stevens on sports
Athletics are on the move
Major league baseball is past the one-third mark for this season and it looks like a year of surprises. The National League, which has been the league of hot contenders, has a 17½ game spread from league leading Cincinnati down to those lovable but losable Mets.
The American League is another situation. New York, the powerhouse for many years, has bounced up the ladder two places from their basement finish a year ago. Baltimore, who surprised everybody last year with their pennant, is trailing off in the second division and Chicago leads the pack with a comfortable three-game lead.
But one team that keeps on winning is the Kansas City Athletics. This year they are aided by their albino kangaroo leather shoes. The kangarooos, three in number, that Charles Finley promised to use as this year's mascot, have not arrived yet. it seems one of them caught a cold, so they are still recuperating in Australia.
The Athletics are on the road to victory again. They hit a cold spell about two weeks ago but the rains last week have washed it out of them.
Saturday they played a nine hour, five minute doubleheader to break their old record for the longest American League doubleheader with Detroit. Although they dropped the first game they came back to take the nightcap in the nineteenth inning. To top that they beat Detroit, the number two club in the league Sunday also.
The A's have placed themselves solidly in the first division. Yes, that was the Kansas
City Athletics, the team that during the 50's held eighth place down. When they added two more teams it meant the Athletics could drop two more places in the standing.
Part of the winning spirit must be accredited to Manager Alvin Dark. His ingenuity and at times his gambling have done much for the club. Sunday he held an 8-4 lead with the bases loaded in the ninth. Catfish Hunter had gone the distance, with only one more out to insure his victory.
Dark brought in a left-hander from the bull pen to pitch to a left-handed batter. But to leave Hunter in a position to pitch to Al Kaline, who was in the on deck circle, if it became necessary; Dark put Hunter on first base.
Hunter never had to go gack to the mound as the relief pitcher retired the side. But this is just one example how Dark manages to keep the A's winning.
Another spark of life has been brought to Kansas City by its rookies. The most outstanding is Rick Monday, for whom the female fans have started a fan club.
But there are others who keep the team churning. Kansas City is a young ball team—a ball team that is alive. It may be a few years before they take a pennant, but they are threats even to league leading Chicago.
No longer can a first division team fly in to Kansas City just to fatten their records. Kansas City can and has beaten every team in the American League regularly. If the next 100 games go like the first 60, the Athletics may have their first berth in the top division since coming to Kansas City.
Clay goes to trial
HOUSTON — (UPI)— Cassius Clay, the deposed world heavy-weight boxing champion who contends he is a Black Muslim minister and exempt from the draft, went on trial Monday on a charge of refusing to be inducted into the Army.
The prosecution does not have to prove Clay is not a minister. But the defense must prove he is.
Hayden Covington of New York, Clay's chief defense lawyer, said he expects the trial to be finished some time today.
U. S. DIST. Atty. Morton Susman said it would take him about two hours to present his case—that Clay on April 28 refused to take the symbolic step forward and be inducted.
Clay, 25. was stripped of his World Boxing Association (WBA) title when he refused to take that step.
"This is a run of the mill case actually," said Carl Walker Jr., assistant U.S. district attorney.
"The only thing a jury has to
decide is whether he (Clay) refused to submit to induction knowingly. The jury should be elected in about 45 minutes."
A PANEL OF 150 veniremen was available for jury selection.
A federal grand jury indicted Clay May 8 on a charge of refusing induction. He has been free on $10,000 bond.
If U.S. Dist. Judge Joe Ingraham decides the Louisville, Ky., draft board was right in reclassifying Clay 1A, the trial will go to a jury.
Victorious in all his 28 professional boxing matches, Clay has been unable to win one court fight to be reclassified on the ground he is a Black Muslim minister.
Kansas' Jim Ryun coated across the finish line with a 4:03.5 minute mile Saturday night to capture the championship in this year's National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Track Championship.
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But the show went to the Southern California 440-relay team. The Trojan quartet shattered the world record with an incredible 38.6 clocking.
It was the highest point total recorded in an NCAA meet since 1939 when USC compiled 85 points.
THE PERFORMANCE broke the listed record by one full second and clipped four-tenths of a second off the pending mark set several days ago by this same team of Earl McCullouch, Fred Kuller, O. J. Simpson and Lennox Miller.
USC, WHICH has won more than half the 46 NCAA championships, coasted to victory as it racked up 86 points. Oregon was second with 40 points.
The next stop for the collegiate trackmen is the national AAU championships this Thursday and Friday at Bakersfield, Calif.
Two California high school milers, who finished one-two in their recent state championship meet, plan to attend KU.
KU signs
4:03.5 minutes
Jayhawk Track Coach Bob Timmons announced Thursday that California champion Mike Solomon of Westminster and runnerup Thorn Bigley of Clairemont have signed letters of intent to attend KU.
Ryun snags mile win
pedwin YOUNG IDEAS IN SHOES
YOUNG IDEAS IN SHOES
MAHARAJAH SANDAL
S6
Made in India of genuine water buffalo
Nebraska's Charlie Green tied the world 100-yard dash record.
All of this took place at Brigham Young Stadium in Provo, Utah, with the festivities coming to a close Saturday night. Southern California came through with the team championship.
BIG. RANDY Matson won the collegiate discus title earlier Saturday night, scoring his second double victory in two years. Matson, who defended his shot put championship Friday night with a meet-record heave of 68-94%, spun the discus 190-4 to win the title.
Matson, the Texas A&M giant,
has a shot put heave of 71-5 $ _{1/2} $ pending for a world record. His winning efforts last year were $ 67_{1/2} $ and 197-0. His best discus
throw on record is 213-9.
Matson said he would give up the discus next year to concentrate on the shot out. He said he was satisfied with his discus throw, but that there was "too much good competition."
He said the weather in Provo was a bit too cool for a top shot put effort.
Ryun hung back until the final 220 yards, then burst to the front and loped across ahead of Roscoe Divine of Oregon who was second in 4:06.2.
DISCUS FINAL—1. Randy Matson, Texas A&M, 190-4. 2. Gary Carlen, Southern California, 186-4. 3. Bill Staley, Utah State, 185-2. 4. John Morton, Florida, 181. 5.
Arthur Swarts, South Carolina, 180-8. 6, Kirk Wassell, UCLA, 179-6.
440 RELAY FINAL—1, Southern C. (McCullough, Kuller, Simpson, Miller), 38.6, (world record, old record 39.6 by Southern University—Southern California has 39.0 mark pending). 2, Tennessee, 40.3. 3, Rice, 40.5. 4, Ohio U. 40.7. 5, Washington, 41.0. 6, Maryland, 41.2.
440 H U R D L E S FINAL—1,
Bob Steele, Michigan State, 50.2.
2, Andy Bell, American, 50.7. 3,
Geoff Vanderstock, Southern California,
50.7. 4, Scott Hagar, Florida,
50.7. 5, Carl Le Mon, Western
Michigan, 50.9. 6, Jon Reimer,
Iowa, 51.1.
MILE FINAL — 1, Jim Ryun,
Kansas, 4:03.5. 2, Roscoe Divine,
Oregon, 4:06.2. 3, Sam Bair, Kent
State, 4:06.7. 4, Larry Wieczorc,
Iowa, 4:07.5. 5, Dave Wilborn,
Oregon, 4:07.9. 6, Dave Roberts,
Washington, 4:07.9.
Summer Kansan Tuesday, June 20,1967
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