent issue of the Saturday Evening Post is an article under the byline of Bucky Harris. The heading reads:

'Ball Players Are As Good As Ever.'

The Detroit pilot is the dean of American League managers, starting his 29th season this spring. He is 60 years old and reached the major leagues 36 years ago, but much of what appears under his name in the Post is plain spinach. Quoting some of his remarks:

'All-around college and high school athletes with pro potential in more than one sport generally choose baseball.'

'There are more first-class players today than ever before.'

'I'm convinced that the old stars in the Hall of Fame would have had conniption fits and considerably lower averages had they faced the variety of trick stuff the pitchers throw today.'

'The slickest fielders and double-play combinations of my time couldn't match the brilliance of the defensive artists on all clubs now.'

'Today, rookies in the deepest bush get intensive schooling in every facet of the game.'

'The old-timers never saw the variety of pitching stuff hitters must contend with today.'

'Nowadays, rookies fresh out of the minors have three or four different pitches.'

'I believe the boys play harder today because there's more incentive for winning.'

'Any way you look at, fielding has improved enormously.'

'In his prime, Hans Wagner, paragon of shortstops, consistently was charged with 40 to 60 errors a year. It's a rare shortstop who boots more than 30 plays a season nowadays.'

'All this yapping about the scarcity of talented rookies is hogwash.'

Harris says that all-around college and high school athletes with pro potential in more than one sport generally choose baseball. Let him tell that to the baseball scouts. They will inform him that the athletes choose football or basketball. College baseball is almost extinct.

As to there being 'more good first-class players today than ever before,' how can Harris explain the fact that major league clubs have been paying bonuses of $25,000 to $100,000 to untried high school and sandlot players. The club that employs Bucky paid $135,000 to three of the players on his present squad when they were graduated from high school.

The millions spent in bonus payments indicates the scarcity of what he refers to as 'good first-class players.'

Harris reflects on the trouble the old-timers would have swinging against the trick stuff that modern pitchers use and claims they never saw the variety of deliveries hitters must contend with today.

Harris came to the major leagues the year that trick deliveries were ruled out. There was no connection between his coming and freak deliveries going, merely a coincidence, but never having batted against doctored balls, Harris is hardly qualified to draw a comparison.

He must have heard of the shine ball, emery ball, licorice-splashed ball, loaded ball, iced ball, fruzzed ball, balls with a few torn stitches, and other inventions. He mentions the spit ball and says it was not in general use because it was so hard to control. This is true but the lads did a fairly good job of controlling the other kinds that were declared illegal at the time he started his big league career.

Harris says that rookies fresh out of the minors have three of four different pitches and presumably considers this a virtue and proof that the modern recruits have an edge over the old-timers.

The fact that the rookies fresh out of the minors have three or four different pitches is a weakness and not a virtue. They have three or four different pitches but are masters of none.

Bucky did not explain why he used 20 different pitchers- count 'em, 20- last year. He should also get together with Willis Hudlin, whom the Detroit club hired to coach pitchers with Tiger farm clubs. He might benefit by reading what Hudlin told Sam Greene of the Detroit News a few days ago:

'It seems to me that if a kid has a good arm all he needs to work on is his curve and fast ball. When he begins to slip is time enough to think of the slider or knuckler or other freak pitches.'

The main criticism has been that recruits in the minors spend their time trying to develop unorthodox deliveries instead of working on fast balls, curves and control.

Honus Wagner retired three years before Harris appeared on the major league scene and Napoleon Lajoie hung up his uniform for the last time four years previously, so Harris never saw either in his prime and is not qualified to judge.

He says Wagner made from 40 to 60 errors a season and that it's a rare shortstop who boots more than 30 a season nowadays.

Using the same reasoning, Harris could proclaim Zeke Bonura the greatest first baseman in history since Bonura each season had the highest fielding average in the league, a fact of which Zeke was very proud. He maintained his standing at the head of the class by ducking every batted ball that he might conceivably fumble.

There was never a better fielding second baseman than Lajoie who once said:

'You will never find the best fielders high in the averages. What makes them good fielders is that they go after everything, take every chance. You've got to feel there's no such thing as an unplayable ball, no matter how impossible it looks. Who knows? The ball may hit a pebble or hard clot of dirt and bounce in your direction.'

Harris says that all clubs now have brilliant double-play combinations but as late as this (February) morning Detroit was still searching for a second baseman.

He also says that 'all of this yapping about the scarcity of talented rookies is hogwash.'

If it is 'hogwash,' Harris had better go out and pick up a few, say a first baseman, a second baseman, a left fielder and three or four pitchers!

The Harris article was ghost-written and ghosts have a habit of introducing some of their own opinions and conclusions in order to pad the material to fill the required space.

This is perhaps what happened here."

-H.G. Salsinger, Detroit News (Baseball Digest, April 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Leo Durocher

WHY DUROCHER WAS FIRED

Insiders Say Leo Wanted To Stay On

"Leo Durocher quit a job he didn't have. No deal was proposed for 1956 by Owner Horace Stoneham of the Giants. The manager, who realized it was all over at the Polo Grounds, tossed in his hand.

'It was a face-saving solution all around,' explained a guy who is close to both of them.

Friends of Durocher insist he would come back to baseball if the price is right. He wanted to return to the Polo Grounds next year, they insisted.

Stoneham is a guy who is deeply loyal to his employees, but this time he played it cozily. He took Durocher to the Marciano-Moore fight but no mention was made of his manager's future. It was Stoheham's desire to force Durocher to make a move. They have never been close and a series of unrelated incidents precipitated Durocher's departure.

Stoneham doesn't like to bounce anyone who works for him. The reluctance of the Giant president to confer with his manager about 1956 before the last Saturday of the season should have convinced Durocher he was through. The result pleased Stoneham because no hostility appeared to mar the breakup. And Stoneham, a true baseball man, is fond of Bill Rigney who succeeds Durocher.

The parting appeared to be a cheerful one. No animosity was revealed at their last press conference. They praised one another, the club president and his unwanted manager. They publicly split, but Stoneham was relieved that he did not have to publicly can Durocher.

It is impossible to denounce Durocher as an incompetent manager. Few are his equal when he has a team that's up close to the leaders. But he becomes bored with a club that's drifting aimlessly. It is also wrong to blame him because the Giants, who won the World Series from the Indians in four straight games last year, folded up. Their ineffectuality didn't influence Stoneham.

Their first quarrel occurred over tickets. It was Stoneham's contention that Durocher's demand for a Brooklyn-Giant series was unreasonable. The situation was duplicated again before a World Series. Once more Stoneham insisted his manager's request was impossible. The manager didn't ask for passes but he wanted to buy more than were available.

Their first argument in the middle of the season infuriated Durocher. He raged out of the clubhouse when informed he couldn't have what he wanted. It is understandable because Durocher has been in baseball a long time and has a lot of acquaintances in many towns.

'I may not be here tomorrow,' Durocher said when a guy reminded him of an engagement for the next day.

It also irritated Durocher because he claims he wasn't consulted about player personnel.

The trip to Japan also caused concealed friction but there were no specific clashes.

'Durocher just didn't fit into Stoneham's idea of the Giant family,' is the way one guy described it.

There was an unfortunate incident which offended Stoneham. At a stag party in Hollywood, Danny Kaye, the comedian, gave an unflattering imitation of Stoneham. The act was reported in the Hollywood columns. It wasn't Durocher's idea.

In spring training there was more proof of Durocher's stubbornness. It has always been Stoneham's belief that Durocher functioned best when he coached third base. It surprised those who knew this to read that Herman Franks was stationed in the coach's box.

'I think Franks is as good a third base coach as Charlie Dressen,' Durocher told reporters when asked about this.

The sale of Sal Maglie to Cleveland was a business deal. Stoneham didn't think it was right when Durocher denounced Maglie as lazy shortly before the pitcher was sent to the American League club. It could have lowered Maglie's price but Stoneham was also concerned with the pitcher's dignity. It might be recollected that Stoneham didn't see Bobby Thomson hit the home run that won the 1951 playoff. He was on his way to the clubhouse to console Maglie who had been taken out of the game. It is the opinion of those associated with Stoneham that Maglie will return to the Giant organization when his playing career is over. Stoneham stands up for guys who put out for him.

The big mistake was bringing Durocher across the river from Brooklyn. Giant partisans loathe any Dodger manager. They expressed their dislike for Durocher by not buying tickets. Some of them refused to accept him although he won two pennants in the seven and half years he worked for Stoneham. They were wrong, as all prejudiced people are. He's a baseball man and this was the best job he could get.

'Leo's a bright fellow,' said one of his friends recently. 'He'll make a good living no matter what he does. But I'll bet he's not through with baseball.'

I agree with him."

-Jimmy Cannon, New York Post (Baseball Digest, November 1955)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Branch Rickey

THE MAHATMA BOWS OUT

Rickey's Career Ends On A Sad Note

"The sad part about the retirement of Branch Rickey as boss man of the Pittsburgh Pirates is that the Mahatma ended his brilliant baseball career on a note of failure. He wouldn't have failed on this occasion if he had had more time to get his long-range plans into operation. But time is a commodity that no one can sell to understandably impatient fans. He was estranging the customers and making the stockholders go for broke.

So Rickey has been carefully shunted away from the controls and into an 'advisory capacity'- whatever that is. The new general manager is a comparative stranger to so an exalted a post- Joe L. Brown, the son of Joe E. Brown of Hollywood fame. And he'll take over with certain advantages that were beyond the reach of the aging Mahatma.

Rickey was a visionary with a mind so imaginative and so keen that he could dream up the wildest dreams. And he explained those ideas- more or less- with thunderous flights of rhetoric. Make no mistake about him. Rickey ranks with William Jennings Bryan as one of the greatest orators this nation has produced.

The one Pirate official who supported the Mahatma to the end was John Galbreath, principal stockholder and president of the club. The other directors kept getting more and more disenchanted with Rickey's extravagances and his unfulfilled promises. They tell the story- maybe apocryphal- of the meeting at which Branch soared off into the wild, blue yonder with a glowing account of his stewardship. Bing Crosby, a director, arose and headed for the door.

'Where are you going?' someone asked.

'I'm going out to hire a string quartet,' airily answered Der Bingle, 'to accompany Branch in his song and dance act.'

To Rickey went the blame for ripping the Pirate team apart when he first took over in order to rebuild from the ground up. In the course of that operation he traded away Ralph Kiner, darling of the gallery gods. The fans never forgave him for it. Nor could they forgive him for bringing in a batch of beardless wonders who had only youth as a recommendation.

There were signs last season the Rickey program was beginning to bring results but the Mahatma had outworn his welcome too much for him to profit by it. He had run out of time. But the 37-year-old Brown will get a reprieve for the simple reason that the fans are willing to wait to see how clean the new broom sweeps.

One uncontrollable item that put the Mahatma over the barrel was the way the Army latched onto his teenagers. There even was a time when something like 400 Pirate fledglings were in Service.

'It's the biblical story of the widow's mite,' sonorously proclaimed Branch. 'They are taking from my poverty.'

But Dick Groat and the O'Brien twins returned to Pittsburgh last season, restoring some solidity and class to the team. Pirate pitching, oddly enough, was of 'championship caliber'- quoting the always quotable Rickey. Thus far, however, the sinking of almost three million dollars in Buccaneer 'futures' has not paid off.

Contrary to his widespread reputation as 'El Cheapo,' the Mahatma is an extravagant man. He built the St. Louis Cardinals from nothing by instituting the farm system, but he became too extravagant for canny Sam Breadon and left to join the Dodgers. There he not only brought the Negro into baseball but cornered the post-war talent market. Again he grew too expensive. Now Pittsburgh has discovered the same thing.

Failure was such a complete stranger to Branch, and his anxiety to conquer his latest challenge was so acute that he even sank $200,000 of his money into the Pirates. There were also stretches when he worked without salary. When it came to work he never spared himself, even at the age of 74. Coldly calculating though he was, he often had an air of unreality about him.

There was the time, for instance, when he was hopscotching all over the map by private plane as a time saver. The pilot informed Branch that the field ahead was closed in by fog. He couldn't land at his destination but would have to go elsewhere.

'By Judas Priest!' exploded Rickey. 'I must keep that appointment.' He thought a moment and spoke up brightly. 'Try to land anyway. I'll take the responsibility.' He'd take the responsibility? It might have been funny except that the intense Mahatma was so deadly serious.

Branch leaves on the unhappy note of failure, a dismal finale for one of the great baseball figures of this generation. But young Brown may be able to build on the foundations the Mahatma left behind. Then it won't be such a failure after all."

-Arthur Daley, The New York Times (Baseball Digest, November 1955)

THIS FIGURES

"A few years ago when Branch Rickey was trying to peddle Danny O'Connell to the Braves for $200,000 cash plus players, he attacked the problem in a rather unusual manner.

Rickey first offered the Braves $250,000 CASH for Pitcher Gene Conley and later offered $150,000 CASH for Outfielder Hank Aaron. Rickey realized at that particular moment the Pirates didn't have a quarter in the bank (figuratively speaking) but he had a motive.

He wanted to establish big prices in the minds of the Braves, who had tremendous receipts and profits in Milwaukee.

Rickey wanted the Braves to see that he was offering $250,000 for Conley, who had yet to prove he was a major league pitcher, and $150,000 for Aaron, who was then in Class A.

So- when the Braves got interested in O'Connell, Rickey had them talking figures. His own."

-Les Biederman, Pittsburgh Press (Baseball Digest, January 1956)

BRANCH'S WRONG BOW

"Ralph Kiner says he was amused at Branch Rickey's statement in his life story, 'Only a few years ago I gave Ralph Kiner a Pittsburgh contract calling for $90,000 and I was glad to do it.'

Kiner's comment: 'The first two years Mr. Rickey was in Pittsburgh I was playing under a two-year contract for $90,000 signed with John Galbreath, not Branch Rickey. The first time I negotiated with Mr. Rickey (1953) he cut me 22 per cent and then traded me less than two months after the season started.' "

-Les Biederman, Pittsburgh Press (Baseball Digest, January 1956)

"They were recalling a spring when Branch Rickey, then general manager of the Cardinals, was having some difficulty signing Marty Marion to a contract.

'You go along with me,' said Rickey, 'and I'll take care of you.'

'You just give me what I want and I'll take care of myself,' replied Marion."

-John C. Hoffman, Chicago Sun-Times (Baseball Digest, May 1956)

HE PLAYED WRITE FIELD

"Among his other accomplishments, Branch Rickey also contributed to the University of Michigan's dominance of Western Conference baseball over the years. He recalls how he started as a baseball boss- at Michigan in 1910.

'I was in law school in Michigan. A baseball coach was being sought. So for about seven weeks I wrote a couple letters a day to Phil Bartelme (then athletic director) suggesting myself.

'One day he called me in and picked up a stack of envelopes, tied in a bundle. 'That's enough of this,' he told me. 'You stop writing letters and start coaching.' ' "

-Harry Stapler, Detroit News (Baseball Digest, August 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Clark Griffith

AMONG GRIFF'S SOUVENIRS

Career Highlights Told By Desk Mementos

"Like most of us, the late Clark Griffith was a 'string-saver' who could never bear to part with the accumulation of trivia which came across his desk for more than 40 years.

You, of course, have seen a small boy empty his pockets. It was in the nature of such pocket-emptying that Calvin Griffith, the foster-son and new president of the Washington Senators, straightened his beloved master's desk recently.

Calvin was merely rummaging for some current contracts and papers pertaining to the present operation. He didn't touch a thing- in the sense that everything was put back as before and looked exactly like the uneventful evening of Sept. 27 when Clark Griffith unknowingly left his office for the last time. Exactly a month later he died, just three weeks before his 86th birthday.

Griff, of course, was not a somber man. He had what the French love to call 'joie de vivre'- joy of living. For instance, he was all set to pull a trick on one of his coaches, Joe Fitzgerald, who doubled as the old gentleman's chauffer when Griff went to spring training. Griff had a loaded golf ball all set for Fitz.

There was another golf ball in his desk which was stamped: 'Mr. Vice President.' It seems that the last time Griff attended the Washington Post and Times Herald National Celebrities tournament, he got out to the first tee without a golf ball. Vice President Nixon hastily obliged and Griff kept the ball for a souvenir after, of course, his exhibition drive had been retrieved.

There was a silver bullet presented by Griff's favorite cowboy character, The Lone Ranger, on the occasion of the old gentleman's last birthday last year.

There was a miniature furniture suite which had been hand-carved by a Negro employee of the ball park and presented to Griff as a birthday present.

There was a picture (in color, yet) from the 'special edition' of the New York Sunday American of May 5, 1907, showing 'The New York Yankees of the American League which will be led by Manager Clark Griffith.' In the picture with Griff were such familiar names as Willie Keeler, Hal Chase and Kid Elberfeld.

There was a small chunk of copper which Griff kept for 35 years when he abandoned his dream of ranching in Montana and sold his holdings to buy the Washington ball club in 1920. The copper came from Griff's ranch.

There were two tiny baseball bats, made from Griffs' house in Norman, Ill., which was torn down. There were religious tracts, many religious medals, honorary cards to various organizations, dozens of clippings, faded snapshots and a social security card.

There was the contract Griff on May 20, 1915, when he agreed to manage the Washington club for three years at $10,000 a year, the money to be paid in 14 semi-monthly installments at $714.28 per payment.

There was a schedule of the 1897 season when Griff pitched for the Chicago White Stockings and had an 18-18 record- the first time in four years he had failed to win better than 20 games. (He won 25 the next season, however.)

In Griff's neat handwriting were various comments on the games. There was one, in particular, which reflected the bantam's (Griff was five-foot-six-and-one-half and weighed 156 pounds) fighting spirit. He was thrown out of a game with Louisville and protested so vigorously that the game was forfeited,a common occurrence in those days. Griff's own comment was: 'Game forfeited because of umpire's failure.'

There were letters dating back to 1880 when Nicholas Young attempted to get Washington into the National League. There were autographed baseballs and, away down deep in the desk, a carefully preserved picture of Griff's first championship team of 1924.

Like a small boy, Griff's 'pockets' were bottomless."

-Bob Addie, Washington Post (Baseball Digest, January 1956)

A FINAL ECHO OF THE 1903 WAR

Giants' Move To Stadium Would Be Final "Surrender"

"The other day, after the New York Football Giants gave a farewell salute to the Polo Grounds, their home for 30 years, and announced they would move into Yankee Stadium, there was an admission by Owner Horace Stoneham that the baseball Giants were similarly minded.

Stoneham said he had been discussing, with Yankee Owner Dan Topping, the advantages of quitting the Polo Grounds, perhaps before his lease expires in 1962. Among the benefits would be a cheaper rental, what with the two teams sharing the maintenance of one park.

When that happens, as is now deemed probable, it will be the capstone to another of the monuments to the memory of the late Clark Griffith. The pity is that he could not have lived to see the baseball war he spearheaded in 1903 concluded in complete triumph for the infant American League over the hated and haughty Giants of that era.

It was the Giants who strived with every weapon, including professional goons, to keep the newly formed American League out of New York after the turn of the century and it was young Griffith who was storming the National League stronghold. For the A.L.'s first two seasons, 1901-2, there was no attempt to put a team in New York because the Giants were considered impregnable.

In fact, the Giants became even more strongly entrenched in 1902 because in July of that season the famed John McGraw jumped the Baltimore Orioles and joined the Giants as manager. The effect was two-fold. It not only brought the Giants another famous name but it was a blow to American League prestige, this inability to hold one of its managers in line. The Orioles' star battery of Iron Man McGinnity and Roger Bresnahan also jumped to the Giants with McGraw.

However, after the 1902 season, American League President Ban Johnson asked Griffith to make the attempt to plant a franchise in New York. Griffith, who helped found the American League two years before, was even then a considerable figure in the game. He had been an ace pitcher with the old Chicago Colts in the National League and in his first year in the American won a pennant with the White Sox as pitcher-manager.

The National League wasn't even recognizing the American as a major circuit. It wouldn't consent to a World Series in either 1901 or 1902 between its pennant-winner, the Pittsburgh Pirates, and the White Sox and Athletics, who won the A.L. pennants. Griffith's task was doubly difficult because there was only one suitable park in New York, the Polo Grounds.

When Griffith announced that the American League would build a park at 166th and Broadway, John Brush, owner of the Giants, laughed broadly. Firstly, the subway stopped ten blocks short of that sight. Next, the Giants were certain Griffith could not get the permission of city authorities to cut through several streets, necessary for the construction. But Ban Johnson and Griffith had planned it smartly.

As a backer for the new team in New York, they had Frank Farrell, a big wheel in Tammany Hall politics. Farrell disposed of the street problem in City Hall. The blasting crews that removed the rock on the hilly park site looked suspiciously like City Hall employees. Griffith himself superintended the construction, and then learned that it was a historic site that he had picked for his park.

He watched workmen unearth ancient bullets, gun stocks, grapeshot, canister and bayonets and then discovered that the place had once been a battleground for George Washington's troops. Finally, a park seating 12,000 was erected, the team was called the Highlanders, and Griffith prepared to take the new American League entry to Atlanta for spring training.

But, alas, there were other problems. No New York newspaper would cover the spring training activities of Griffith's team. They jeered it and said Griffith was on a fool's mission in his attempt to invade the Giants' territory. In desperation, Griffith turned to an old friend, Jim Price, sports editor of the New York Press. The Press was not a fashionable newspaper; in fact it was second rate, but Griffith convinced Price the paper had nothing to lose by covering the Highlanders.

Griffith had to promise to pay the expense and toll charges of the Press baseball writer. He picked his own man, Jim Bagley, whom he remembered as a one-time brilliant writer but was then an unemployed Bowery character. He dressed Bagley in new clothes, took him to Atlanta and was rewarded. Bagley's stories on the Highlanders were so entertaining that the other Manhattan papers rushed reporters to their camp before training ended.

When the season opened, Griffith noted that his team was being heckled by the same gang of thugs sitting in the same seats every day. Tammany Man Farrell rounded up some henchmen of his own, gave John Brush's bums the bum's rush and got the confession that they were in the hire of Owner Brush of the Giants. The Highlanders ended the season in fourth place, but American League baseball had come to New York to stay. At the end of the season, the first World Series was played. Mr. Griffith would have liked to have lived to see the Giants respectfully requesting permission to play in the American League park."

-Shirley Povich, Washington Post (Baseball Digest, May 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Duffy Lewis

A STRIKE DUFFY LEWIS HAD TO TAKE

"Duffy Lewis, the traveling secretary of the Milwaukee Braves, was a gifted outfielder of the Boston Red Sox team that won the World Series from the Phils in 1915 and because he did an outstanding job in that Series, he was booked on a vaudeville tour.

'I lived near San Francisco in those days and Gavvy Cravath, the star of the Phils, lived in Los Angeles,' Lewis related recently. 'There was great rivalry between these cities in those days and I figured when I played in a Los Angeles theater I'd be in for a little trouble.

'I told a few stories, then I asked if the people had any questions. One fellow got up and asked about the two catches I made on Cravath in the series that was played in Boston. I said they were long balls and mentioned that Cravath was a great hitter.

' 'You probably wouldn't have caught those two balls if the games had been played in Baker Bowl in Philadelphia, would you?' the fan asked.

' 'No, I don't think I would,' I told him. 'They probably would have been home runs.'

' 'I see,' the man replied. 'In other words, if Cravath had hit them in Philadelphia instead of Boston, he would have been up on that stage right now instead of you!' ' "

-Les Biederman, Pittsburgh Press (Baseball Digest, August 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Roger Peckinpaugh

 YOUNGEST BIG LEAGUE MANAGER? PECK!

"Who was the youngest to become a major league manager? Longtime shortstop Roger Peckinpaugh was a babe of 23 when he became boss of the woebegone seventh-place Yanks in mid-September, 1914. He ruled in 14 games and finished in a tie for sixth with the White Sox.

He got his chance when Frank Chance, now of the Hall of Fame and renowned 'Peerless Leader' of the Cubs, got sore at the Yanks' owners and busted out of a three-year contract.

When Peck was relieved at season's end, it was graciously and perhaps correctly written he could have kept the job but thought the burden might cramp his work on the shortstop beat. He was succeeded by Wild Bill Donovan.

Peck managed no more until 1928 when he started a six-year term with Cleveland, then after two years in the minors went back to the Indians for the 1941 season. His best major score was third in 1929.

It's doubtful if he hears as much about his youngest manager distinction as his eight errors for Washington against Pittsburgh in the 1925 World  Series- the record for a seven-game set. He was awarded the goatee for the Senators' loss. On the eve of the Series, he had been named the league's Most Valuable Player.

For lack of knowledge of Peck's tour with the Yanks, much beer is tossed and lost in tap room seminars dealing with the youngest manager issue. The unwary go for 'Boy Wonder' Bucky Harris, who was 27 when he won with the Senators in 1924. Others go for Joe Cronin, who was but 26 when he won with the Senators in '33. But the shrewdies name Lou Boudreau, who was 24 when he was appointed Cleveland manager in 1942."

-Don Donaghey, Philadelphia Bulletin (Baseball Digest, July 1956)

1956 Yankee World Series of the Past: 1941

 "One of the most memorable moments in World Series history happened at Ebbets Field, in the fourth game of the 1941 meetings with the Yankees, when Hugh Casey's third strike to Tommy Henrich, which would have ended the game, eluded Brooklyn catcher Mickey Owen.

If Owen had held the ball, the game was over, of course, and the Series would have been tied at two games each. Brooklyn was ahead, 4-3, two out and nobody on. But by the time the inning was over, the Yanks had picked up four runs, the ball game, and a 3-1 edge in the Series, which they went on to wrap up in five games.

Police had been stationed at all the exit gates in the stands around the dugouts so they'd be ready to dash on the field as soon as the game ended and throw up a protective cordon behind which the players on the diamond could get through the dugouts to the dressing rooms. However, the cops, like most of the fans, thought Henrich had fanned and ran out on the field as soon as Tommy's bat came around. There they were, a whole squad of bluecoats, running toward Mickey, and there was Mickey, weaving through the police like a broken-field runner, desperately pursuing the ball.

Leo Durocher, the Brooklyn manager, bounced off the bench gesturing wildly, like a farmer shooing chickens, and frantically chased the cops back to the stands.

They say everything happens at Ebbets Field and I guess it's true; that's the only time in my life, on or off the ball field, I ever saw a citizen chase cops."

-Tom Meany, Baseball Digest, October 1956

1956 Yankee of the Past: Joe McCarthy

MARSE JOE'S BIGGEST SERIES THRILL? SWEEP OVER CUBS, WHO FIRED HIM

1932 Triumph Also Sweet To Yankee Pilot Because It Was His First Title

McCarthy Rates Gehrig Greatest Competitor For His Clubs In Fall Classic

"A decade ago, Marse Joe McCarthy would have been reluctant to deliver such direct answers, as he did when he celebrated his sixty-ninth birthday, April 21, to two direct questions from an old friend, J.G. Taylor Spink, publisher of THE SPORTING NEWS. The questions were: 

'What World Series was your biggest thrill?' and 'Who's the greatest World Series competitor for your great Yankee teams?'

Time has sharpened the focus of McCarthy's marvelous memory and has brought the glowing events of nine World's Series and his seven world championship triumphs into an orderly sequence.

'I never had a greater thrill for a Series than the Yankees' four-game sweep over the Cubs in 1932,' Marse Joe began. 'Perhaps you understand why. First, it was my first World's Series winner; secondly, it was against the Cubs.'

McCarthy didn't put it in so many words that revenge was sweet and this series, he felt, vindicated him.

Marse Joe, taking over as Cub manager in 1926, had built them into a National League power, rising from eighth to fourth place in his first season. He won the pennant in 1929, but the nightmare of that ten-run World Series inning in Philadelphia, when Hack Wilson last two fly balls in the sun, hovered over the Bruins throughout the 1930 season.

Grabbed By Yanks Quickly

Owner Bill Wrigley dismissed McCarthy in the final week of the 1930 season. Ed Barrow was quick to sign Marse Joe to direct the Yankees.

Before the '32 season, Barrow bought Shortstop Frankie Crosetti for $75,000 and Vernon Gomez for $40,000 from the Pacific Coast League, acquired speedy Ben Chapman, Red Ruffing and Johnny Allen, who broke in with a 17-4 pitching record. The Yankees won 107 games and took the pennant by 13 games over the A's.

This was the celebrated Series when Babe Ruth called his home run shot into the center field seats at Wrigley, the most defiantly brazen gesture in baseball annals.

The Babe was great, but the old Iron Horse, Lou Gehrig, was, for McCarthy, the most dominant of Series stars.

'I didn't manage Ruth at his peak,' said McCarthy.

'But how could anyone be greater than Gehrig? Look at his World Series batting, .361. He was right at the crest of his career in 1932, and he put on the greatest one-man show I've ever seen. In the four games against Chicago, Lou batted .529 and was personally responsible for 14 runs.

'He had nine hits, including three home runs and a double. He scored nine runs and drove in seven; I heard Charlie Grimm say after that Series, 'I didn't anyone could be so good.' I often thought that Gehrig actually felt sorry for opposing pitchers.

'If he were a hungry hitter, a fellow greedy for headlines, he would have hit a lot more home runs and for a higher average. When we had a ball game wrapped up and Gehrig had a few key hits, he wasn't nearly so dangerous a batter. I guess he was the kind of fellow who never liked to rub in a defeat or embarrass a pitcher.

'The writers used to come down and visit our bench before games, and often you'd see someone pointing to a spot in the stands where a home run was hit. But I never heard Gehrig ever mention any of his home runs. The other fellows used to talk about them as you hear on every bench in the majors or minors.

'If you were around Gehrig, you'd get the impression that he never hit a home run in his life.'

The Yankees hit .313 and buried the Cubs under an avalanche of 37 runs in the four games in 1932. 'There was a lot of heat in the Series,' winked Joe, referring to the feud that the Yankees made of the Cubs' shabby treatment of Mark Koenig and their former manager, Rogers Hornsby.

Koenig was a popular ex-Yankee. Acquired in mid-season, Mark was a big factor in winning the pennant for Grimm, who had replaced Hornsby as manager on August 2. Koenig was voted a half share of the World's Series prize money and Hornsby didn't get a nickel.

'For such bench jockeys as Art Fletcher, the Yankees' coach; Sam Byrd and Ben Chapman, this was all the ammunition they needed,' chuckled McCarthy. They poured it on every inning. That Fletcher could put a burr under the hide of an elephant. He was at his best in the 1936 Series against the Giants when he got on Bill Terry for not joining the Players' Association.

'I enjoyed myself in the 1932 Series because our club was hitting. Even if it hadn't been hitting, Gehrig himself would have carried the attack. The third game was the crucial one for us. If the Cubs had won it, they probably would have tied the Series and we would have had to go back to New York to wind it up.

'As a manager, I had one big move to make in the Series and it came in the third game ... but to give you the background, we had four starting pitchers, Ruffing, Allen, Gomez and George Pipgras.

'It was at the bottom of the Depression but Commissioner Landis wouldn't allow tickets to be sold in singles, even at the Stadium; it was buy a strip of three or go home.

'It rained all morning and into the afternoon of the first game in New York, and the Series opened with a poor crowd, 41,459. Most fans didn't think there would be a game. In fact, the rain was so heavy that Gehrig, living in New Rochelle, didn't arrive at the Stadium until five minutes before game time.

'Missing batting practice never bothered him. He started out with a home run and a single and scored three runs as Ruffing went all the way for a 12 to 6 victory.

'Gehrig had three hits, scored two runs and drove in a third the next day as Gomez won, 5 to 2. Then we moved to Chicago.

'The third game was anybody's game until the last out. We had two relief pitchers, Herb Pennock and Wilcy Moore. Pipgras started the third game and pitched through the ninth, when Pennock came through in glorious style. We started with three runs in the first on Earle Combs' single, a walk to Joe Sewell and Ruth's home run. Gehrig homered in the third but the Cubs finally tied it up in the fourth.

Blow Silenced Cubs

'Now came the fifth inning, the one when Ruth called his shot. He was arguing with the Chicago bench at the time. Ruth's shot into the center field bleachers silenced the Cubs. When Gehrig followed with another homer into the right field bleachers, it was a worse shock to them. But they were fighters.

'The wind was blowing to right when Koenig appeared as a pinch hitter in the ninth inning for Lyle Tinning, a Chicago pitcher. Koenig was a switch hitter. I didn't want him to bat lefthanded against Pipgras for I was afraid that he'd pull the ball into the seats.

'That was why I brought in Pennock, a lefthanded pitcher. Koenig would have to switch, and he wasn't as dangerous as a righthanded batter who had to hit against the wind into left field. Grimm must have reasoned along with me, for he withdrew Koenig and sent up Rollie Hemsley. Pennock struck him out.

'The only person who asked me why I made that move was Bob Connery, the Yankee scout. It was the key one for us. The Cubs came back the next day and knocked out Allen in the first inning. Wilcy Moore pitched strong relief ball and we came back to tie the score at 5 to 5 going into the seventh.

'The Yankees got four runs in that inning and four in the ninth to win, 13 to 6. It was one of the great days in Yankee history. Ruth was held to one hit, Gehrig to a double and a single but it was a big day for Tony Lazzeri, Combs, Dickey and Sewell. Tony had two home runs and a single, Combs a homer, two singles and scored four runs. Dickey and Sewell each had three hits.

'That was the Series, above all the others, that gave me the big thrill.' "

-Cy Kritzer, Buffalo, N.Y. (The Sporting News, 1956)

1956 Yankee of the Past: Lefty Gomez

"Lefty Gomez, the Yankees' great lefty of the '30s, owes much of his popularity to his ability to tell a good story on himself.

Like the time he went in to pitch with a runner on first, and with his windup, the runner stole second. McCarthy warned the rookie to watch the runner. Gomez wound up again and the runner stole third. Again the conference, again the windup, and the runner was safe with a theft of home.

'And that was the longest windup in history,' Gomez confesses. 'I wound up in St. Paul.' "

-John Mooney, Salt Lake City Tribune (Baseball Digest, May 1956)

THERE'S NO PURE POWER PITCHER NOW

Gomez Last To Get By With Only Fast Ball

"On the Yankees' train from Boston to New York this spring, the talk ran to pitchers, mostly because the radio finally beat the static and was telling about the tough luck defeat of Cleveland's Herb Score.

'That makes two he loses 1-0 and the season ain't two weeks old yet,' said Yogi Berra. 'The kid is snakebit.'

Casey Stengel said, 'I don't wish the fellow any more tough luck but if he has any I hope it's against us. He's hard to lick.'

Bill Dickey said, 'Score is like all great pitchers in one respect. The best you can get from them is a run here and there, sometimes none at all. What I mean is that you never get a big inning.'

'Hank Greenberg says Score is a ringer for Lefty Grove,' Hank Bauer said.

'No,' Dickey said. 'A little bit like Grove but no ringer for him. Got that full, wide delivery but doesn't blow you down like Grove did. Score is best when he's curving you.'

'Score showed me a pretty good fast ball,' Irv Noren said.

'Sure he's got a fast ball,' Dickey said, 'but he's no Grove or even a Feller.'

Whitey Ford said, 'Whattaya mean, Bill, when you say Score is not even a Feller with his fast one? You don't mean Feller wasn't as fast as Grove?'

Dickey said, 'That's right. That's just what I mean. I get tired hearing about Feller being the fastest in his time, but he wouldn't have been the fastest thing since Walter Johnson. Feller was the fastest in his time, but he wouldn't have been the fastest in Grove's time.'

'Maybe you were more impressed with Grove because he was a left-handed pitcher and you were a left-handed batter,' a baseball writer suggested to Dickey.

'Listen, I'm not talking about I hit against Grove,' Dickey said. 'What I'm talking about is how fast his ball used to come in there compared to Feller's.

'I'm not talking about the viewpoint of a man with a bat on his shoulder,' Dickey continued. 'I'm talking about as their batterymate. I'm the only man who ever caught both Grove and Feller in All-Star Games and that's why I say Grove was faster.'

'They were both power pitchers, Bill,' said Jim Turner, the Yankee pitching coach. 'There's nobody around like that anymore. Nobody who can blow you down for nine innings.'

'Sometimes Mr. Mack would use Grove for relief,' Dickey said, 'and there was no sense going up to the plate. When he knew that he only had to pound that ball in there for a couple of innings, you could hear more of it than you could see.

'Our guy Larsen is winning because he gave up trying to blow the ball past everybody and worked on his change-up,' Turner said.

'That's right,' Dickey said, 'and you should know because you kept screaming at him to stop being so proud and mule-headed about his fast one.'

Turner said, 'Look at the other pitchers who win in our league and none of 'em tries to overpower you. Pierce has got a good fast ball, but he gets you out on his change-up. Whitey Ford wins with good junk.'

Casey Stengel said, 'Look at them Cleveland fellers. That Lemon can throw that ball hard but he just keeps putting it around your knees and dares you to hit it.'

'Early Wynn mixes 'em up the best,' Turner said. 'He's got that fast ball, everybody knows, but he just uses it like a gun at your head to keep you respectful. Mostly he's just curving that ball up there or giving you his knuckler. He works around the plate like a guy doing hemstitching and never gives you anything much good to hit at.'

'The last pitcher I saw who could get by only with a fast ball was Gomez,' Dickey said. 'He didn't have any curve, never did develop one. He would just keep pumping that fast one.

'Gomez was a big winner because his fast ball was alive. He always aimed at the heart of the plate and never got one over the middle, because the thing would sort of snap, crackle, pop like the loose end of a live wire. So he missed the middle and kept hitting the corners, which made him a great pitcher and he should be in the Hall of Fame.' "

-Shirley Povich, Washington Post (Baseball Digest, July 1956)

STRUCK OUT AGAIN

"Lefty Gomez, a great pitcher but a big out as a hitter when he was in the baseball headlines, has a 13-year-old son, Gary, who is a pitcher-outfielder for Durham (Conn.) High School. The youngster affects an open stance at the plate. Lefty tried to change Gary's batting style to help him pull the ball. 'But Pop, I've read your clippings,' the youngster protested."

-Max Kase, New York Journal-American (Baseball Digest, August 1956)

HALF PAST - THEN THE ALARM SOUNDED

"During an Old Timers' Day a while back those two pitching stalwarts of yesteryear, Lefty Gomez and Red Ruffing, became embroiled in a violent but good-natured argument.

'My homer was longer,' Ruffing kept insisting.

'You're crazy,' said Gomez. 'Mine was the longest ever hit anywhere.'

The odd part about this conversation was that they weren't disputing home run balls they'd hit but home run balls they'd thrown. Ruffing's candidate was some obscure chap- his name was too unimportant to stick in memory- who lingered in the big leagues only long enough to hit one titanic homer off Ruffing before disappearing.

'That's kid stuff,' sneered Lefty. 'Let me show you what Jimmie Foxx did to me. See that corner of the upper left field stands alongside the bullpen? Old Double-X broke seats up there on a ball I pitched to him. I climbed up there the next day to see the damage and the trip was so long it exhausted me. About three rows down from the top and in the farthest corner- well, that's where he hit it. It must be at least 450 feet from the plate and the ball was still rising when it smashed the seats.'

Lefty shook his head wonderingly.

'It was a good pitch, too,' he said. 'I got it half past him. But, oh, brother, what he did with the second half!' "

-Arthur Daley, New York Times (Baseball Digest, August 1956)

LEFT SPEECHLESS

"Lefty Gomez, the only pitcher ever to win three All-Star Games (1933-35-37) and who perpetuated his mastery over National League teams by winning six World Series games and never getting beat, worked his last big league game for Washington. That was in 1943 when the Senators were beginning to take on a strong Latin-American flavor. He went to Washington from the Boston Braves on waivers, pitched one game and lost it.

That was all for Lefty and, although he was part Castilian himself, he hung up his spikes. 'I was under a handicap at Washington,' he said. 'I could only speak English.' "

-John P. Carmichael, Chicago Daily News (Baseball Digest, September 1956)

ONE LEFTY STILL HASN'T ANSWERED

"Lefty Gomez, the star Yankee pitcher of years gone by, remembers a long ago day- before umpires were scrupulous about enforcing the 'quickie pitch' rule- when he was inspired with a sure-fire plan to handle Hank Greenberg if the slugger came to bat with men on base.

'When I get two strikes on Greenberg,' Gomez confided to Catcher Bill Dickey, 'you walk half way to the mound and I'll walk half way in. We'll turn back, count to eight, and just as you get past the plate and I get to the mound, I'll fire a pitch. Greenberg won't know what hit him.'

Dickey suggested that Gomez detail the idea to Joe McCarthy, then manager of the New Yorkers. McCarthy listened patiently, then told Gomez: 'That's fine, Lefty, just fine. But there is one thing you overlooked. How are you going to get two strikes on Greenberg in the first place?' "

-David Condon, Chicago Tribune (Baseball Digest, October 1956)