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)
No comments:
Post a Comment