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Summer Session Kaasan
Tuesday, July 17, 1962
By Steve Clark
The "Grand Old Man of Baseball," Stan (The Man) Musial is fat from washed up.
This year the aging veteran (42 years old) is burning up the National League just as he has in past years. He is presently hitting 333, fourth among the league's top hitters.
MUSIAL PROVED his worth in the recent All-Star game (his 19th) by igniting a two-run rally in the sixth inning. Musial's selection to the All-Star squad the past couple of years has been more of an honorary one since his performances have been sub-par (for Musial that is).
This year Musial should have been chosen to the first team, but the players apparently felt otherwise. If there was to be a second ballot, the National Leaguers probably would like to see his bat in the lineup for three or more innings (the distance in which starters must go).
When Musial broke into the major leagues, the so-called batting experts said he would never make it. When Musial steps to the plate he looks like a scared little boy playing peek-a-boo. He crouches considerably and his elbows are closer to the body than experts say they should be.
THIS DID not bother Musial any more than it bothered bumble bees when aeronautical engineers said they shouldn't be able to fly since their weight is not proportioned right.
Again those experts said Musial was through three years ago, but Stan the Man wanted to play more baseball so he started on a parttime basis, about 75-100 games a year, resting every third or fourth day and playing only one game of doubleheaders. Now his bat is so valuable, that manager Johnny Keane has him in the lineup every day possible.
President John Kennedy summed up the Musial story when the two first met at Milwaukee in the summer of 1960.
KENNEDY TOLD Musial, "They tell me you're too old to play ball and I'm too young to run for the presidency. I have a hunch we'll fool 'em."
The Cardinal slugger is a sure bet for Hall of Fame honors and Cooperstown is just waiting for him to retire. It couldn't happen to a better ball player.
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Ty Cobb used to be criticized because of the way he held his bat. The ex-Detroit Hall-of-Famer would spread his hands about six inches apart.
"YOU CAN'T get any power that way." the critics would say.
Cobb explained that a run via the single route counted as much as a home run. Cobb did not need the home run and probably would not have enjoyed it even if he was a power hitter.
Cobb loved to run the base paths. One could be sure that once the Georgia Peach got on first base with a single that he would cross home plate.
COBB WAS a sure bet to steal second and third. He was merciess on the base paths and would slide in with honed spikes high.
Today's power hitters attract the crowd but there's nothing more valuable to a team than a good singles man who can run the bases.
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Maury Wills, shortstop for the Los Angeles Dodgers, is following in Cobb's footsteps as a base-stealer. Already he has accumulated 46 thefts and his name is on every catcher's wanted list. The 160-pounder chalked up two in the All-Star game.
ON ONE PLAY he had American League left fielder Rocky Colavito in a quandary. Wills arrived at second base on a single and Colavito figured he was there to stay, so he fired the ball to second base. Wills had other plans and started for third where he arrived standing up.
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The National League seems to have the American's number in the All-Star games and will be trying to continue their mastery later this month in Chicago. The senior loop holds a 6-1 edge in the last seven games and shows no sign of slacking up.
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Arnold Palmer endeared himself to British golfing fans last week when he won his second straight British Open Golf Championship.
This time, he not only won the tournament, but shot the lowest score in the tournament's 102-year-old history. Palmer shot 276 for the 72-hole grand.
PALMER IS definitely in the same class with Walter Hagan, who won the Open four times, and Bobby Jones, the half-century's most outstanding male golfer who won the British tournament three times.
Consistency is the mark of a good golfer. Before a golfer can be compared with the Hagans and the Joneses he must prove himself as a winner. Palmer is the only golfer today who has done this.
There are always flashes in the pan who pop up, win one major tournament and disappear into obscurity. Jack Fleck is a good example. There are others like Dow Finsterwald, who place in the money, at every tournament, but seldom win the big money.
Palmer, though, has proved his ability to be a consistent winner. Before he's through he's liable to make folks forget Hagan, Jones, Sam Snead and Ben Hogan.
'Weeping Greek' Misses His Girl Babe,' But Retains Fond Memories
By Oscar Fraley UPI Sports Writer
Life has been a series of dull towns and lonely hotels for Big George Zaharias since the Babe went away.
Big George, who was billed in his wrestling days as "The Weeping Greek from Cripple Creek." never was as contented as when he lived joyously in the shadow of Babe Didriksen. But it all turned sour when the Babe died in 1956.
"IVE GOT to take the old days," says Big George in his deep rumbling voice. "They were the best."
He was one of the good ones, the "Weeping Greek," when he was hurling his 225 pounds around the ring in the gruelling theatrics of his trade. Big George worked at it from 1027 through 20 bruising years and he met and knew them all.
"But," he added in his slow, easy manner, "guys like Strangler Lewis, Jim Londos and Ray Stecker could beat anybody on earth today."
"UNDERSTAND. I'm not knocking these guys today," he urged as he settled his current 330 pounds into a protesting arm chair. "They're really great.
HE WAS MIDWAY in his mat career when he was paired with the Babe in a Los Angeles golf tournament in 1938, shortly after she had taken to golf seriously.
"She was my girl, right then and there," he remembers dolefully. "She said to me, 'What are you lookin' at?' I grinned at her and said 'You, cause you're my kind of girl. How about dinner?' She looked me over and said okay. She was my girl from then on."
They were quite a pair, the wiry, tom-boyish Babe who was quick to speak, and the slow, ambling and amiable behemoth. She reached the golfing peak as he faded from the limelight and Big George was perfectly content to bask in her reflected glory.
THERE WAS a lot of it, too. The Babe was the first Yank to win the British Amateur, in 1947, and she turned professional after that and proceeded to mop up. She won two U.S. Open crowns and, when they bought a golf course in Florida, the world was their personal oyster.
But then the Babe had a cancer operation in 1953 and it was thought she had beaten the rap when she came back to take the Open again in 1954. The axe started to fall when she was advised she had it again late in 1955.
"Well," she told Big George, "that's the rub of the green."
IT ENDED for them in September of 1956 in a hospital in Galveston, Tex.
"She looked up at me and said
BUSINESS MACHINES CO.
Portable typewriters $49.50 up.
'Hold me like you used to honey,'" Big George remembers. "That was it."
Mimeographing and Ditto work.
Cleaning and repairing for all kinds office equipment. PRINTING by offset.
912 Mass.
VI 3-0151
the old days.
If you know him, it's easy to understand just why.
There have been ups and downs for him since then. But nothing filled the void and at the moment the memories are leading him into an attempt to buy the Professional Golf Association course at Dunedin, Fla., when that group moves to West Palm Beach. Waiting it out, Big George has that telling comment.
"Ive got to take the old days."
GRANADA
NOW SHOWING!
Ends Tonight
Walt Disney's
"BON VOYAGE"
Starts Wednesday
Jeff Chandler
in "MERILL'S
MARAUDERS"
A True Story
Arvid Shulenberger will read selections of Robert Browning
Poetry Hour
4. 00 p.m.
Thursday, July 19
Browsing Room - Kansas Union
Refreshments Will Be Served